kien's 150g Room Divider Mixed Reef & Stuff

[Leah]

It is gorgeous! I love your house lay out too. What amazing job you have done it is just
incredible.

[mike31154]

Definitely a beauty. I like the choice of white on the stand & hood. What type of paint/finish is that? And you've also decided to have the light fixture above the canopy? Kind of a neat idea too, but would you care to elaborate on the reason behind that decision? I realize it's a fixture not a retro light set up, but it does throw a lot of light into the room the way you have it set up.

[shrimpchips]

Love the monster on your couch. We have an Eric and a Beth living on ours.

[kien]

Originally Posted by shrimpchips

Love the monster on your couch. We have an Eric and a Beth living on ours.

We found Kenji at a fair in Cabbage Town a couple of years ago. He was hiding in a box of "one of a kinds" with a bunch of other Monsters :-)

[kien]

Got the brains of my Reef operations up and running. Here she is, the Profilux Plus EX II. Apparently I have a Salinity alarm..







And here's what all the electrical looks like. A bit of a mess right now but once I'm happy with the connections I will tie everything up neat and tidy.

..

..


There is also an acrylic panel that separates the sump/water top off section from the electrical section. I took it out to take these photos.

[kien]

And here's a laundry list of what the Proflilux does for me today..

* It monitors Salinity, pH, Temperature, Water level of my top off reservoir, and ORP (once the probe arrives),

* It controls and times my lights (Actinics and Halides and Refugium light), oh and moon lights (once they arrive). Will have moon lights programmed on a standard moon cycle.

* Keeps my temperature in whatever range I want. Currently it hovers between 78 and 80 degrees F. If it drops below 78, my heaters switch on. Once it hits 79, heaters switch off. No more worry about stuck heaters! If the temp raises to 81, these bad boys kick in..




* The controller is plugged into an old router that I hacked up to turn into a wireless digital bridge. You can actually get a wireless adapter for the profilux but it was too expensive, so I made one from the old router. I have email alerts set up to email me every 4 hours with the current stats of the tank (lights, probe readings, etc..). There is also an automatic email sent whenever a measured value is outside of and acceptable range. Temp too high, I get an email, temp too low, I get an email, water in auto top off too low, I get an email! This fall I plan on working on a native iPhone app to monitor and control the profilux from my iPhone!

* Tunze controll! I have a couple of Tunze 6105s (one I bought new and one I bought used). With a couple of dedicated cables plugged into the profilux I can control both tunze just like the dedicated Tunze controller. Currently I have my two powerheads on an opposing sinus wave. They go from 20% power to 100% in 15 seconds on opposite cycles. At night the powerheads are cut down to half power.



Future: I plan on getting a dosing pump to hook up to the profilux.

[kien]

Here are some scenes from the reef..

[kien]

Originally Posted by Leah

It is gorgeous! I love your house lay out too. What amazing job you have done it is just
incredible.

hehe, thanks :-)

Originally Posted by mike31154

Definitely a beauty. I like the choice of white on the stand & hood. What type of paint/finish is that? And you've also decided to have the light fixture above the canopy? Kind of a neat idea too, but would you care to elaborate on the reason behind that decision? I realize it's a fixture not a retro light set up, but it does throw a lot of light into the room the way you have it set up.

The canopy is painted in a glossy enamel from a spray paint can :-) The stand doors/skin is an Ikea cabinet door "Abstrakt" that was already painted and finished in a smooth high gloss finish.

Actually there quite a few reasons why I went with this design for the canopy and light combination.

1. I wanted to be able to remove the top easily to gain access to the tank for maintenance. I can just pull the light off, then the canopy. Neither are very heavy. I would not have minded hanging the light if I didn't have a two story vaulted ceiling over the tank :-)

2. I also wanted to vent the heat from the tank out the top of the canopy. There are a lot of canopy designs where the light is right inside the canopy and it is completely enclosed. With that design you typically have to install fans or something to help vent the heat. Well, with this design there are lots of avenues for heat ventilation. I did install vent holes on either end of the canopy in case I too needed to install fans for extra air flow but because the top is completely open, it seems enough heat is escaping out the top and I have not had any heat issues with my tank.

3. Having the light sit outside and on top of the canopy also helps to keep the light fixture itself cool. This should help prolong the life of the fixture and bulbs.

4. The lights are high enough away from the surface of the water as to prevent splashing onto the light and developing salt creep. I hate cleaning out light fixtures and with this design I only have to wipe the glass every few months instead of every few days or weeks even.

Agreed it does produce a bit of light spill but not as much if you see it in person. The camera is very light sensitive so it exaggerates that light spill more than what you actually see. In the end it is no different than if you hung the light from the ceiling which many people seem to like to do as well :-)