BornToHula's 75 Gallon Tank Improvement Thread

[BornToHula]

This isn’t necessarily a build thread – more of an “I want to fix/improve my tank” thread.

I am new to reef tanks in general, but I have learned a lot since got my tank last May - my complete setup was originally purchased from a member here on ARC who was exiting the hobby.

The tank has worked great so far, but a few things are either breaking down or are not performing the way I think they should, so I decided to start a thread to both show off my tank some and also get some advice on getting the tank looking the way I want it.

Here is how the tank was a couple months ago, I'll be taking new pictures soon.

The Basics

It’s a standard 75g tank with a 20g-long sump.

3 48” Build My LEDs 12K & 14K spectrums and a Super Actinic

MP40 and MP10 powerheads

2 Tunze powerheads (not sure on the model)

Reef Octopus XS160 skimmer

BRS dual chamber reactor running GFO and Carbon

Tunze ATO system (currently not working)

Neptune Apex

BRS dosing pumps (still need to set these up)

Livestock

Pair of Clownfish

Blue Chromis

Kole Tang

Pink spotted watchman goby and pistol shrimp pair

Red Velvet Wrasse

Black Cap Basslet

2 peppermint shrimp

Fire shrimp

2 red bubble tip anemones

2 green bubble tip anemones

Maxima Clam

Corals

I need to start writing down the names of these when I buy them, I forget what almost all of these are called. Once I get the tank running how I want it, I’ll be adding lots more stuff.

Green Star Polyp

Various acro frags

Some bird’s nest (I think??)

Two types of acans

4 Different types of Zoas

Frog Spawn

Reverse Superman montipora

Shelf Montipora

Things that I need to work on (and what this thread will be about!)

· Cyano Bacteria has been a constant problem since I got the tank – I need to find the cause and correct it

· I had a large Nitrate spike recently and it hurt my anemones and SPS frags pretty bad – I need to find out what caused it and how to prevent it from happening again

· Green Star Polyp is taking over my tank

· I don’t believe the Reef Octopus skimmer is working as it should – I just got a Skimz SM161 that I will be setting up ASAP.

· Tunze ATO system has stopped working – pump will only fill tank for a split second, then starts pulsing on and off with no water being pumped through it. I need to find out what the problem is and see if I can replace the specific part. If not I will be buying a new ATO. I’m topping off the tank by hand in the meantime.

· Set up Bulk Reef Supply dosing pumps for Alk and Calc

· Look into replacing bulk reef supply dual chamber reactors. The GFO seems to always clump up after a week – even if I am tumbling it aggressively. Once the GFO is clumped up the flow reduces to near zero.

· I will be building a canopy – due to the two dogs I have, the living room (where the tank is) gets dusty. A canopy will eliminate the dust falling into the tank.

If I can get my tank looking half as good as some of the people's here at ARC I'll be happy, hopefully this thread can show the journey to getting it there.

[Juiceman]

Tunze is in town. Contact them and see if they can see what's wrong with the pump. They gave me a replacement for free.

Otherwise, you can purchase a replacement pump from them or Aquatek.

[BornToHula]

Tunze is in town. Contact them and see if they can see what's wrong with the pump. They gave me a replacement for free.

Otherwise, you can purchase a replacement pump from them or Aquatek.

Cool, I didn't know they were in town. I read somewhere you can test the pump with a 9 volt battery, I'm going to try that first to see the pump is the problem. If its something else I'll contact Tunze.

[+KimP]

Yeah those pumps don't last too long, especially if you tend to let your top off container run low before refilling and the pump sucks air. Mine just went out actually and I need to replace it. Lucky they aren't too expensive.

[BornToHula]

Yeah those pumps don't last too long, especially if you tend to let your top off container run low before refilling and the pump sucks air. Mine just went out actually and I need to replace it. Lucky they aren't too expensive.

That's exactly what happened, the top off container ran out and the pump was ran for a few hours during the night before I caught it.

In other news, I got this in today. Hopefully going to assemble it and put it in tonight.

[FarmerTy]

That's a fine looking skimmer!

[BornToHula]

Finally got the skimmer all hooked up and starting its break-in period. The instructions say it may take a few days before it starts skimming anything.

Also, I forgot to mention I have a couple of live rocks from Fishy Business in quarantine. While it was pricey, I am impressed with their live rock - no bad hitchhikers so far.

I will be replacing the circled rocks with the two rocks in quarantine. I'm just going to remove the rocks I crossed out.

[madsalt]

Good call on getting rid of the GSP rocks. I love the green but unless you want to babysit it a lot, i its not worth it.

You might be surprised how quickly a skimmer starts to work. When I put mine in it started working in less than a day, it was crazy.

[BornToHula]

Good call on getting rid of the GSP rocks. I love the green but unless you want to babysit it a lot, i its not worth it.

