caferacermike

So about 4 months ago my RO/DI shutoff developed a leak, probably from hard water deposits, well needless to say one day I left the house and came home to a freshwater tnak. I lost everything, I mean everything. I don't have a pod alive in my tnak. I've been letting it sit clearing up all this time. I do need to rebuild and it's about time to get started. Until then, look for me giving away lots of stuff as I clean my garage. I have about 2 quarts each of the BRS mix yourself 2 part. I'd say that will make at least 4 gallons of solutions. My mixing and holding jugs are old and will be thrown away, you just need 2 1 gallon jugs to follow the recipe. The dry chemicals have "hardened" but as the directions say, they are still good, just need to chip it out of the containers. There is also a Magnesium supplement, Another 2 quarts. I'll even toss in 3 gallons of dry Kalkwasser powder (you will never be able to use it all, I promise) My guess is this is well over $100 worth of stuff. I really need you to get it today, the 18th as I am clearing out the garage for a new motorcycle that will be delivered here tomorrow morning.

Did the media canister get picked up? If not I would like a chance at it.

Whatever happened to CASH? I've never once over drafted an account, probably because I've never had a checking account. Nope I pay for everything with cash or I draw teller checks from my credit union if it needs to be mailed in. I use my credit card and paypal to pay bills online, or to make online purchases, and neither are tied to my accounts. That way they cannot sneak in and make a grab for my money. I send in a teller check once a month and pay off the credit card bill every month. Well I can say my methods have worked well for 20 years and I plan to make it work for another 40 or so. As long as they keep printing cash, that's the method I will prefer. I have a savings account with Austin Telco credit union and they've always treated me with respect, have never made an attempt to charge me for anything other than when I ask to print out more than 1 check per visit or when I asked to have records printed out (records were $1 a month to print and each check is $1). The small inconvenience to need to visit the CU once a week to print out a check to be mailed sure beats recurring $35 overdraft charges and possible impact of a negative credit report. Notice I did say "inconvenience". When you visit a grocery store the prices are cheaper than the corner store right? They call them "convenience stores", you pay for the convenience. The banks think you don't mind paying $35 for the convenience of using your debit card. The original poster made a comment about having 4 separate accounts and how he was outraged by the fees. I can relate to the feeling but at some point you need to man up and realize that dude you have 4 accounts at the same bank. I can understand why they would charge you maintenance fees for that many accounts. Simplify your life. You don't need that many accounts. You say that you and the Wife have an account together, does that mean that she also has several accounts somewhere else? As in, a total of 6-8 accounts to manage? I have 1 savings account to keep my liquid cash in and 1 401K that I divert 25% of my income into. That's it. My GF saw how I did it and decided that for whatever reason that she had 3 different banks wasn't working anymore, and switched everything to 1 USAA online account that offers free checking and a savings account. She can pull cash from an ATM for free and can also make deposits at any credit union free of charge. She no longer gets random charges and loves the "scan a check feature".

Wish list fulfilled.

I'm looking at building a couple of items and I'm looking for some of the canisters that you add on (or come built in) for the prefilters or for DI canisters. I'm also looking for a couple of the refillable inner cans that you fill with DI resin. Looking for very cheap. Can make nice SPS and LPS frags as trade.

Looks very similar to the Magnificent I had for a couple of years, except it looks in bad shape. It should be very purple and green. It needs to be nursed back and if you look around online you'll see that most folks agree that the Magnificent is about the most difficult anemone to keep. Mine lived several years until my tnak crashed. I wouldn't say it was any more difficult than the other anemones I've kept. It was a very high light anemone, in fact mine stayed at the water line and would spread out across the top of the water to get the most of my metal halides. I hope you have 250w halides or brighter.

Prof does.

Ha it was like watching pron load in 1995 on a dial up. OMG, is that a nipple? Oh, oh, oh,........****, no it's a freckle. That's a heck of a seat. Where is the neck brace? Shouldn't he have a little snap around foam neck brace thingy?

It's bad news. I killed an entire fully grown in 75g reef and 3 shrimp eating blue ribbon eels with ozone. It was supposed to clear up my hair algae problem. When I first introduced it to my skimmer it was great. My skimmate looked like used motor oil for several weeks. I moved about 4 months after starting the ozone. When I set the tnak back up, I decided to leave a few pieces out of service until the tnak looked perfect again. After about 3 weeks everything seemed to have done a great job of surviving so I turned the ozone on again. About an hour later I went to bed. In the morning my entire set up was dead. It was nasty. Nothing had changed that i know of. My fish all suffocated. They were all at the bottom of the tnak, the eels were literally tied in knots with broken spines from fighting death. Every single piece died. My dinner plate sized prized efflo, my magnificent anemones, the eels, everything. If I learned anything from that, it was that I should have bought the ORP meter with it. It senses when the ozone is safe to be on and when there is to much in the water.

Your main concern will not be the weight. Google search for this and there are a ton of stories of people with 50g+ tnaks that were broken somehow and then managed to do tens of thousands of dollars worth of damage to the apartments below.

Yeppers he is still around. It's a 3 day weekend so maybe he can whip something up for you. I know he had a couple of good size rectangles lying around that could be easily adapted.

Ok, and I answered it in a direct manner. I then added that what is pulled out, will be put back in. You are not the only person that reads this forum and thus an open ended question such as yours could cause a noob to unnecessarily fear that skimmers will cause harm to their tank. By addressing this, hopefully it can put those that could become worried an answer that can put them at ease.

