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  #11  
Old 11-19-2009, 11:16 PM
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Now like I promised, I built a stand and a canopy for this tank. I spent the last three days working with these tools



So I had a damn good idea of what I wanted for a stand. I wanted something with a mixed Victorian / Venician style to it, but with in a budget and something that I can do myself. Now Im not a journeyman carpenter like Doug. But I sure try haha.

Now for a frame I decided to use an old friend of mine....My old 45 gallon stand, thats right the one built out of 2x6's. Terry was using it for his 30 gallon starfire cube but he suddenly got different ideas and gave it back to me....I wonder what he has planned actually hmm.

So this stand was slightly modified for Terry's cube, he had a 3 inch deep square cut into it to set his cube into to hide the base of the tank. and with the styrofoam leveler it really was only 3/4 inch deep. That cut out that Terry did was perfect for my tank, it was 20" wide and so was my tank!.

So thats the story on that stand now for pictures!

The beginnings of the canopy


More beginnings, but with the night lights one so cool!


FTS of the beginings.


And after I got the trim on with stain
[IMG]http://i645.photobucket.com/albums/uu172/bauder1986/P1010896.jpg[/IMG
]



I designed the stand to let me remove the front panel to store stuff underneath, dont mind the mess, I just moved in haha



Oh and did I mention that the bulb in my Corallife MH went on me...Yah crazy, so I needed another bulb and terry decided that he didnt have a use for this 150 watt K2 Viper at the moment, so he let me use it till I got mine running again! He is a pretty nice guy eh! Gives me my stand back, loans me his MH. haha Thx Terry!




And the FTS of the finished product!

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  #12  
Old 11-19-2009, 11:17 PM
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And another FTS of the pretty stuff Dont mind the ****y looking corals, they had no light for most of the day.


But yah, I'm pretty proud of what I managed to pull off here. I spent $775.00 on this tank already with the intention of spending another 100 on another Nano fan, some hammerhead frogspawn and an actinic PC fixture to combo with the MH. Oh yah and a canopy cooling fan sometime soonish. The cooling fan isnt really a big worry, my temp only goes up 2 degrees in a full light cycle, but it doesnt hurt to be safe, right?

So final run down on what I have:

Coral:
Digitata
Frogspawn / Octospawn
Blue Pom Pom Xenia
Gorilla's Nipples
Fire and Ice Zoos
6 other types of Zoos

Hardware:
1 Korelia Nano
150 watt heater
150 watt MH K2 Viper / Corallife
Cleaning Magnet

Dosing:
Weekly:
Iodine
Strontium/Molybdenum
Calcium

Every two days:
Phytoplankton

Every three days:
Coral Vit
Phols
Amino Acid LPS

Feed the Frogspawn Mysis shrimp every night, or try to keep up on that habit haha.

Building supplies came from Home Depot, 80 bucks worth of trim, 4 bucks worth of hardboard, 12 bucks in stain and brushes and 8 bucks in glue.

So yah thats what I can build I guess, honestly I'm surprised that it turned out this good, Im not the best at cabinet making.
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  #13  
Old 11-19-2009, 11:53 PM
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I dont think you should be dosing anything, it can easily throw that tank out of whack if you do weekly to by weekly water changes that should be enough. i think you should raise you salinity slowly to 1.024-1.026 around that range. in your pictures your zoas were really scretched out. and your xenia still isnt happy from your recent ones same with your frogspawn. they are not expanding like they should. everything is going good. just keep it simple with tanks this size. also i dont think you need to feed phyto in the tank either or any of those other ones. changing 2 to 3 gallons a week will be plenty to keep the parameters in check. you wanted to keep it simple anyways though right.

keep up the good work man.
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  #14  
Old 11-20-2009, 12:10 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Boomboy View Post
I dont think you should be dosing anything, it can easily throw that tank out of whack if you do weekly to by weekly water changes that should be enough. i think you should raise you salinity slowly to 1.024-1.026 around that range. in your pictures your zoas were really scretched out. and your xenia still isnt happy from your recent ones same with your frogspawn. they are not expanding like they should. everything is going good. just keep it simple with tanks this size. also i dont think you need to feed phyto in the tank either or any of those other ones. changing 2 to 3 gallons a week will be plenty to keep the parameters in check. you wanted to keep it simple anyways though right.

keep up the good work man.
ok Ill give it a shot, ill do a water change tomorrow to raise the salinity up a point. I do however want to keep dosing my coral vit, phols, and amino acid LPS, but maybe a little less often. the frogspawn is all the way out now, ill get a photo of it. But the xenia is still not that happy but i think that it is because of the higher light intensity. Xenia is usually a low light coral.

