120G Rimless shallow peninsula tank

[Janci]

Holy moley!! Man, why didn't you tell me you had such an amazing tank!?!? (I never noticed the link in your sig haha). It looks absolutely stunning

Thanks.
I guess you were all busy with travelling, nice food and getting engaged... didn't want to disturb

 

[Janci]

Long overdue update.
The tank is doing relatively well.
Due to some lack of time, I did not do a water change in over 4 weeks and corals started to stutter and show lack of colour and PE.
Did a first water change 3 days ago and will do another one this weekend.
After the first change, corals reacted immediately and look much happier now.

So back to basics.
In the end I went with the Fritz Aquatics RPM salt. Seems to be a good replacement for the Tropic Marine at a lower price.
So all of us are happy.

 

[Wrangy]

Thanks.
I guess you were all busy with travelling, nice food and getting engaged... didn't want to disturb

Haha fair enough! I'm here now though

 

[RichtheReefer21]

Long overdue update.
The tank is doing relatively well.
Due to some lack of time, I did not do a water change in over 4 weeks and corals started to stutter and show lack of colour and PE.
Did a first water change 3 days ago and will do another one this weekend.
After the first change, corals reacted immediately and look much happier now.

So back to basics.
In the end I went with the Fritz Aquatics RPM salt. Seems to be a good replacement for the Tropic Marine at a lower price.
So all of us are happy.

I use the RPM as well. It always comes out to 460ca and around 8.6 dKh for me. Glad to hear everything is well sir. It's amazing what a wc schedule really does for a tank. Out with the old and in with the new!

 

[GoVols]

Janci,
How's your reef doing?

 

[Janci]

Janci,
How's your reef doing?

Hi Freddie, all is doing well. Thank you.
I haven't been able to keep this thread updated as some other things have kept me busy.

The tank is still running with minimum effort and biweekly water changes.
Ever since I changed salt, it seems like the corals are not acting like they did before.
There is still a possibility that I will move house, so that is another reason for not spending any extra time and money on it now.
The last coral I added was over 3 months ago. Being it a monti, I believed it would thrive but it does not. I got it very green and now it looks pale and unhappy.

I hope to add some pictures later next week after I got some time for maintenance and tidying up.

 

[Salty Lemon]

I wasn't able to get through all of this today, but I'm definitely coming back to catch up. I'll be following along from now on.

 

[RichtheReefer21]

I wasn't able to get through all of this today, but I'm definitely coming back to catch up. I'll be following along from now on.

It's quite a thread. So natural feeling. Love this build.

 

[samnaz]

It's quite a thread. So natural feeling. Love this build.

Same!

 

[Janci]

Good news... I did maintenance, changed water, cleaned pumps and I even took pictures.
Bad news... "pictures or it did not happen"... they are still on the camera Will get this sorted asap.
More bad news... I found my skimmer malfunctioning. There seemed to be no air going in so I squeezed the complete air tube to look for blockage but could not find any. So slowly (it took some minutes to face the truth) I realized that I had to take out the skimmer pump and get it cleaned. Which I did but that did not not solve the problem neither.
So during my initial laziness of just squeezing the air hose, I now took it off and found salt blockage right where it connects to the pump. As the salt was hard I could not feel this when squeezing. ;Facepalm
The good thing is that the skimmer pump is now clean after more than 1 year in service without service.

More good news... my favourite salt is coming back to town. Tropic Marine Pro Salt as from next week.
The pictures that will follow will show how happy I am with this news. My corals need this salt.
Hopefully a new update in a couple of days.

 

[RichtheReefer21]

Good news... I did maintenance, changed water, cleaned pumps and I even took pictures.
Bad news... "pictures or it did not happen"... they are still on the camera Will get this sorted asap.
More bad news... I found my skimmer malfunctioning. There seemed to be no air going in so I squeezed the complete air tube to look for blockage but could not find any. So slowly (it took some minutes to face the truth) I realized that I had to take out the skimmer pump and get it cleaned. Which I did but that did not not solve the problem neither.
So during my initial laziness of just squeezing the air hose, I now took it off and found salt blockage right where it connects to the pump. As the salt was hard I could not feel this when squeezing. ;Facepalm
The good thing is that the skimmer pump is now clean after more than 1 year in service without service.

More good news... my favourite salt is coming back to town. Tropic Marine Pro Salt as from next week.
The pictures that will follow will show how happy I am with this news. My corals need this salt.
Hopefully a new update in a couple of days.

I tried to look this skimmer up quickly, but couldnt find an answer.

Do u know if this pump utilizes a pinwheel needle by chance?

 

[YHSublime]

So during my initial laziness of just squeezing the air hose, I now took it off and found salt blockage right where it connects to the pump. As the salt was hard I could not feel this when squeezing. ;Facepalm
The good thing is that the skimmer pump is now clean after more than 1 year in service without service.

It's such a chore! But better having it run right than not. I should probably do the same, it's been about a year.

 

[Rakie]

Looks great! Almost time for that double size upgrade

 

[Jon Fishman]

pfffft....... that's not 'shallow'

Great build though!

 

[najer]

You are supposed to clean skimmers?
... Sounds like hokum to me!?

 

[Janci]

I tried to look this skimmer up quickly, but couldnt find an answer.
Do u know if this pump utilizes a pinwheel needle by chance?

Yes, the Royal Exclusiv pumps use needle wheels, but that was not the problem.
During cleaning I found filter floss in the needles that might have caused less flow. But now all is clean.

It's such a chore! But better having it run right than not. I should probably do the same, it's been about a year.

A year is the service mark!

Looks great! Almost time for that double size upgrade

Ha, look who is talking about size upgrading....

pfffft....... that's not 'shallow'
Great build though!

It was supposed to be more shallow, but the tank builder made some mistakes during cutting and drilling the hole for the overflow.
The height is 30mm higher than requested and the overflow is about 12mm higher than anticipated. With the tank running there is only 15mm between water level and the top of the glass which does not allow me to go full on flow.
Still, it is shallow enough to reach the bottom with my arm without scuba gear.

You are supposed to clean skimmers?
... Sounds like hokum to me!?

I heard other people clean them as well.

 

[Jon Fishman]

I'm going 41cm deep myself..... won't even need to get my elbows wet!

 

[Janci]

Finally I got around to get the pictures to R2R.
I'll start with the tank itself.

Some top shots while doing the water change.
You can see that I had to remove some coral skeleton and placed it on the overflow. I managed to redirect the wave makers and it turned out some corals did not like the flow.

It is this time of the year again when the sun light hits the tank in the late afternoon.
It does not seem to bother the corals and it give a nice "touch" when looking from above.

Green, purple, blue, red... do not seem to be so green, purple blue and red in sun light.
More examples later.

 

[Janci]

More photo dumping.
Just some shots which turned out not so bad.

 

[bubbaque]

Very nice!