They pull out both "bad" and "good" but keep in mind that through proper animal husbandry everything will be kept in balance. For instance if you are worried about pulling out a little good with a skimmer then by all accounts you wouldn't want to do water changes then right?

Pull them to high up and you won't be surface skimming. I like the water to fall at least 3/4"-1". I tend not to hear mine, probably because I've grown to ignore it. I've seen people use a very coarse black sponge media cut to the dimensions of their overflow and place it just under the weir teeth. This disrupts the flow of the water instead of a cascading waterfall. It will need to be checked often for cleanliness. If it gets grimy or covered, it may make your tnak overflow onto the floor.

Ah yes Tim but keep in mind as well that I have plenty of of old print how to set up and maintain a salt water aquarium books here at the house printed circa 1970-1985 that say the proper care and maintenance for corals is to have a "back up set" of corals soaking in a 10% bleach to water solution, so that when your display corals lose that bright white look and get covered in algae, you can then quickly swap them out for sparkling white ones. It's just I feel, and have read, that when skimmers and MH lamps were incorporated to the hobby, that the hobby jumped leaps and bounds into the future. As you said there were some successes before that, but not many and not enough to call it a hobby. Most people were keeping fish in a tank full of dead bleached out coral skeletons. I agree that as corals adapted to the domesticated life that things also got easier, but it was the proper lighting that kept them alive in the first place. I also agree that for the most part all of my corals in the beginning were wild caught. So non of my successes were due to adapted corals.

It's been since January that I unplugged my skimmer. I haven't done a water change in over a year. My tnak is fully stocked, my corals are growing so fast now I don't know what to do with them. And yes you've seen the pictures in the for sale threads. I also top off with untreated tap water. The thing is that I've had my tnak for at least 7 years now. I know it inside and out. We've been through it all together. I could spot a problem a week before it will actually happen. I wouldn't recommend my methods to anyone. It's just to dangerous to preach it. Keep in mind that my tnak is fully established and not newly set up. If you are starting out with a new tnak and don't have loads of experience than I say yes, buy a skimmer. It will make your life a lot easier and will help prevent issues. I believe 100% that skimmers and metal halide lamps are the 2 single reasons that people were able to domesticate this hobby. For about 4 decades prior folks dabbled in salt water. Corals were a huge no-no and even in the beginning it was strictly limited to softies. The mid 80's began to see significant changes and improvements. I think it is very important to set up a new tnak with the best equipment, best intentions, and the highest quality livestock possible. After it has been set up and stable for a few years you can begin to wean it off all the "extras". I'd say to make your life easier, and to have the best possible outcome, a large sump with a good skimmer and return pump and beginners basic equipment. Once you are proficient then you might dabble in "exotic" set ups to prove just how awesome you are. Might try a Jaubert Plenum, super deep sand bed method, exotic algae sumps, under gravel plenum system, etc... but prove to yourself that you can keep a basic known set up running and healthy before trying to simplify your tnak.

Yeah I sold that skimmer to Kyle with the 400g tnak. It worked awesome on the 75g. You remember the thread with the pictures.

If I recall correctly, it was 84"Lx36"Hx32"W Stand was about 24" tall. Canopy was about 16" tall.

Nobody mentioned Fazoli's? They have all you can eat breadsticks.

Robb is right. It has been said that taping pics of clown fish hosting can induce the real ones into hosting. It has been said that most all of our clowns have been tank bred and raised for so many years now that these F2, F3, F4 fish no longer understand, nor care about hosting.

You can generally call down to the permit offices and ask about your project. Don't give them any real information. Just say that you are interested in adding screens, don't tell them the address and such. They can tell you whether you need permits or not. If you give them your info and there is a disagreement then they now have your info to come and visit. They tend not to know what they are doing, ha professionals, so try and write down the person's name and the time you called and what the verdict was. I was about to buy a small shed for my property and the sales guy offered me the largest they make for a little more than the small one. I jumped on that. 24Lx14'W and 14'H. I measured out my property and knew it was big enough for the shed and should be good for codes. I called down to the office and we got to talking and I was asking about set backs from the house and fence line. I offered my address and the lady told me there was absolutely no way I could have that shed in my neighborhood, none of the yards would allow for it. We argued back and forth and when she finally listened to me saying that my yard was 50' from house to fence S-N and 100' from E-W you could just hear her voice crack. She told me she did not believe me. I went immediately to the office with my land survey and a to scale line drawing of the shed. They finally looked at it and said, well shoot we couldn't stop you from building 4 sheds on your property, $32 please. I'm actually glad I paid for the permit since a neighbor complained about a year later about the shed, not to me of course, no to the city. The city contacted me about the complaint and how I need to take the shed down, blah blah blah. The guy finally took a breath and I asked him why did I pay the city $32 so they could later on call and harass me? I got a pleasant "I'm sorry, I'll look into that". I received a formal letter from RR outlining the original protest and the city's response that I had all the proper permits and that the shed had been inspected and that they would not be proceeding any further.

Kyle I'm sorry to see you selling off that tank so soon after buying it from me. It also hurts to see you selling it so cheap. You are definitely taking a hit. Your prices are way to low. I paid double what you are asking for the tank and stand when I purchased it, $3,000, in fact I made payments on the thing until it was paid off before I brought it home. I paid a lot more for the skimmer. If you look on the Euroreef website the Eheim upgrade is your asking price. All of the Eheim pumps were brand new when I bought it and only ran for about 3 weeks. Euroreef told me in an email that to replace that skimmer, as is, would cost $6,500 plus freight shipping.

Sorry Robbs. Thought you said Tuesday night.

$SOLD$ Thanks Ban. I hope it works out in in your tnak.