You might be surprised how quickly a skimmer starts to work. When I put mine in it started working in less than a day, it was crazy.

GSP is like the T-1000 Terminator, even after I scrub it off and think its dead, it comes back stronger than ever a few weeks later.

After I remove the rocks I marked above there are still two spots on other rocks that have a little GSP on them. Hopefully I can kill those off somehow, or at least stop its growth.

[FarmerTy]

The only true way to stop it then is liquid nitrogen... oh no, it melted and is reforming!

[madsalt]

Do you have a FTS shot with the new BMLs on it?

[BornToHula]

Do you have a FTS shot with the new BMLs on it?

Not yet, I'll take one tonight.

Do you have that pulley system for the BMLs set up in your canopy still? If so could you take a pic of it for me? I'm in the planing stages of building my canopy and want to implement something similar.

The only true way to stop it then is liquid nitrogen... oh no, it melted and is reforming!

Haha. Funnily enough I have seen people talking about burning it off or using lasers to try and kill it. Liquid nitrogen may just do the trick.

[BornToHula]

Well, yesterday I removed all the rocks with GSP and replaced them with the ones that were in quarantine. Unfortunately, this caused a few sections of the rock work to become unstable. I need to look into how to reinforce some sections before I accidentally hit them or something and they fall down. Maybe plastic rods and superglue on the back of the rocks?

In other news...

Skimmer is still breaking in, no foam or anything is being made yet.

Here is a FTS with the Build My LEDs installed (before the removal of all the GSP).

[jolt]

I have had good luck with EPO putty holding rocks together. You may need to tie wrap them together until the putty dries. Marco rocks sells that particular putty. I don't know how well other brands work.

[FarmerTy]

I'd also do the putty or just reaquascape with a more stable structure.

[BornToHula]

Thanks for the suggestions, I will try the putty.

[madsalt]

I like the BMLs, they give a nice uniform look across the entire tank.

[BornToHula]

Here is the change in the look of my tank after the removal of Green Start Polyp. As you can see algae and Cyano Bacteria are still big issues.

Before:

After:

Now that the GSP has been taken care of I am switching my focus to lowering Nitrate and Phosphate, and raising and stabilizing Alk, Ca and Mg. Here are my testing results for the past two days, I am going to use the amount dropped over the 1 day period for Alk and Ca as the baseline for my BRS dosing pumps using their two part solution. All tests were done using Red Sea Pro tests kits.

I have a Hanna Checker for phosphate, but out of the 6 test I have done with it I have only ever received a 0.00 ppm reading. I have ordered more reagent packages for it to double check, but I think my unit my not be working.

Alk:

2/7/15 6.72 dKH

2/8/15 6.3 dKH

Single day drop: .42 dKH

Goal: 9.0 dKH

Need to dose 24 ml a day to maintain dKH levels. Will dose an extra 22 ml a day for the next 7 days to raise dKH to 9.0.

Ca:

2/7/15 380 ppm

2/8/15 370 ppm

Single day drop: 10 ppm

Goal: 420 ppm

Need to dose 80 ml a day to maintain Ca levels. Will dose an extra 60 ml a day for the next 7 days to raise Ca ppm to 420.

Mg:

2/7/15 1340 pm

I believe this is in range of where I want to be. I'm not going to dose anything for it as of right now.

Nitrate:

2/7/15 2.0 ppm

2/8/15 2.0 ppm

I need some feedback on these levels - I assume they are high due to the algae and cyano issue, but looking online a lot of sources say this is an acceptable amount of nitrates? Water changes are the only way I know of for reducing Nitrate, are there any other ways?

Phosphate:

These tests are pretty hard to read so in reality these results could be anywhere from 0.02 ppm to 0.16 ppm, the below results are my best guesses.

2/7/15 .04 ppm

2/8/15 .08 ppm

The phosphate levels surprisingly seem to be within acceptable range.

[madsalt]

Talking to Ty and moving forward with my tank reboot, we are aiming for a Phosphate level of 0.0 to .03. As far as your Nitrates go, yes on the water changes, perhaps vacuuming the sand and you could try to reduce it chemically. I have never gone the chemical route so I am not sure how that stuff works. I know RCA has some.

While you are treating the algae and cyano you may need to reduce your light levels and light time. This is a trade off because of the corals you have so it will be fine balance.

If you would like and you have time this evening you are welcome to bring a water sample and your meter and we can check them with my meter and reagents. I may ask you to test my mag though

[BornToHula]

Talking to Ty and moving forward with my tank reboot, we are aiming for a Phosphate level of 0.0 to .03. As far as your Nitrates go, yes on the water changes, perhaps vacuuming the sand and you could try to reduce it chemically. I have never gone the chemical route so I am not sure how that stuff works. I know RCA has some.

