Greybeard's Wide, Shallow Peninsula

Greybeard · Jan 28, 2020

So.. I bought an Apogee SQ-520 par sensor. Used it to test my light at my normal color (slightly blue, probably 10k, maybe 12) 2x Kessel AP700's. Wanted to actually SEE what the lights are putting out.

The lights have 5 power settings. I didn't test low power, but I tested the other four. I have to say, I was running two fifths power, and will be raising that (slowly) to four fifths power.

Some interesting data... all readings except the peaks were at the bottom of the tank. Where the islands are, I measured the higher and lower levels.

Greybeard · Feb 4, 2020

After reviewing the par ratings, I decided that some added T5's would be good. Picked up the Aquaticlife Hybrid fixture.

Who on earth designed that thing to have a cord at both ends?

Idiots.

Spent a couple hours redesigning it, moving the ballasts, re-cutting cord passes... Ok, now it works like it should.

Suspend my AP700's in the center, and back up it goes. Hanging kit from Aquaticlife is too short. Going to have to find some method to drop it a good 6". Why wouldn't they give you a little extra cable? Not like thin stainless cable is expensive... My Kessel hanging kit was long enough for a two story ceiling

Picked up a female Lamark's Angelfish and a few LPS corals from my LFS on Saturday. Had one that jumped, prompting me to put a screen cover over the tank. So far so good. My Tamini tang is chasing her around some, but not bad, and there's plenty of room for her to get away.

najer · Feb 4, 2020

Sorry you had the jumper.

Greybeard · Feb 4, 2020

najer said:
Sorry you had the jumper.

Thanks... that was a couple of years ago.

Greybeard · Mar 6, 2020

Ok, updates been a little slow in coming. First few months of a new reef, you know... just waiting it out.

Tank got wet 11/10/19... so I'm 4 months in.

KZ system is awesome, now that I'm starting to really understand it... KZ badly needs to get a native English speaker to do a good startup howto. Their documentation is just bad.

So, dosing Zeobak, Zeofood, Zeostart, changing out the rocks every 6 weeks, running a passive bag of carbon... Ammonia and Nitrite stay undetectable. Nitrates stable at 7. Changing Zeofood and Zeostart dosages a bit can send that number down to zero, or up to 40... you can almost 'dial' your Nitrate levels at will. Phosphate is a bit more problematic. I'm running very stable at 0.11. I'd like that a little lower, but as I'm running pretty sparse on corals yet, I'm not going to do anything about it.

Trident/DOS/BRS 2pt, Calc/Alk/Mag are dead stable. Calc is a little high, just over 500, but that's where it likes to be... I'm dosing very little. 10% weekly changes with HWMarine Mix, it just seems to want to stay there. Got my LFS bringing in Tropic Marin salt for me, so I'll be switching, as I use up the Marine Mix I have.

I've got a nice Stylophora that a friend donated, doing very well. A few small frags of Acropora and Millipora that are at least holding their own. Montipora seems to be doing well... though I killed a couple with excessive light, before I did my PAR testing. The Elegance and Duncan corals that I picked up are doing quite well. Fish are all fat and happy... I'm starting to see coraline algae spots on the plastic substrate and worm tubes on the back glass.

So, what's wrong? Eh. I got a bit of cyano going on. Ordered some of KZ's Cyano stuff, but I'm not real worried about that. Figure it's just part of the uglies

And, what's new: SLASH club in St. Louis has a frag swap this weekend... I'll be there, hopefully, fill up some of this empty space

Four weeks later, Oklahoma has the Tornado Alley coral swap... I'll be there, as well, if the good Lord is willing

So, time to fill this sucker up

Crabs McJones · Mar 6, 2020

@Greybeard thoughts on the real reef rock? How are you liking it?

Greybeard · Mar 6, 2020

Oh... ok. How 'bout some photos

DHill6 · Mar 6, 2020

Greybeard said:
Ok, updates been a little slow in coming. First few months of a new reef, you know... just waiting it out.

Tank got wet 11/10/19... so I'm 4 months in.

KZ system is awesome, now that I'm starting to really understand it... KZ badly needs to get a native English speaker to do a good startup howto. Their documentation is just bad.

So, dosing Zeobak, Zeofood, Zeostart, changing out the rocks every 6 weeks, running a passive bag of carbon... Ammonia and Nitrite stay undetectable. Nitrates stable at 7. Changing Zeofood and Zeostart dosages a bit can send that number down to zero, or up to 40... you can almost 'dial' your Nitrate levels at will. Phosphate is a bit more problematic. I'm running very stable at 0.11. I'd like that a little lower, but as I'm running pretty sparse on corals yet, I'm not going to do anything about it.

