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  #21  
Old 01-08-2010, 04:19 AM
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did not drive home.. so far its holding out. at least its in an unfinished basement now. I just hope it doesnt crap out again and then not get looked at for a day or 2 heh
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  #22  
Old 01-11-2010, 11:34 PM
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Made the 3 hour trek home last night and then 3 hours back to work this morning.

The bad news: a few corals look rough. One of the brownoporia frags I put in a few weeks ago is gone. One of the clowns had a couple flecks of what looks like ick. Slight diatom bloom in the low flow areas.

The good news: everything else looks in awesome shape. the girl did a good job containing the mess and getting everything but the sump up and running again.

i got the sump back up to working temp tested the water and got it working again. I ran it full out for a bit and the leak did not appear. Not wanting the gf to deal with any more bs for the tank I then cranked it down so its just a nice low steady flow though the overflows till i can get home and check it out more this weekend.

so far so good.
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  #23  
Old 01-16-2010, 11:34 PM
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Found the tanks first victim today.

the overflow has been backed up for 2 days, but i have had a very busy day including traveling around the countryside for job interviews. Basicaly i saw it was plugged up, assumed a snail was in it or something and just throttled the pump back so more drains into the sump.


today i went to modify the returns, as i allready planed to do and found my lawnmower blenny jammed in the return pipe, the plumbing previously had had a small rigid pipe into it for venting. My lmb had gotten into the overflow then sucked into the hole and stuck on the vent tubing so he could not swim out or get dumped into the sump.


Now both tanks have durso style vents so if anyone falls in they will get sucked straight to the sump. the other advantage to this is now the main tank's return has no problem taking the full GPH of the return pump. It will never have to do this as some is going to the second tank and a small amount returning to the sump. I did run it at full speed for about 15 mins and the water would not even rise an inch over the overflow.


The gf is sad that was her favorite fish. was one of my favorite too.

no more fish untill i get some kind of grating on the overflow though.
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  #24  
Old 03-04-2010, 05:29 AM
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New peave

after not testing the tank for a while

testing it only to find everything is near perfect.



I am working in Leduc again so the tank gets little bits of maintenance regularly. and it shows.. everything is looking better. HA is still not beat but diminishing.

thinking about a couple new fish.. dunno what yet.

I want to drill my 33 and pull it beside the system and join it in instead of just having it be the fresh water purifying tank. must get hole saw one of these trips.

I want to upgrade my lights as well, and add real lights to the fifteen. tank is mixed reef so far, would like to try a bit more sps.

for the 40 b i was thinking a combo mh/t5ho unit but im undecided as to get 1x250 or 2x150 for the metal halides... any ideas?

and for the 15 with intents to go into some kind of frag tank would a 70w mh or 4 bulb t5ho cut it?


I had an excuse to run into Edmonton this evening, for some reason thought it was Thursday.. rushed in to try to get to bwa and ma before they close just to look.

mwhahaha did i feel silly when i saw they were closed and remembered its only Wednesday
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  #25  
Old 03-25-2010, 12:31 AM
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Sad story and funny story.


I got a royal gamma and a red spotted blenny at BWA last week.


first night my dottyback was picking on the gamma so i put them lights out and they left each other alone.


lights come on an hour or two before i get home from work, when i get home the gamma is in an open area of the tank .. with a couple little nipps but looks ok... i watch them lots and the dotty seems to be leaving it alone all the time.


come home from work the next day and it has a few more chunks out so i put him in the 15gallon.

come home the next day and its dead and half eaten by the sandmonsters allready.


so then yesterday i cant see the red spotted blenny at feeding time.. thought nothing of it he might be hidden, go down to feed them today and he is not seen again

check the overflow,

check the sump.

watch the tank for like 15 mins


look at the frags in the 15.. and low and behold there he is

there is no way he could have jumped across because the canopy blocks it.

my only guess is he went up the shared return line and got spat out into the small tank.


I think he looks skinny i think he might stay there for a few days till he gets plumped up
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  #26  
Old 03-25-2010, 06:48 PM
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Stuipid blenny found his way to the floor sometime last night.

guess those little red spot ones are good jumpers eh?


