Hart's 120 3/4" starfire expansion!

[hart24601]

Thanks for confirming up what the smell is, always wondered about that. I tried google, but that either led to ozone, which I knew it wasn't, or "the motor is broken!". I agree with you on the ich thing, that is what made me remember these guys. But apparently half of this hobby is shoving your opinion down others throats and fighting online, so I have not talked about it other than on my thread here.

I think not many use it just because they don't know about it, but the antiquated design doesn't help. If I hadn't used these before I would not enjoy the learning curve on a reef tank. But when you start making and selling an updated design I will be in line to buy it! :wink:

Happy to have you post about these and that I am not alone in thinking they are great for reef use when needed/desired.

 

[Paul B]

But apparently half of this hobby is shoving your opinion down others throats and fighting online, so I have not talked about it other than on my thread here.

I gave up mentioning many topics on all forums. DSBs, ground probes, ich, quarantining, hyposalinity, hair algae, cyano just to name a few topics I won't discuss any more. That is why I am writing a book. Even if I am the only one who reads it, It will be nice and peaceful.

 

[hart24601]

I have been using them since the 60s and have about 5 of them. Most for parts as they are made very badly and rust out, leak, fall apart etc. Most of the parts I made. My tank would not work without yearly cleanings with a diatom filter.

Hey Paul, if you don't mind giving me a freebie that may be in your book... What is the most important thing to keep these guys running? Oil? I use an oil that I have for firearms, has PTFE in it and works pretty well for them.

 

[Paul B]

Yes oil. Oil them every time you use them. The bearings are surrounded by a wicking material that infuses the oil into the bronze bearing. You need to keep it oiled. Even then, the thing will leak as the seal where the shaft comes out of the motor dries out and will leak. They are still available and you can easily change it. The bag will also break and you can sew it a couple of times, but then you will have to change it or make a new one. Never open the bottle unless you have to fix the bag. The seal on the bottle also dries out and as long as you don't touch it it is fine. As I said, not a really good piece of machinery and not thought out well.

 

[hart24601]

My gf really like flowerpot corals, it seems like their care has some a long way with the widespread availability of small food. The ORA red has been doing well so I wanted to grab a few more. I also have been wanting to find a few more vendors since LiveAquaria got bought by petco. I already use unique corals, so I was looking around and saw a pretty sweet flowerpot package from gonzo's. Placed order last week, but because of reefstock he didn't have time to ship, but included a freebie. I have gotten freebies before, and while nice, many times they don't really match the order. Like buying SPS but you get a LPS with sweepers and it's hard to find a spot. Well he gave an extra flowerpot, so I am really impressed with that! They came today and are still not out, so no pictures yet.

I also thought I would try world wide corals. They have ebay auctions, and since I have not ordered from them before I didn't know what to expect. The prices went pretty high, nothing crazy for really top of the line frags, but I have been in live sales from several places and have gotten coral that was a bit disappointing compared to the photo, so I was hesitant to spend much. I still won 2 auctions and got them today...

The coral are fantastic. I now have no doubts about WWC items. Well worth paying a bit more, it wasn't crazy - but more than a live sale - I always wanted a green slimer despite how common they are and won an auction for a radioactive green for $46 (plus combined shipping). It is the most green slimer I have ever seen. It has PE within a few min. It is even brighter than this pic:

I also got a greenthumb acro. It's not quite as teal as the photo on ebay, but more than what I could capture, once again nice PE in minutes:

Overall I am really impressed with WWC, the frags are top class.

Hopefully the gonzo FPs will come out soon. I put them in low flow for now, I might have to mess with a few things to get them happy. It's hard to have a mixed reef flowise.

 

[hart24601]

A bit of a bummer. The flowerpots look pretty terrible. Not sure why, I got them the same day as WWC corals above and didn't notice the water being any colder or anything like that. I was hoping they were just acclimating, but they have tissue recession. I talked with gonzo, who has been great about answering messages fast, and after sending a photo said he would send a new pack or credit for other coral. My gf loves flowerpots, so I think we will try it again, after the storms pass. Sad it happened, but gonzo has been great so far. The WWC corals continue to look great. I also bought a small blue squammy from pieces of the ocean, it has a cool pattern I have not seen often and despite it being pretty small, under 2" - which makes me nervous, the price wasn't too bad so I pulled the trigger. With the storms it will ship Monday. I think from here on out I will have fedex hold packages at kinkos.

 

[hart24601]

So got unique coral order in good shape. "UC 3D tort", "purple dragon", and Reef Gen - "Justin's Pink Goniopora burgosi". I have their red dragon and it's done well so purple should be cool too. I think the red might be in the tort's background.

Donna from unique corals came up with the name Kimpossible for the pink flowerpot, I asked a good name, like the pink power ranger, and she thought said Kimpossible and I like it.

One think that I am really, really happy to see is when I was glueing these guys I took a min to pick up the large maxima clam and look at the bottom for snails or anything other issues. I didn't see any, but I did notice when he was pulled in definite growth!!!!!!!!!!! Hooray! I have come to the point where if I don't see growth I assume they are going to die, even if they look perfect. No it doesn't mean he won't get sick or something won't happen, but it's a fantastic sign he is actually living and growing! Did I say how happy that makes me? Ha.

