Gilroy 425g Build Thread (All Apex, all the time)

[Terence]

Oh, and on very large tanks, like mine, I think that an AWC using the new PMUP would be the best approach. The amount of time it would need to be on would be maybe 8-10 minutes to do 10 gallons each day. Using OSC and time statements, The accuracy might be +/- 3 seconds (max) - which would be less than .05% or about a half of cup of water - hardly anything to get worried about - 3.5 cups a week. Every three months it might show some sort of slight salinity shift (due to correction by ATO) that then could be corrected for. The one thing that would have to be worked out though is how things might be different with a full vs. a nearly empty reservoir. One might have to construct a floating rig for the pump to keep the static pressure equal as the tank drops.

 

[reefwiser]

How much head pressure does the Pmup have? Could the reservoir be 10 to 15 feet away would be an issue.

 

[Terence]

laterally is not an issue. Vertically it is 14' max.

 

[reefwiser]

Thanks

 

[Reef_Hobbyist]

I love my DOS pumps for AWC and ATO. I use small doses throughout the day on each. However, I wore out the ATO pump over an 8 month period. Granted I have a large system so it is running a lot 15,000 ml per day (about 4 gallons). The website recommends replacing the complete assembly (cover, peri-tube, fittings and roller wheel) approximately every 700 hours of pump run time. I am thinking $30 is not a big deal but I was surprised to learn I didn't even get one full year out of it.

 

[Terence]

Running it slower, if possible, extends the life of the pump head. We have customers do the entire pump head because the mechanical pieces of the rollers wear out too.

 

[Terence]

Having raised them from 1/2" little buggers and after nearly three years living in a 12"x12" cube, my black percs were brought home to the paradise and agoraphobia of 50x the water and space - and lots of new friends!

No anemones though - they had none in my cube for a year as it died and was not replaced. The best they can hope for in their new tank is some nice euphyllia.

 

[Fishlee]

Nice! They are all black. My black clown has an orange nose

 

[Terence]

My male has a tiny bit of orange on his nose but the female has none and has a cool misbar pattern.

After two weeks since introduced the last lot of fish I finally saw the yasa Hashi goby. See if you can find him in this photo.

 

[mwilk19]

I see him peeking out. Do you know if he was captive bred?

 

[Fudsey]

I almost thought it was his mouth sticking out of the gravel next to the coral.... lol

 

[Terence]

Here he is! This is an iphone snap from far away through 3" glass into the shadows - given that it is not too embarrassing of a shot!

 

[Terence]

I got the live web cam up and running again. It is a very old Cisco cam but its better than nothing for now!

a

 

[Terence]

Here is an update to what projects have been done lately.

Last week, after the granite went in, I made the bottom plywood "floors" for the stand. The one on the left is just there to hold another piece of granite so I used 1/2" cheap plywood. The one on the right I used the leftover piece of sanded maple plywood since it will be the bottom of the inside of the cabinet.

After that, yesterday I decided to create another orange mounting board and mount up the power supplies for the LED and make it look as clean as possible. Still some additional wire management to do, but its looking better every day.

Also yesterday I got one of my web cams back online.

Then today I decided to get the automatic ongoing water change going with another DOS unit. I got that installed and all the tubing run. I made up about 90g of salt and configured it to do 16ooo ml a day of water change.

All done for the weekend.

 

[lennyd19]

That is for sure!

 

[Terence]

I shot a few pics of some corals last night. Getting better with the camera and the new 105 lens. The 3/4" glass makes for some challenges though.

 

[FDAWG]

Don't let Paul near your tank

 

[Terence]

Don't let Paul near your tank

Well, most will not get your attempt at humor but the real lesson related to this is that if you are going to use an Apex, don't disable every safety feature built into it and then not look at your tank for two days while leaving the lights on for over 24 hours. Only an n00b would do such a thing.

Not the place here to hash it out - any other thread would be fine and I would participate.

 

[psirex]

I'll say it again - I am jealous of this build.....

 

[Matthias7]

Nice photography skills. Sweet looking corals