I guess ill just stick to new corals and not get any more new fish for a while.
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  #27  
Old 03-30-2010, 07:04 AM
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Killed a few birds with one stone today.

at least there were no more fish involved.

problem 1: Christmas tree coral :shrinking like crazy.
Problem 2: HOB refugueum that i had nothing to do since i went sump-less
problem 3: lots of hoses and extra power-head in the sump for Phosphate remover+carbon reactor.
problem 4: Cyano and problem algae in the fugue/sortie tank.


solution 1: Isolate non-photosynthetic coral and increase feeding since its not getting enough in the DT.

Solution 2: use HOB fugue to put the coral in.

Solution 3: Plumb the reactors and the HOB off the return, thus freeing up power-heads.

Solution 4: Re-organize freed up power-heads so there is more flow in the tank and the Fugue, hopefully curing the cyano.


So now I guess its time to sit back and see how things work out. The HOB has a small powerhead and heater in it, and I will probably get some more LR rubble. I will try to give it lots of little feedings and the extras can slowly drip out into the system.

I got a few frags from Dez's fragapoloza last week so far all but one look good. Superman monti is starting to brown a little but i kind of expected that.

I have my eyes on new lights for the dt in the very near future.

When that happens i am thinking seriously about modifying the stand, plumbing my old 33 into the system where the 15g fugue is, and putting the fugue above the 2 tanks just as a fugue instead of a fugue/softie/beginner frag tank. Might have to rename it Frankentanks but that's ok because its sitting in my unfinished basement.


To add to the madness the girlfriends sister gave the gf a 50 gallon tank.. which is now full of Fresh water, she plans to start easy, i keep telling her it should be salt so she can have the seahorses shes all ways wanted but she doesn't need extra babies right now with our second one coming out next Monday.

Last edited by blacknife; 03-30-2010 at 07:09 AM.
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  #28  
Old 04-09-2010, 11:26 PM
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Baby is out, came out early, brought on by food poisioning or something from some bad fish.

I picked up a 38tall with hopes of redoing the sump for my system.

turns out i forgot to take into account the black trim when deciding it would fit in the stand the glass is 12" the opening in the stand is 12" the trim takes up an extra 1/4" on each side. doh

so I have a new vision

There is room enough room between the DT and the wall and then to the door to the mancave that i could put the 40 there, with only a couple inches overlap in the corner. draining to my 33 as a LRR at the same height, and tied to the 20 gallon sump from the main tank.

i can probably push the tank back towards the wall so there is no overlap, Just have to wait till i have the sump off to drill and drain off most of the water quickly.

Just have to draw up a quick sketch of the stand to figure out how much wood i need, and wait till i have hole saws and the guts to drill.

Tank would be FOwlr or perhaps low light, preadatory reef with the PC lights that are currently on the 40.

the sump should then be able to handle the drainage from all three tanks, and there will be lots more room to play in.

Last edited by blacknife; 04-09-2010 at 11:41 PM.
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  #29  
Old 04-14-2010, 04:38 AM
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Got glass hole saw..

got crazy

decided to go with the added sump water,

made a "stand" to put the new refugieum the same hight as my sump.

lined up and marked holes.

drilled the empty tank..

Making a new big batch of water to fill it up.

tomorrows project.. drain and clean the sump then drill it and re-pumb everything that needs re-plumbing.

I think i will attempt to make some of the rock for in there, i will see how that goes. but for now it can just be extra water for stability.
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  #30  
Old 04-25-2010, 08:51 PM
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All projects got derailed by going on a week of storm callout down south the next day.

Came back and my new/used lights were in the post office. 6 bulb nova extreme. they look great and i swear i can see growth on some of the sps after a week of having them.

15g addon is on lights off and all it is housing is the tube anenome, gorilla crab, and a hermit. it had the softies, some lr and the cheato in it with standard flourescents but it seemed to just want to grow cyano and diatoms. the sandbed is black in it and i am not sure what to do. might just take it offline, rebuild the stand and put one of the bigger tanks there. might just leave things the same.

Main tank looks good same small little patches of HA but its not spreading at all and i can deal with that. If the "easier" sps that are in there keep doing good i might have to try a couple little harder ones.

I want to setup the other tanks as either an addon or separate. I was thinking all the low light corals could go in the other tank. I would like the ease of having a common sump but wondering if the long term health of some of the hard corals would be better if i left the softies in a separate tank instead of just using carbon.
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