 

[gettaReef]

Nice corals!

 

[hart24601]

So... I knew one of the value units the royal blue LEDs were getting brown, but I peaked at another unit today and it looks like the same thing is happening to it. The 3rd fixture looks fine but I can't say I have much confidence in it now. I can see the color change across the tank now, and right after I bought new longer cords for them which wasn't cheap.

So I was thinking about options. I like lots of LEDs but was also thinking of a t5/LED fixture, but the only ones I see are 2 grand or so. I could try and replace all the burnt leds, but they will do it again, I could do nothing, or I could get 2 or 3 new fixtures for 200 a pop.

I already have the AI rail mount that I use for the reefbreeders, and after searching it looks like the hydra 26's just dropped 100 bucks to 300. So I am going to go with 3 hydra 26's and the director controller. I still would like a hybrid light, but this will cost under 1,000. I went with the 26s instead of the 52's as I would rather have greater coverage with less hot spots. Those 52s really make a spot that is pretty strong, and since I will be mounting them perpendicular I like the idea of 2 pucks wide rather than 4 since i don't need that much at the front of the tank. I considered adding another 26 for 4 units, but really 3 should be plenty I think. That gives 6 pucks - so about 1.5x a hydra 52, but the 26 runs at a higher wattage so it's about the power of 2 52s.

 

[jzaso]

I think the T-5 led combos are it! just added four tubes to supplement the two boxes I have on the 90-what a visual difference, softened the shadowing increased perceived brightness color pop-love it- did it for looks growth has always been good,diy t5 led combo??

 

[hart24601]

A DIY would probably have been the smartest idea, but I picked up 3 hydra 26. I will play around with them and might add t5 if I am not happy. I do think that is a nice combo. I was totally happy with growth and color under the reefbreeders, but I guess those LEDs don't last very long if run 100% even though they are 3 watt LEDs that are not driven past 2w even at 100%. I have never had a top tier fixture so to speak (I do wish they had lime), so I am excited to see how things look, if there is any difference. It will be nice to have the light intensity ramp up and back down through the day, the values were great, but in order to view the coral when I was home they had to be either "ON" or "OFF" and I could tell things were not happy with that much light before the lights shut off. Even the clam starts to pull its mantle back a bit a couple hours before bed. At least now I can have a peak intensity and ramp them down for better viewing at night when I get home. It will be hard to test PAR though.

If there was a single bulb t5 reflector that you could just easily mount to the rails I would put one on each side.

The spread of the 26 concerns me front to back, but the rockwork layout is sloped well for it I think, the one ceramic rock is tall in back and tapers down before dropping off and the other one is a platform mid level and most coral is in the middle of that one. After having crazy intensity on the 65 I like having a few spots of 100 PAR for low light guys.

 

[jzaso]

You will like those hydras and it looks like you could easily add a couple of t5 for adjustment if needed- I was shocked when I added those t5s could not believe the difference! looking good hart great build!!

 

[hart24601]

You will like those hydras and it looks like you could easily add a couple of t5 for adjustment if needed- I was shocked when I added those t5s could not believe the difference! looking good hart great build!!

Thanks for the kind words!

 

[hart24601]

Wow. So I ordered the hydra yesterday afternoon and I got them today! BRS is in MN so it's super fast shipping, that is nice they got the order out so fast!

Granted I am coming from reefbreeders with burnt LEDs, but wow, these are really cool. The director was easy to setup and allows all sorts of fun stuff. I was worried about front to back light with the 26, no issues there so I am happy, but I think I will eventually move to 4 units, 3 has really good coverage, but the SPS on the edge (the big monti) does shade on the side. I am really impressed with the increased color, I didn't think it would make such a big difference, but there really is.

I have been fiddling with settings and ramp colors. Will have to see how the corals look after a few days. I realize now that it will be very hard to figure how much light the tank gets per day since the intensity changes so much. I can't really use my PAR x photoperiod that I was using. It was easy to measure a spot that is 300 PAR and didn't change for 8hr, I don't really know how to do it now.

The 3 hydras are rated 90w each on max, so 270 total, my 3 reefbreeders were right around 300w total but I ran them 100% 11hr a day, but the hydras must have much more efficient LEDs because it seems waaaaaay brighter at 100%. I used their "quick start" program and then modified it a bit so it's not as white when I get home. I setup the rolling clouds and the lunar program too. I never thought I would like stuff like that, but it's fun.

I really don't know how things will respond to the current settings I have, but I am 90% sure I will get a 4th unit so that will force me to decrease intensity eventually I think.

 

[hart24601]

One thing that jumps out at me when looking at all the LED color threads is that I must not be very picky when it comes to color. I like the 10K look and I like 20K. I do lean more to the higher k, but I like that the various settings make the tank look different. I see a lot of people obsessing over getting colors just right and playing with each channel, but I apparently am not that picky.

