boognish

My 3 AI Hydras (non-hd) are hung with 18" AI EXT rails. I want 12" for better overlap and less par in the ends of my tank. They are pretty much discontinued and stores that still carry them seem to have all lengths other than 12".

I am getting params back in order and need more coral to get nutrient consumption/needs up before starting a new program. I am looking for larger colonies or frags of cheaper and hardier sps, zoas, and palys. If you have large colonies of Birdsnest, common zoas, etc, let me know. Again - colonies or large frags preferred. I'll even take some 'trash palys' if they are on their own little isolatable island.

Bump - $55 - Need it gone.

For sale - One Sherman Rose Bubble Tip Anemone. Approximately 4" - 6". Split about 6 months ago and this guy finally wandered to some glass where I could catch him. Its in an open tupperware in the tank with eggrate on top waiting to go to it's new home. $60 OBO - Open to trades for coral.

A couple days before breaking down the tank for repair, I took video of everything in case livestock didn't make it through the ordeal and to have a record of the aquscape and where everything was. When I took that off of the GoPro, I found video form before "The Great SPS Die-Off". I miss the colorful branches and am currently hunting to restock it all. What I ended up with was way too much footage to choose from so it's a long video. I don't expect many to make it all the way through, but somewhere around 8 minutes, I do go into the tank and chase fish around for a while and find some blue zoas I thought I had lost doing great behind some rocks. I may need to remove the audio track because I received a warning that it's copyrighted and the video is blocked in some countries. Watch it at YouTube in HD if you have the bandwidth. And if you have any of the sps you see in the first half video that you can frag, PM me!

I think this aquascape is finally ready for those colonies you're so graciously offering up, @JeeperTy! Or did I read too much into that? The 175 has been back up and running for three weeks, now. So far, my support repair has held, the seems are not leaking, and I only had two casualties: An unknown tiny sps colony and my pinkbar goby. I'm not sure why the pinkbar died 2 weeks after going back in, but I suspect stress since every other fish seems to be fine so far. My two rose bubbletips found new places and are bubbling up for the first time since I got the original a couple years ago. My rock barrier has kept "Big Bertha" the clam in place. Ordinarily, it would be against the front glass by now. The barrier created a pretty cool sandbed area and some low rocks that are prime real-estate for zoas. Right now, I'm just using the area as a temp holding spot until I figure out where everything should go. This weekend, I took out the 3x400w MHs and installed 3x AI Hydra 52s and got the canopy back on it's lift arms. The Hydra52s will be 11.5" off the surface in the water, but the canopy is currently in its upper position, so they are presently about 2" off the surface. After all the stories of people burning their coral, I wanted to make sure my light cycle and photoperiod programming was right before lowering it. This coral has been in a holding tank for a month while I did the repair, so they need a slower acclimation. I am amazed at the color these lights can bring out of what I thought was boring old, faded coral! I'll be lowering the canopy tomorrow, fine-tuning the color frequencies and levels this week, and hopefully getting some better pictures. There's a big window right behind the tank, so daytime shots are pretty much impossible. Once I get the colors where I like them, I can post the Apex programming and levels for anyone interested.

Sleep? What is that? If only everything was completely moved back into the 175, she would be ecstatic. Between pee-wee hockey tournaments in College Station, an Olympic hopeful, scholarship-hunting daughter at swim meets in Bee Caves, work, and now... (for some reason it decides to rain in Austin) my lawn and garden are going nuts... who has time for sleep? I have been working on the tank after hours (10 - 3am-ish). Good news is, no leaks, and I finished re-aqua-scaping tonight and I am finally ready to move all of the frags and colonies back in. My clam has grown so much and ALWAYS works it's way up against the front glass, so I had to sacrifice some sand-bed and build a rock barrier to keep it back. I'm sure the scaping will change as I put the nems, frags, and colonies back in tomorrow night, but so far I like what has developed. Here's an unfocused and blown out pic of tonight's progress. Once frags, nems, etc are in and the temporary system is moved out of the living room, I can start to re-doing all electrical, controllers, etc. and set up my new light system. I am switching from MH to LEDs, but that's entirely a different subject and post...

I started the transfer back into the 175 tonight. A late start combined with two broken rock pillars that needed to be rebuilt and 4 NHL 1st round, game-2 playoff games means I'll be up all night. I underestimated the amount of new saltwater I would need, so I'm in limbo. Right now, my 2 Black Ocellaris, 2 large RBTAs, 3 pajama cardinals, and target mandarin are still in the 25 long tank with all the coral and only 2 Koralia Nanos. Big Bertha (my giant 1' x 1.5' Derasa), Dejardinis Tang, Hippo Tang, Melanurus Wrasse, and Pinkbar Blenny are in the 175, with an mp40 and Tunze Turbelle. I am currently posting this to get away from watching my RO/DI make water. I'm pretty sure I only slow it down. I just need about 3 to 5 gallons to be able to get the flow going and get a couple hours of sleep before my daughter's swim meet... 75 gallons-per-day suddenly seems slower than it ever was before.

Thanks for the offer, Reburn, but I have 4 tubes of RTV 103. Considering my work, family, hockey, and coaching schedule, I knew this would take a while, so I took the time set up a pretty elaborate temporary setup that will hopefully keep everything alive and happy long enough. I've done the inside of both overflows, which proved to be no simple undertaking in such cramped space. I used the caulk gun tubes, but recommend small tubes for easier application inside overflows. The rest of the tank is stripped of the old and ready for new silicone tomorrow. The silicone should have plenty of time to set while I set up the fix for the broken trim supports and figure out how to hang my new light system in the canopy.

14 Years this May 26th! So it looks like you could be slightly ahead of schedule. Mine averages out to ~16 a year, but as your relationship grows, you learn ways to earn some credits back.

All livestock and rock is on the life support system. Tank and sump are empty, the glass is scraped clean of coralline, and sandbed is in an old 55 gallon with saltwater and a koralia to prevent die-off which would cause a cycle when it goes back in. The life support system (AKA divorce evidence item against me #223) I have stripped the silicone off of the inside of the overflows and will tape and apply new silicone to them tonight. FYI, buy a lot of razor blades and wear gloves. They dull quickly and break. They hurt when they cut you, and when you forget about the cuts and clean the glass with Acetone, it hurts more... Tomorrow, I will start stripping all other silicone from the tank and hopefully have it all resealed and start the brace repair this weekend and allow the silicone a couple days to cure. I've been researching silicones. There are so many threads on the innerwebs that contradict which are safe, which are not safe, and which are sorta safe. I gave up on all the pros (who must have stayed at Holiday Inn last night) and just read the MSDS on as many as I could. Essentially, here's what I found. Silicone2 is NOT safe at all. Don't even consider it. Silicone1 (GM or Dow available at Lowes, Home Depot, etc) used to be safe to use as long as it was not labeled 'Mildew Resistant'. This was usually the 'Doors and Windows' as opposed to the 'Bathroom and Sink'. However, they are now adding Petrolium Distillates to both in addition to the mildewcides. I never found exactly what the Petrolium distillates do, but I did read it could prevent mildew as well. My research eventually lead me to Momentive RTV103/108. 103 is black, 108 is clear. It contains only methyltriacetoxysilane and octamethylcyclotetrasiloxane in proportions that somehow form a bond significantly stronger (60%?) than store bought silicones. I read that many tank manufacturers use it and the MSDS sheets say it is FDA and USDS certified as NSF safe for food contact. It is considerably more expensive than the others, but in my case well worth it for strength and safety. The only place I found it in town was Grainger and they had to order it for next-day delivery from Dallas.

Well, my temporary 'stop-gap' fix for the failed top supports in April 2013 ended up not being as temporary as I planned. Here's a link to the post with my 'temporary' fix for broken top supports. Last week, I noticed that I was going through more top-off than usual. There was no water in the garage where my bulkheads, pump and chiller are, so I inspected under the tank. Yup... there was water in the stand and occasional drips. I have a leak. The front left where the bowed glass meets the side has a pretty steady drip of water flowing down, welling up in the trim all the way around the tank, and flowing over into the stand underneath. I guess the 'fix' was ok for the back, but the broken supports were putting strain on the top front as well and allowing them to bow out and the seams to fail. After a day, I noticed the flow had slowed due to salt creep, so I got some super-glue gel and crammed it all around where the leaky seam was. I've reduce it to a gradual drip... for now... I think I may put a strap around the top to prevent catastrophic failure. If I hadn't of spent the better part of a year and good chunk of change building the custom stand and canopy, I would get a new, larger tank. Instead, I have decided to remove all rock, livestock, and substrate, then completely drain, reseal, and repair the tank. Although I am just getting SPS back in after an alk swing killed 90% of it, everything is doing great. Zoas and shrooms are spreading everywhere and not looking like frag plugs, and it's just finally looking more natural. And now I have to tear it down... I had to figure out a way to to provide front-to-back support on the top where the trim has failed. I decided to use two cables with brackets spanning from front to back with brackets hanging over each end. All stainless steel to prevent corrosion. So far, the only progress on this part are the brackets. To prevent them from slipping up over the edge, the cables will attach lower than the front lip causing it to pull in towards the tank. Both supports are broken at the back. I have set up a temporary system to house everything in. The 150 gallon tub should hold most of the livestock and rock pillars. Complete with a frag tank and 1/3 hp chiller beneath the top resevoir. Water flows from the big tub up to the black container where I'll have a skimmer and calcium reactor drip, overflows into the 20-long frag tank which will hopefully hold smaller frags and anemones/clowns, then back into the 150 gallon tub. The amazing part of this setup is I didn't have to cut one piece of PVC or hose and didn't have to buy buy a pump, valve, chiller, or anything. The bulkhead attached to the pump even has an outlet for my skimmer and a ball valve with a hose for circulation in the tub already set up. My wife is a bit upset because my hoarding ways have been validated. She's very pleased with the state of our living room right now, too. Thankfully, Ty is also a hoarder and has loaned me his old T5 setup and MH fixture and ballast. I have ~40 gallons of saltwater ready for the transfer. I should be doing the transfer now, but I am writing this update instead. Procrastinating... Maybe it will all fix itself while I'm up here. Maybe I'll wake up and it was all a bad dream. Anyone want to go get a beer? Once I start this, I don't think I'll be getting away until it's done.

Thanks for the offer on help - I may take you up on that when it comes time to implement the final fix. The pink sps is Pink Setosa. It is starting to encrust the rock I mounted it to, but I think it is a bit faded. It certainly glows under the MH and the T5s.

Update time... Seems like things are finally starting to grow, and most of the zoas are hanging in there, so I've started moving more coral from the old 75 gallon to the 175. The 75 had 150W MHs and 96W actinics. The 175 has 3x400W MHs. I took par measurements in both tanks and I'm trying to place things where the par is close the the same and acclimating them with a shortened light period. I just replaced the 400W MHs and allowed them to burn in for a week. I will re-check and compare PAR readings with the old and new bulbs. All pics were taken with Samsung Galaxy S3. This guy was a great grower in the 75, but only had blue tips. It still has fully extended polyps, so I'm hoping it colors up in the new tank. Now for the bad news... While I was off snowboarding, my neighbor called and informed me that my return pump was not on and that the tank was blowing bubbles. I suspected the pump in the saltwater mixing station was going bad and was the culprit for a tripped fuse in the garage. I had him unplug it and the return pump came right back on. The following day, my Brother in law checked the tank and called to tell me there was about 1/4 inch of water in the stand. (I made it water tight, so it wasn't on the floor). I assumed the wavebox pumped water up and it just overflowed the sump a bit. I spent a week getting the salinity back up (was down to 1.02-ish) since taopoff replaced the spillage. During the first water change when I got back, the tank level went way below the overflows and the sump quickly filled to the top when I cut off the return pump. I turned the flow back on and realized that the top supports had broken (heat maybe??). My bow-front is now a bow-front/back. The back had pulled away from the overflow's vertical side and water is just flowing in along the back to about 1/3 down. My heart sank. To avoid a complete blowout of the back of the tank, I implemented a stop-gap short term 'fix'. I went to Lowes and engineered a bolt system that I could place between the tank and the wall that I could slowly open wider and press the bow-back in a bit. I drained the water about 1/3 down, placed the bolts between a board against the wall and one along the trim at the top of the tank (dispersing the load), and opened up the bolts ... slooooowly... It brought the bow in and I am no longer worried about a blowout while I find the time and figure out a more permanent fix. I will be adding some of the reef epoxy I use to mount corals (cures in water) to temporarily seal up the vertical piece where it's leaking into the overflow. Once I find 2 or 3 full days where I can be at the house over a weekend, I will implement my long-term fix: move all coral from the top levels to the bottom drain the water and place an airstone and an extra powerheads use my bolt system to bring the 'bow-back' all the way straight and add support: option 1: find or fabricate a new top trim and supports option 2: create new front-to-back supports with cables that I can adjust like the back bolts I am using as a temp method option 3: eurobrace the back of the tank option 4: a combo of #3 and either #1 or #2 re-silicone the overflow vertical against the back Wait for silicon to cure and refill the tank, cross fingers, and remove the temporary fix. I am not looking forward to cutting flow for a 24-48 hours while silicon cures, but I don't think it is avoidable. If anyone has experience or input on any of the methods I'm considering, please feel free to chime in.

Good idea! We reef people have each others back! I got the exhaust fan moved to the garage and all hooked up. I tested it and it sure was nice to NOT HEAR A THING when the MHs kicked on. I am going to build a shelf for the fan in the garage and engineer some sort of light flap to prevent cool air from leaking out and warm air from leaking in when the fan is not in operation. I will be adding a stained and trimmed box to cover the end. It will open to the back and hide the duct and pump wires. I have a GREAT WAY to cushion the blow when she sees it this evening... I am heading down South Austin to buy some coral. "Look honey, I spent more $ on coral... Oh by the way, there is a 6.5" hole in the wall and all of our AC is being pushed out there."