I found that the gorilla nipples reached out ever since i introduced them into the tank, they do that in my buddies tanks as well, we have more than sufficient lighting, i think it be more of a characteristic of them. the other zoo colonies have a really short reach but fully spread heads. My digi's polips are always out, not all the way out but none the less they're out.

But yah, ill start relying on the water changes for calc, iodine, strontium, molybdenum. Ill maybe stop the phyto but i seem to have great results with the zoos on that, and i dose really small amounts of everything as well. I am very careful with my dosing because i know how easy it is to throw a tank out of whack.

Thanks
Josh
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  #15  
Old 11-20-2009, 12:21 AM
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  #16  
Old 11-20-2009, 04:53 AM
simplycoral simplycoral is offline
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Looking Good Josh ..

Those Gorillas Nipples are definitely reaching for the light. They don't have that characteristic in my tank. Maybe try moving them a little closer to the top to see if they relax.

If the Xenia is retracted this is normally a good indication that something is out of whack. Xenia is very sensitive to PH swings so maybe a good idea to test the PH at different times during the day.

S.
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  #17  
Old 11-20-2009, 04:57 AM
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alright, ill move the gorillas actually i might move everything around to accomadate everything better. Ill test the ph through out the day.The strangest thing is that everything has great growth, color and good polyp extension. hmm.
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  #18  
Old 11-20-2009, 11:09 PM
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Ok, so I aquascaped my tank to better suit the needs of my corals, and I took the bulb out of the K2 viper MH and put it in my CoralLife fixture, which has much superior reflectors and heat dispation. Im getting better lighting, appears that the zoos have settled down quite abit since then. I guess I have to somehow match Simons lighting with his breeder tanks but that will take time

So Im took advise from all those that gave it, Im slowly raiseing my salinity to 1.024 from 1.021. One day and im up one point. I double checked my ph and guess what Simon, you nailed it on the head, 8.0, so Im slowly raising that as well, got it up .1 and the xenia is starting to smarten up!

other than that, ammonia is at .40 ppm, and nitrates are at 15 ppm, but i suspect that came from stirring up everything in the tank in the aquascape so im gonna let that settle down. If I do have any algea beakout my two snails got it covered like with every other piece of algea that tries to spring up.

Now heres a question for you folks, I'm sitting at 460 ppm calcium and 12.88 alkalinity which is pretty close to my prefered 440 ppm 10.80 alk. I was wondering if you guys see nothing wrong with that range. I see good growth, color in almost all corals, with xenia being the exception, so I think Im in the right, but let me know if im not.

Im going to let my water changes do the work for Iodine, strontium, molybdenum and most of the calcium but im still going to does the coral vit, amino acid LPS and Phols stuff carefully. I already see good results with the zoos and the digi on that.

anyways just thought Id let you all know, give me thoughts, opinions, and maybe a few good jokes.

Oh yah, I eventually want to retrofit a actiinic fixture into this deal thats under 20" in total length. Help me out by finding ideas/merchants. Thanks folks.
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  #19  
Old 12-11-2009, 10:10 AM
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Alright people, update time. Sorry but no FTS right now due to cranky Octospawn due to salinity raise. So I spent the last couple of weeks raising my Salinity and getting my coral used to the idea that there well not be as much dosing from now on. To say the least, the zoos are starting to accept the changes but the ones that everyone expressed concern for are not settling down, the gorilla nipples are still reaching for the stars even though i reaquascaped and brought them higher. I switched the bulb from the K2 viper back to my Corallife fixture due to superior reflectors and still, the gorilla nipples want to reach high.

K so i say WTF do they want??? they are still healthy looking, color is good, they open all the way up every day but they still reach.

Other than that, I am waiting for the Octospawn to relax and then ill have pics up. Oh and Simon, you should see that Frogspawn, wow does it ever reach
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  #20  
Old 12-11-2009, 07:48 PM
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Is that enough flow???? in my 10 i started with a K1 then added a nano. i am moving my 10g into a 15 G (easier to get lights on) and will be using a k2 and k1. just my 2 cents. also i dont see any surface agitation. IME does wonders.

when zoas reach its usually a low light issue , but with 150w halide i woudnt say this is the issue.
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