One thing I like about these is that I can peak the whites for a couple of hours and then ramp them down faster than the other colors. This way I can see the tank at say 12k when I get home from work and then have it go to 20k over the evening. I really like that.

 

[hart24601]

Bought some berghia a while back. Saw a couple at night for nothing for a quite a while. The aptasia are going like crazy, I have been knocking them back even with those guys in there, but last night I saw one eating. I tried to get the camera while he was munching away, but he ran when I hit him with light. Looks like might be laying eggs too, there is sure plenty to eat. I have worried that the flow is too much in spots, this was in a lower flow area, so will just keep waiting.

Pic of the new clam, blue squammy although not quite as blue as on the vendors site! These little guys can be tough, so will have to see how well he does. It would really be a cool pattern if he makes it to be huge!

I have that overhang that doesn't get any light, so I figured why not fill it with feather dusters! I have had some of the "giant" dusters in the tank for years, I think they like carbon dosing, so seems perfect. This is now feather duster overhang! In the pic there are 2 coco worms and 4 dusters. The big ones were on sale at LA so got 6 and put two in other low light spots. Not a good pic as the glass isn't very clean and you an see **** aptasia, but it give that bare area a really cool look imo.

Update on the gonzo flowerpot frags. He reshipped and they all arrived great! Nice PE soon after putting them in. Can't recommend him enough, he reshipped for free and no hassles at all. Prompt responses and we chatted some time about what might have happened - seems to really care. A+

 

[hart24601]

So I bought two more large maxima clams from an ebay seller Yourfishstore1. I have set up a clam QT 20 long with one of my old reefbreeders fixtures, small powerhead and internal filter with some floss from the DT. I was sad to see the clams arrived dead. I knew it right away, as one of the bags had brown water, and sure enough, they were gone. One was worse and I didn't even bother putting it in the tank (one with rotten water), I was really hoping to save the other one, but by the time I got home from work it was clearly dead.

I sent the vendor pics right away, isn't that standard practice now? But they got back to me very quickly and refunded the entire auction back by this morning. So if anyone encounters Your Fish Store, they treated me right so that is a positive review from me. DOA is sad, but customer service is where it's at.


So I ordered 2 wild caught clams from pacific east. They are a bit smaller, but cheaper. The eBay vendor said there were tank raised, no idea if that is true, but I am nervous on getting some wild ones, but it was their weekly special and might as well try. Most I hear is they need crazy lighting, but I have that covered.

 

[hart24601]

I asked Dr Mac about the clams and if I could share that info. Here is what he had to say about the wild clams.

Email 1:

Hi Bret,
The wild Maxima clams are challenging to keep. Intense light and a well fed fish population is good. Stable water parameters are also important. They often normally do not open a lot, some so and some don't and that is the way they are. I have been to Polynesia setting up our collection station there and seen many on the reef and most do not open much, this is often a concern for some folks. The cultured clams are much hardier and open more, but we are not able to get blue ones at this time, maybe again later this summer as they grow out more. The price on the wild clams is great, at wholesale to the public, so if you are up to the challenge then we will gladly pick you the best we have available.
Thanks, Dr. Mac

Email 2:

Not a problem, I will pick you the best ones I have available. In French Polynesia, around the more remote islands in the Austral islands, we collect these clams. There are hundreds of millions in that area. Some open and extend their mantle more than others in the wild. While I would like every one to have nice extension it is just not so with many. Maxima clams from other areas of the world seem to all have good extension and all the ones we culture there have great extension, but not all the wild collected ones. The wild collected Maxima clams are challenging to keep and require very intense lighting, stable water conditions, and a well fed fish population. Over the years I have spoken with many hobbyists that have bought these clams and the most successful ones have larger well fed fish populations in their tanks. We started culturing Maxima clams about 6 years ago with our partner in French Polynesia, his background was in the black pearl culture industry, and in the beginning we funded the operation by collecting just the wild clams, now we can offer both cultured and wild, plus all the fish we collect their. We tend to import far fewer of the wild clams now, in fact this last shipment included 110 and were the first we have offered for almost a year because we are concentrated more on the culturing now than wild collection, but many folks had been asking for these larger wild clams. We actually prefer to deal with just the cultured clams, they are hardier and easy to keep compared with the wild collected larger clams that are more for expert level hobbyists and those up for the challenge.

 

[gettaReef]

Thanks for sharing, and good luck. I look forward to seeing them!

 

[hart24601]

I won the acro growout challange so I will get that 4th hydra 26! It worked out perfect, how often does that happen??? Would have been cool to win the overall, but I would have wanted to set up the tank prize and that would have ened up costing me more and more $$. This prize directly saves me money since I already was going to get the exact same light!

Other news I bought a BRS 50ml/day doser and will use this at night to dose kalk. I will still use 2 part on the bubbleM doser, but I have the room and my pH while better than it was, still has room to improve. I will not dose through the ATO as I don't like how changing evaporation alters the dose. I will do a fixed amount at night well under what my tank evaps and let the ato as normal during the day. The BM doser will pick up what the kalk can't supply.

I think this is what I want, I was explaining it to a friend and rather than type it I am lazy and screen grab: