BPB's Humble SPS Dominant 90 Gallon

[dragon99]

Been a while without an update. Mass mushroom murder day today. I cannot wait to be done with these for good. It will be worth starting over totally fresh to never have to deal with mushrooms again. All the white areas were totally coated with layers of discosoma shrooms

How agressive towards acro's are the shrooms? That's a lot of white.

 

[Bpb]

How agressive towards acro's are the shrooms? That's a lot of white.

Very aggressive. They will swarm and kill an entire colony if I allow it. It’s hard to stay on top of them. I used so much kalk I had to turn off my calcium reactor for a few days. Alk spiked up like 1.5 dkh rested 6 hours after treatment. I just need to address them more frequently than once every 2-3 months.

 

[Bpb]

Shoooo shrooms, dont bother meeee!

More real estate for sticks!

Telling you man. Next tank will have some favia on the substrate level, along with a few higher end montipora, but otherwise only sticks will enter the water column. I’ve seen how things can become a plague

 

[justingraham]

Just read thru very nice tank enjoyed the read

 

[Bpb]

Just read thru very nice tank enjoyed the read

Thanks for stopping by and for the kind words!

 

[blstravler]

Really nice tank! Love your approach - I run a similar set up - find simple just works. After being out of the hobby for a dozen years I tried all the latest and greatest and have since gone back to what I did years ago - very similar to what you do now and simple really does work.

What did you ever decide on for your Calcium Reactor feed pump?

 

[Bpb]

Really nice tank! Love your approach - I run a similar set up - find simple just works. After being out of the hobby for a dozen years I tried all the latest and greatest and have since gone back to what I did years ago - very similar to what you do now and simple really does work.

What did you ever decide on for your Calcium Reactor feed pump?

I can’t rightly say where I left off on the calcium reactor issue last on here as far as documenting. Truth be told me lack of new item acquisition has been the sole reason for sparse updates lately. Big things brewing though.

As it stands now. My masterflex pump is still in operation. I have about 2 years left of tubing maybe. I cannot remember what model number the roller head is. But it does not accept LS17 tubing, and there is not a pharmed BPT option for the LS15 it uses. They only sell the LS15 tubing in 25 foot lengths last I checked and at $100 it’s just not worth it to me.

I purchased a handful of the fuel filters the aquamaxx and deltec reactors are coming with now, and once I run out of masterflex tubing or if the pump dies before hand (it’s very old) I will just run the reactor off of a maxijet.

At this point the Kamoer pumps are so new still and I’ve seen so many out of the box lemon issues, I just can’t see dropping 300 bucks for one right now. A 300 pump should run for 5 years minimum by my own standards. I’m just not convinced the kamoer has quite that reputation

 

[Bpb]

Masterflex has been unplugged. The noise was tolerable but not preferable in a living room setting. Happened across a kamoer for a partial trade of some acropora so I figured why the heck not. Which is funny considering a month ago I just said in writing that I wouldn’t use one. I’m allowed to change my mind. Thanks @blstravler! The noise level is basically nil. I cannot hear it. Now I can hear my skimmer as the loudest thing on the tank. Keeping the masterflex though in case the kamoer bites the dust

And here is a video of my only chalice.

 

[NY_Caveman]

That Chalice is awesome!

 

[blstravler]

Masterflex has been unplugged. The noise was tolerable but not preferable in a living room setting. Happened across a kamoer for a partial trade of some acropora so I figured why the heck not. Which is funny considering a month ago I just said in writing that I wouldn’t use one. I’m allowed to change my mind. Thanks @blstravler! The noise level is basically nil. I cannot hear it. Now I can hear my skimmer as the loudest thing on the tank. Keeping the masterflex though in case the kamoer bites the dust

And here is a video of my only chalice.

Glad the pump worked out - enjoy!

 

[BantyRooster97]

You need a brushless masterflex. I have one in my office & the skimmer, the fans on my biocube (next to my big tank) & the water flowing through my fuge are all louder than my masterflex. But I've heard good things about the kamoer pumps.

 

[Bpb]

You need a brushless masterflex. I have one in my office & the skimmer, the fans on my biocube (next to my big tank) & the water flowing through my fuge are all louder than my masterflex. But I've heard good things about the kamoer pumps.

Don’t I know it. The price tag on those is prohibitive for my budget. Even used

 

[BantyRooster97]

I bought mine at an online auction. There are lots of places that sell off old lab equipment. I actually bought several, to cut down on the shipping expense, & then sold off the other 2 at what it cost me to get them.

 

[Butcher333]

Whew! It can really eat away the evening after work going threw a build thread. Nice! I can’t believe this is a budget! LoL

 

[Tahoe61]

Whew! It can really eat away the evening after work going threw a build thread. Nice! I can’t believe this is a budget! LoL

Update.

 

[Bpb]

Whew! It can really eat away the evening after work going threw a build thread. Nice! I can’t believe this is a budget! LoL

Truthfully flattered. Thanks for stopping by! It has been a budget build through and through. There are a couple nicer items present on the tank, yes. But all purchased at heavy discount, or free. By free I rationalize equipment and coral obtained through trades and sales of my own equipment and coral to be free.

 

[Bpb]

Update.

Lousy filtered phone picture at night under blues. Still slowly fragging the corals down to the rocks. It’s a MUCH slower process than I anticipated. Mainly because I don’t feel safe shipping large colonies, and I haven’t finished the new stand yet for the 150 gallon. Needs stain and clear coat. Then onto leak testing. Anyway. Here’s a couple pics. Doesn’t even look like I’ve cut anything but I’ve taken probably 250-300 frags since Jan.

 

[Bpb]

I retract my statement that the 20,000k bulbs are snuffing out the color that my 14,000k had produced. This one is looking outstanding lately. Getting some yellow in there for the first time in the 2 years I’ve owned it

 

[blstravler]

I retract my statement that the 20,000k bulbs are snuffing out the color that my 14,000k had produced. This one is looking outstanding lately. Getting some yellow in there for the first time in the 2 years I’ve owned it

Think the frag I got from you is of the same Acro and mine is showing the same yellow even some of the tips are going yellow - sorry for the bad pic...

 

[Bpb]

Think the frag I got from you is of the same Acro and mine is showing the same yellow even some of the tips are going yellow - sorry for the bad pic...

Outstanding! I’m glad to hear it’s doing well!