While you are treating the algae and cyano you may need to reduce your light levels and light time. This is a trade off because of the corals you have so it will be fine balance.

If you would like and you have time this evening you are welcome to bring a water sample and your meter and we can check them with my meter and reagents. I may ask you to test my mag though

I want to try to avoid fixing the nitrates chemically, in my experience chemicals have been temporary fix. It looks like I will continue to do 20-30 g water changes once a week.

I have had success when I reduce the lights. When I got the BMLs from you a couple weeks ago I only ran them for 1 hour a day for 4 days, and 95% of the cyano and algae was gone. Unfortunately, it came right back when I increased the lighting to 8 hours a day @ 70% intensity.

I don't have time to come by tonight, but if after I get my new Hanna reagents in and I still read a 0.00 for phosphates I may take you up on that offer! I got plenty of testing reagents for mag from my Red Sea kit .

[FarmerTy]

Hula, looks like you're on your way to becoming a reef master with the way you are tracking your parameters and your plan going forward to maintain them.

For your question on nitrates, water changes are the simplest form. Dilution is your friend in that scenario. You can always look into carbon dosing as a viable alternative too, now that you have a big bad skimmer. Carbon dosing is great for removing nitrates and there are many available forms to use, each with their own pros and cons (vodka, vinegar, biopellets, etc). I personally use vodka when needed but have taken my biopellets offline because it strips the nitrates out of the tank entirely in my case. I see nothing wrong with 2 ppm and actually prefer to run anywhere from 1-5ppm.

[BornToHula]

Thank you for the words of encouragement Ty, I hope one day my corals look as good as yours! I'll look into the carbon dosing, I haven't seen too much about besides a Bulk Reef Supply video when I first got started in the hobby, but I love researching and trying new stuff. Plus its always a good excuse to have a bottle of Vodka around!

I have a question for you (or anyone really) - do you see anything in my parameters, or have any other guesses, that would explain the amount of algae and cyano I have?

I've had this problem since I got the tank, initially people thought its because the tank was in its "new" phase, but I think I am well past that now. I'm sure I have a flaw in my processes that is leading to the outbreaks, I'm just not sure what it is yet. I have to admit it can get discouraging at times when the tank doesn't look good after all the time/effort/resources put into it.

Maybe some insight into my lighting and feeding habits would be helpful, as I think they are some of the usual causes of algae and cyano:

I feed once a day - either 1/3 to 1/2 block of mysis shrimp or about 3 pinches of New Life Spectrum pellets. When I feed the pellets I use a feeding tool to prevent the majority of food from hitting the sand, but a small amount still falls down there. With mysis I just melt a block in RODI water and pour a portion of it in then refreeze the remaining amount for another day. I also put in half a strip of nori for the Kole Tang once a day.

I recently changed my lighting from 2 AI Sol Blues to 3 Build My LED bars - the 12k and 14k Spectrum bars both turn on at 2pm, ramp up to 70% by 4pm, stay at 70% for 4 hours, then ramp down for 2 hours starting at 8pm to turn off at 10pm. The actinic blue bar is only on for 3 hours - 7pm to 10pm at 50% for now. I have tried "blackout" periods which help, but as soon as I go back to a normal lighting schedule the algae/cyano returns.

[FarmerTy]

While I don't know the history of your tank Hula, I think you're taking all the right steps to righting the ship. The new skimmer should help a ton once it has broken in. Once it does, I'd run it "wet" for a bit while looking into getting your GFO reactor functioning properly and looking into carbon dosing of some sort. You have cyano and GHA due to nutrients... plain and simple. Some of it will go away with time if your tank is new... it's just waiting to hit a good stable balance of nutrients in... than nutrients being exported or utilized by bacterial/coral processes.

I would just continue to aggressively export nutrients and allow your system to balance out with time. One thing to think about, but it really doesn't matter if every bit of food is eaten or if all of it falls on the sandbed. It will all end up contributing to your nutrient level... the main difference is the route it eventually gets there if that makes any sense. It either rots and adds nutrients directly or ends up as poop that contributes down the road. So the point I make is you have a lot of control of the amount of nutrients that enters your system.

[BornToHula]

Thank you for the advice Ty, I appreciate it. I have to keep reminding myself that even if everything is good now, the tank isn't all the sudden going to look great overnight...

Tonight I got the BRS dosing pumps set up, and will hopefully be running a dose tonight if I can get the Apex programming figured out.

Also, I have been thinking about how I am going to build my canopy. I had previously made these plans when I had AI Sol Blues installed but I never built it. Now with the Build My LED lights, the canopy has to be about an inch longer and no longer has to be as tall as the plans show. I figured I'd share my plans, I thought they are pretty cool.

Front:

Back:

Side:

Front being opened:

[FarmerTy]

That's pretty cool indeed! How'd you do that? Sketchup? I think those are some skills I need to acquire!