My wife is out shooting cats and dogs. She loves her job. She is a photographer and volunteers with Humans Society Of Williamson County. Both our dogs and our cat lived there before we found them Today, she is shooting older dogs and cats with human models and in boxes for a campaign they are doing to help find permanent homes for them. What better time is there than that to cut 6.5" holes in the living room wall??!! I am cooling off after cutting the garage side, so I snapped a couple pics because I didn't want her to miss out on all the "What the !@#$ are you doing?"'s and the "We will never sell this house"'s. More pics once I get the exhaust fan set up in the garage and back onto the Apex control system. Maybe some of her reaction, too.

Thanks, Whiskeypete. The angle on mine is 165. I am not sure that you'll be able to use that exact angle. Your depth might be shorter since the thank is shorter and the bow is not as deep. If it scales exactly it'll work, but I'm not sure. I started by using the template I made of the tank and laying it across and tracing it onto the solid board and just eyeballing it then working out the exact angle from there. After that, I used the angle measurement to make sure the canopy matched. Good luck on your build - it was a fun undertaking for me. Tank Update The green algae on the marco rock is definitely going away. I am even starting to see specs of pink, red, and purple coralline starting in some spots. The back glass has some brown algae on it, but nothing a lawnmower or my Kole Tang can't take care of once he is added to the tank. I just need to catch him... The purple palys with red/orange skirts are going nuts. I started with 4 polyps 3 weeks ago and now there are about 8 -10 with several more about to show up. I moved a few more corals over from the 75 tonight: frogspawn, a rose/pink montipora, a green slimer frag, some more zoas, a tiny purple digi frag, and what used to be a pretty large colony of garf bonzai that never really took in my 75 and has been receding as of late. Hopefully the 400W MHs will make it happy. Tomorrow I'll frag my Purple Haze Monti and find a good spot for it. I am using these as test subjects before moving over all my other corals and my clam. I'll give em a week or two and if they are all as happy as the palys, zoas, and german blue digi that are in there, I'll move everything. If I can find the time, I am going to punch the 6" hole through the wall to vent the MHs to the garage. Right now, I have the 6" duct coming out of the canopy and going down to the fan on the floor in the living room. The wife LOVES it. The fan pulls a lot of warm air and isn't exactly quiet. Not to mention the attractive 7 feet of 6" silver duct hanging there. I had to re-repair the 29g biocube I got for a QT tank and it's workign fine now. I am still looking for any input you may have on which fish to get first. Any of you have the "I shouldn't have put that fish in first" stories? I want to start with the Kole since he is pretty docile and is a good algae grazer. After that, I'd like to add a couple at a time so they can QT together.

I have moved a couple small hearty frags (one german blue digi and a few Palys) over from my 75 gallon and they are doing great. I have many more that I want to move, but I have a pretty minimal photoperiod right now to combat the 'new tank' algae. I noticed the usual brown diatom algae appearing on the marco rocks about 3 weeks ago. I was hoping to avoid this by cycling that rock with all of the Fiji live rock as it cycled for a month and half, but no dice... the cleanup crew was happy it arrived and went to town on it immediately. A week later, that algae tuned to (or was replaced by) a bright green short surface algae. It has been there for almost 2 weeks and is still ONLY on the marco rocks, so I am assuming it is surviving on silicates since my PO4 tests nearly 0. This is not a picture from my tank, but exactly what I am seeing: I have the photoperiod reduced, I'm using Rowa-Phos in a phosban reactor, I've added extra snails and hermits, and my skimmer is going nuts with what appears to be algae by the color. I am hooking up my UV filter soon. I have to feed the clowns, so I am doing weekly changes of about 15 gallons. From what I'm reading, this is a normal tank cycle and I just need to be patient. I am pretty confident so far since it is only on the new/dead rock and not on any of the Fiji live rock or the established rock I got from Hydro. It sure stands out though in front of all that nice purple. I want to add some fish that may work on the algae and increase the bioload. I want to catch my Kole Tang and move him from my 75g, but he's pretty elusive and the rockwork and racks make it nearly impossible without tearing it apart. I'm open to recommendations as to which fish to add first. All that is in there right now are 2 juvenile (1.25") Black Ocellaris and a RBTA. They aren't hosting after 3 weeks in there with the anemone, so I am also hoping that adding some other fish will cause them to seek shelter/protection in the anemone. This past weekend, I repaired and set up a 29g BioCube as a QT with 75% water from a water change and 25% new water, so I'm ready to get some fish! If you have experience with which fish to add first, I'm listening! I am shooting for mostly SPS mixed reef, so only useful reef safe fish.