Trident/DOS/BRS 2pt, Calc/Alk/Mag are dead stable. Calc is a little high, just over 500, but that's where it likes to be... I'm dosing very little. 10% weekly changes with HWMarine Mix, it just seems to want to stay there. Got my LFS bringing in Tropic Marin salt for me, so I'll be switching, as I use up the Marine Mix I have.

I've got a nice Stylophora that a friend donated, doing very well. A few small frags of Acropora and Millipora that are at least holding their own. Montipora seems to be doing well... though I killed a couple with excessive light, before I did my PAR testing. The Elegance and Duncan corals that I picked up are doing quite well. Fish are all fat and happy... I'm starting to see coraline algae spots on the plastic substrate and worm tubes on the back glass.

So, what's wrong? Eh. I got a bit of cyano going on. Ordered some of KZ's Cyano stuff, but I'm not real worried about that. Figure it's just part of the uglies

And, what's new: SLASH club in St. Louis has a frag swap this weekend... I'll be there, hopefully, fill up some of this empty space Four weeks later, Oklahoma has the Tornado Alley coral swap... I'll be there, as well, if the good Lord is willing

So, time to fill this sucker up

Good to read this, going to start KZ on a 43g, going slow and hope not to kill anything. I was wondering how you keep nitrate up while using this, the food products?

Greybeard · Mar 6, 2020

Crabs McJones said:
@Greybeard thoughts on the real reef rock? How are you liking it?

Real rock: Eh.

It's man made, dry base rock, well cured, and painted purple. The purple paint lets you skip that bright white stage, and maybe helps some with the uglies... during the first few months.

I do not believe that there was anything 'live' in that rock when I bought it. Packed damp... it was heavier that way, since it's sold by weight, but I can't see any other benefit. Active bacteria? I seriously doubt it. In any case, it didn't establish a bio filter any faster than normal, using Dr. Tim's, which is what I did. Went by the book, just as it does with any other dry rock startup I've ever done.

Some attractive shapes, yes. Not a lot of rubble, which is great... Obviously worth the difference between it and reef saver or whatever? Not really.

Now, if someone were to start selling a bottle of purple reef paint to spray over our reef saver rocks... that'd be great

Greybeard · Mar 6, 2020

DHill6 said:
Good to read this, going to start KZ on a 43g, going slow and hope not to kill anything. I was wondering how you keep nitrate up while using this, the food products?

It's a balance, how much you feed, to how much of the base 3 you're dosing. Zeobac, Zeofood, Zeostart. I've never had any trouble controlling nitrate with this system... I do feed a lot, though.

Greybeard · Mar 17, 2020

Pump replacement on it's way.

I've been using Rossmont Movers. Good, solid pump, easy to clean, moves a TON of water. Two problems: 1)they're a little noisy ramping up and down speeds, and 2) The software for their Waver is absolute garbage.

Set up the waver, a hundred dollar option, mind you... App won't work on my Pixel3. Ok, so I've got a tablet, managed to get it working. Connect it to the wifi, set up the pumps, and do a wave pattern. Had to go watch a youtube video to figure it out... it's far from intuitive, but ok, that works. A week later, want to decrease cycle times slightly? Fine, fire up the app, manage active presets... crash. Boom. Had to factory reset the waver and start over.

every

single

time

I

use

it.

Yeah, it's that irritating. I was told to update the software... that fails. Tried an Apple phone, same thing. The app is simply garbage.

So... As recommended by folks on this site, a brand new pair of Tunze 6105's and an Apex dual Tunze control cable are on their way. Thanks BRS, for the 10% off St. Paddy's day sale

Hey, St. Patrick's day. Have to get out the Tulimore Dew for this evening's sippin' whisky

Cwentz758 · Mar 21, 2020

Hello sir! Love your tank! Looking at having my own custom built similar dimensions but not a peninsula. Few questions, first do you regret the height at all? Would you prefer an extra 2 inches? Second I saw you mentioned the 30in width was kind of bothersome at one point. I feel like 24in is just a smidge smaller than I’d like so was looking at 26 or 28 inches. Would you believe it’s worth it having those extra few inches or not worth it just go 30 which would be my max.
Thanks man love the tank!

Greybeard · Mar 22, 2020

Do I regret the low (18") height? No... not at all. For me, height and depth need to balance, and easy serviceability is a primary design constraint. I want to be able to reach anything in the tank, without having to don a mask and snorkel. The 30" width, to me, made the 18" height necessary. Then again, I'm old, fat, and don't have gorilla arms... Someone built differently might well be able to reach across a taller tank without problem. Some people don't mind stepping on a stool or something to access their tank. Fine... to each their own. I'll keep my feet firmly on the ground, thanks.

