12 Eggs's 48" planet - nano no 'mo!

[12_egg_omelette]

Let me start by apologizing for the long delay in posting this build. I guess I fell off the forum for a while after moving from college station, starting a new position in San Antonio and having a baby.

But the good news is I'm no longer in a nano cube though I find myself telling my wife I miss it. It's in the garage still but I don't foresee it ever serving as anything other than a hospital tank for corals. It served me well 13 years in the hobby. I started in undergrad.

I want to document this the right way so I'll need to go back and search for pictures and tell the story from the start. So it will probably take me until this weekend to catch everyone up.

I started with a used planet aquarium rimless I picked up from Austin one day. I paid for it full without seeing it in person and it was a great decision.

After 4 bottles of vinegar a tooth brush it cleaned up quite nicely

So now I have a tank and stand only that's nice and clean. I'm still in college station for about two months at this point and I started to collect equipment. I'll be posted about that after work today.

[+Jimbo662]

Those are great tanks. Is it 75g?

[12_egg_omelette]

So I started off with a synergy reef sump but I have since switch it out to a trigger system sump.

There's a big jump as I didn't take that many pictures right away.

But the tank is running two Radion XR30 pros at this point, 2 MP40, vectra M1 nyos skimmer, I have an xr15 lighting my fuge frag tank as well. Auto top off is handled by a puratek ATO

I then relatively recently ordered a marine technical calcium reactor the mini cal. The pictures is from when I was running it to purge the lines. I'm not using an effluent box I got from melves reef running two ph proves connected to the apex.

[12_egg_omelette]

I ended up buying this beautiful blueberry that was flourishing until we had to spend four days in the hospital when our baby girl came. The apex AFS was still working but I wasn't putting nori in for the tangs so they decided to make it their meal

I ended up giving it to another reefer when we got back hoping that it would recover.

Here are some shots of the live rock I'm using and some sponges I have in the tank as well.

Now for some coral pictures. These are pretty old now as I'm working to more recent photos.

I ended up getting a couple aptasia and bought a laser because who doesn't want one. Well it really just upset my wife because it could end up hurting the baby's eyes and I did end up burning myself when I put the batteries in and it was shipped on the on position.

I quirky abandoned this solution and got nudies

http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160826/d2216bf0e1b2d223b153f9d1f66e7be5.jpg

http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160826/934d0d346eeecf05e4dae7e0bc840b56.jpg

They are working, it's been a slow process but effortless on my part other than the bill for them $200+.

Fast forward my parameters weren't getting any better and my biopellet reactor screen kept getting clogged so I removed it the gfo and carbon reactor and went to probidio they make biodigest and biotim. I was getting good results

http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160826/1848e0e49bc21e70e37f44709de82afa.jpg

I then thought hmm. I'm getting good results with this. I'm also using a couple KZ products why not go full zeovit. So I ordered an avast marine vibe.

[12_egg_omelette]

[12_egg_omelette]

Those are great tanks. Is it 75g?

It's an 85 gallon tank.

[12_egg_omelette]

Here is what I'm doing

0.6 liter zeovit in Avast Marine Reactor. Water flow is set to 68 US gallons per hour. The feed pump is set to run 3 hour on / 3 hour off / 3 hour on interval. Here is the apex code I'm using to run it

Fallback OFF

OSC 180:00/180:00/000:00 Then ON

I'm going to keep running this cycle until I change out the zeovit stones so about 4 weeks.

One of the inconveniences of running a zeovit system is the need to pump your reactor daily, this cleans the zeovit stones. This is where the vibe really shines. It has a motor that when on swings a counter weight underneath to vibrate the chamber and cause the film to float away. I'm currently uses the apex to run these cycles. My apex code is as follows

Fallback OFF

Set ON

If Time 18:01 to 05:59 Then OFF

If Time 06:01 to 17:59 Then OFF

I removed my GFO and Carbon reactor a while ago and last week I removed my miracle mud and fuge out completely. I'm not running 0.25 liters of korallenzucht carbon in a bag and making sure to knead it daily. I boiled rodi water and let the bag soak it in overnight before placing it into my return section of my sump.

I'm now dosing 3 drops of ZeoBack daily for the first 2 weeks, flowed by a 2 x weekly dosage of 3 drops. I'm also dosing 0.25 ml ZeoStart 2 x daily (morning & evening). All of these doses are done in the middle chamber of my sump where my feed pump is. I'm also dosing 3 drops of sponge power every other day.

I'm shooting for the following parameters.

KH 6.5 – 7.5

Ca 400 – 420 mg

Mg 1250 – 1300 mg

K+ ~ 380 mg

I have to say I really haven't ever tested for potassium, but I just picked up a test kit and will be doing this weekend. To correct for any deficits I'll be using the KZ potassium.

[jolt]

Why the switch from synergy to trigger? Just curious since a large sump is in my future ...

[bige]

Everything looks great. You've done a lot of trial and error.

[12_egg_omelette]

Why the switch from synergy to trigger? Just curious since a large sump is in my future ...

The synergy sump was a Berlin set up. I've attached a picture for a better visualization from when we moved. It also sustained some slight damage that I was able to patch. I really wanted to try a fuge and my wife really didn't want me to use a sump that was repaired. Really worried about leaks. So it was swapped out for the trigger system.

[12_egg_omelette]

Everything looks great. You've done a lot of trial and error.

Thank you.

[+olaggie01]

Looks great. How are you liking the vibe now that you have had it for a while?

What rock did you go with?

[12_egg_omelette]

Thanks ol ag.

I'm liking the vibe it does make a good amount of noise but isn't so much that it bothers our new born. It goes off twice a day for one minute and the first time is 6:30 pm.

The rock for the reactor is the zeovit.

The rock in the tank is a mixture of rock from a buddy who was breaking down and Tampa bay salt water. I love the Tampa bay stuff. It's nice when I ordered it at 11 am it was ready for pick up at 4:45 pm.

[12_egg_omelette]

Well the big fluffy acans aren't responding well to the Zeovit, they haven't expanded in 24 hours now, the same with another nice LPS. I'm going to give it a couple days before I try to do any intervention. Maybe it's just acclimating, I'll try some phytoplankton along with some rotifers (target feeding) to see if I can get a feeding response out of them.

[12_egg_omelette]

This got delivered yesterday forgot to mention it. Super stoked about this, I need to make a stand thinking cinder blocks. Also want to add some loc line to the bulk head.

I've been debating if I want to add a float valve and a port for some Mur lock tubing. To be honest I suck at this type of stuff.

[12_egg_omelette]

Upgrade time!

[+Jimbo662]

woohoo...let the fun begin!

[12_egg_omelette]

Trying to find the best combination. I do realize it's a major upgrade from my gen 2 pros. The color blending is outstanding as is the brightness going from four picks to three.

I'm not able to put picks more spread out to get more diffused light then I was with the xr30 pros. It might be a combination of the lens along with fact that the 30 had the picks very close together. I'm toying with the idea of settling with four xr15s.

I should be getting par measurements tomorrow. Unfortunately I've changed my rock scape slightly since the last time I took par measurements so won't be able to truly compare. I'll load the same schedule I was using and the same intensity though and just see how it compares.

Here is the tank with three xr15s on it.