Project 105

They definitely don't work over here... I mean... I've already seen them, but for everyone else's sake... :-)

FTS

Really nice looking stuff man!!!!!

Thanks Donnie, and these pics are after having to move everything to a new tank over the weekend.

Nice job on the move. Must have been a lot of work but it looks like you pulled it off.

It looks great, especially as I realised that you'd had to move everything with your corals etc attached.

Thanks guys, It was a ton of work especially sine i was working alone. Tank seems to be fine with the exception of the GHA, even after multiple WC's it is still kicking. My feedings are only twice per week, and my lighting schedule is around 7 hrs. So I bought some phosphate sponge to run in my reactor and I will be doing a blackout starting tomorrow and going for 48hrs. Hopefully that will help knock it out, after the sponge has run it course it will be GFO 24/7 to help keep it down. Also ordered a Hanna PO4 meter to really see how this works. Hope to have good news soon.

When I replaced my chemi pure elite gha growth stopped. Now I'm just waiting for the lawnmower to finish it off. :-)

Your plan should knock it out quick.

phosguard came in today, going into reactor tonight . will test tonight then again this weekend.


now the waiting game.

Been a long time since I made any noise with this tank. It has been HELL since my disaster in the winter. Tank has been nothing but an algae home for the last 3-4 months, The algae was such an issue that I couldnt see through the front glass. After a good clean up, I told myself that I would be happier just knocking this thing down, and moving back to my nano's where I have had more fun and better luck. I placed my entire setup for sale and had a few bites , but no takers. Then today I got in touch with a really good friend of mine, and talked to him about what I could do to really bring this thing back to life, or if he thought my return to nanos was a better idea. Well he has convinced me not to give up on this tank, and to keep it running. He brought up the conversation / ideas for this tank when we set it up and said that if I was going to give up this easy then I needed to really think about if I even wanted a tank. He was right, so now I am going to upgrade a few pieces of equipment, and get this thing back into shape. List of new equipment is :

AI SOL (Blue)x 2
MP40w ES x 2
better skimmer, just not sure which one yet.

I will be selling off some of my existing equipment, once my new items start to arrive. I wont be in the position to buy most of this stuff until shortly after Thanksgiving , hopefully hit up some of the black friday sales. That will give me plenty of time for my deep tank cleaning , my rescape, and moving tank to new location in my house. Well I guess that will end my super long story and hope to have good pics soon.

Interesting you say "if I was going to give up this easy then I needed to really think about if I even wanted a tank", that's the second time today I've read someone saying that.
Made me remember the loses I had in FW tanks when a teenager (and had to save for the replacement fish) and yet I kept going, now I rarely (touch wood) have a loss. Now I'm on the same learning curve I forget that even the more experienced still have issues. I guess that's part of what makes it such a consuming hobby, or as Mrs Y say's "fanatic".

Glad you've decided to to stick with it. I think we ALL have those thoughts on occassions. There's alot more to maintaining a larger set-up... time, money & effort. Things change slower it seems.. takes alot more "Growth" to mature and fill out. But your options increase with every gallon

Keep us updated of your plans. I'm always willing to help out other reefers with projects.

Well I have offically traced my PO4 problems back to the Salt I am using. For years I have used Reef Crystals along with dosing ESV 2 PART with 0 problems. I then switched to Red Sea Coral PRO due to all of the great reviews it was getting. Well , F that. I have done NOTHING but battle every type of algae you can imagine. I manually remove and siphon and huge water change , just to get to do it all over again a week later.

FINALLY after mucho thought-o I had an idea. Why not buy a small bag of another salt (reef crystals) and test it against the red sea. SO i made 2 5g batches of salt water both mixed overnight, both were made with the same ro/di water and both were heated to 79*

RC = 0 PO4

RSCP = 0.25 PO4

both tested with API kit

RC = 0.06 with Hanna Checker

RSCP = 1.3 with Hanna Checker

I found other reefers that have had terrible luck with this salt as well. One just lost a ton of SPS due to high PO4, some pieces he has had for 8 years.
Also Fish2morrow said they had bad luck with it as well. After much research, discussions, and multiple curse words I have settled on my new salt.

Aquavitro Salinity , its a bit spendy but each batch is lab tested and the Lab results along with batch # are attached to the bucket. Each bucket make ~225g I think it says @ 1.026 so I will be good for a long while. I will report back on how my tank adapts to the switch. I will also be taking some before and after pics to see if we can see the difference.

I'm glad you've gotten to the bottom of it. I had to move my SPS out until I found my P04 issue... and enough water changes to dilute it back out. I like the Lab Results data on the package! If you don't mind me asking.. how much was it? Where for best price?

I paid $120 for the one I got today from fish2morrow. Keep in mind this is not a standard 5g bucket, its more like a 7-8g bucket. Also keep in mind you should be able to get about 50-75g or so more out of this one than a standard bucket. I think my math was correct on that LOL. Havent checked around for other pricing. I WOULD NOT order this online, the bucket is very heavy and shipping will cost you a fortune.

Wow thats strange Bryan, I been using RSCP for a few months now and my tank tests "0" PO4 but I will be keeping a close eye on it since you found this. On my next batch I will test the mixed water for PO4 also. Thanks for the heads up.

Well, I'm still confused, I made a batch of RSCP and tested it today and the results were PO4 undetectable. I guess its like any other brand, some good batches, some bad. Here's the results on 5 gallons. Only gripe I have with it is all the calcium that covers the mixing pump, I think I will go back to reef crystals on my next bucket and keep my fingers crossed.

SG---1025
PH---8.4
Calcium-480
Alk-----12 DKH
nitrate--0
ammonia-0
PO4-0
mag-1380

Those numbers look great !! Wish mine were the same.

as for the calcium covered pump, I know exactly what you mean. It looked like I painted it after about 3-4 mixtures.

First batch of my Aquavitro mix was AWSOME water was crystal clear after about 20min. It is taking about 1/3 cup of salt per gallon to achieve 1.024

levels are as follows :

SG---1024
PH---8.2
Calcium-470
Alk-----10 DKH
nitrate--0
ammonia-0
PO4-0
mag-1400

FINALLY got my own Hanna checker (no more borrowing) and after my massive tank cleaning and large number of water changes with the new salt my PO4 readings are down to 0.00 on the meter. At first I thought it I screwed up the test so I did it again , second test = 0.00.


WOO HOO !!!


Just got a new batch of GFO also, so these levels should be pretty easy to maintain from now on. I'm stoked !!



Test on tank water before cleaning/WC (done Wed. 11/9) = 0.94

Great work buddy!

Can't wait till you get going again full force! Always loved your tank, looking forward to seeing pics of it again. :-)