The 30" width... not certain where you would have gathered that I didn't like it... I may have commented that it makes everything more expensive, which is true, but I do, in fact, really like the width. In fact, I'd have happily gone even wider and shallower, but the location didn't lend itself to that. If I ever do another new tank, I may well go with a 4' x 4' x 16" tank, mount it low, and do a mangrove system.

If you're not doing a peninsula, then that 30" width becomes problematic. Reaching across 30", and trying to get to the back corner, especially over rockwork, is going to be a problem. How much of one, and would it be worth it? That's something only you can answer.

Thanks for looking, hope you enjoy your new tank!

Greybeard · Mar 22, 2020

Want to talk a bit about the pump replacement that I mentioned above. Got that done this weekend.

Tunze 6105 pumps, two, plugged into my Apex. Had to learn to use virtual outlets and profiles to make it work, but eventually, I got it pretty close to what I was wanting. 30% to 80% ramp, over a minute, then back to 30%. Opposite on the other side. Both pumps on the 'back' wall of my peninsula, blasting down the bottom outside. I'm getting random whirlpool eddies and good, quite random motion everywhere except right along the edges. Fine by me.

I'd like to reduce the max power a bit at night, but haven't yet figured out how to do that in my Apex. Being able to see pump speeds from Fusion is pretty nice. Not having to worry about my Rossmont wave controller wigging out on me? Worth every penny.

The pumps are fairly quiet... honestly, there's some hum, but it's not bad. The way I've got the tank mounted up against the wall, nearly in contact with the wall, with an open wall cavity behind it... I believe I'm amplifying the hum a bit, just through acoustics of the wall cavity.

Greybeard · Mar 23, 2020

Couple of shots... still early, but it's looking better and better

Quick 'fts'... yeah, I'm dealing with a little cyano. Have faith, it'll get fixed. KZ's Cyano stuff is working, but slowly.

And a center shot, catching a few of my fishes. Little red Gonipora seems to be doing well. Picked him up at the SLASH frag trade a few weeks ago. Might be the last frag trade I go to for a while...

Greybeard · Jun 10, 2020

Quick update...

Tank maturing, finally got out of the cyano stage, for which I am everlastingly grateful. LPS seem to be doing very, very well... SPS are OK, but not growing like LPS are. I'm still only 6 months in... no rush. Fishes happy and healthy, bare bottom plastic sheet probably 60% coraline covered.

Had a bit of an issue, my daughter's family were visiting, granddaughters loved looking at the tank, but I wasn't paying much attention... Let my Alk reservoir go empty. Wasn't monitoring the Trident... until I got an Apex alarm, Alk < 7.0

Really? Missed one day of dosing, Alk goes from 8.15 to 6.95? in a day? Wow. According to BRS's calculator, 6.95 to 8.15 should take 128ml of Soda Ash solution. I'm only dosing 40ml/day.

Refilled my Alk jug, levels coming back up steadily... we're at 7.28 now. I increased to 45ml/day until things get back to normal.

Greybeard · Jun 10, 2020

Had to take a room shot for another group today... might as well post it with my update, though it doesn't really show the tank much. Kindof gives perspective, though

tripdad · Jun 10, 2020

The couch is facing the wrong direction..........Nice room and nice tank.

Greybeard · Jun 10, 2020

tripdad said:
The couch is facing the wrong direction..........Nice room and nice tank.

Thanks. One of the reasons we bought this house. Big rooms, wide open spaces... and the price was right

I generally sit in the smaller couch. Tank is on my right, TV just left of center.

I do try and sit 'round the bar for a little while every evening. Enjoy a dram, perhaps? Look over the critters, see how everyone is doing. My daily dosing... Zeovit is good for that, encourages a more hands on reefing approach. If you can't spend a few minutes every day with your tank, what's the point?

najer · Jun 10, 2020

Greybeard said:
Thanks. One of the reasons we bought this house. Big rooms, wide open spaces... and the price was right

I generally sit in the smaller couch. Tank is on my right, TV just left of center.

I do try and sit 'round the bar for a little while every evening. Enjoy a dram, perhaps? Look over the critters, see how everyone is doing. My daily dosing... Zeovit is good for that, encourages a more hands on reefing approach. If you can't spend a few minutes every day with your tank, what's the point?

We need a pic of the counter top please, that is a beautiful part of this build!