Hello everyone. I am excited to be part of Reef2reef. I figured I would take a second and introduce myself. I have been in the saltwater hobby since I was 16yo. I started with a 55 gallon fresh water tank that I switched to salt / reef. It’s amazing that anything survived in that tank. I had no money and no clue. I was using tap water and a two bulb florescent shop light I picked up on the side of the road. When I went to college is switched to a nano on my desk. That eventually became a 29 gallon with a sump as I progressed through my college career. After college I had a 120 reef in my apartment. I got out of the hobby for about 6 months when I purchased my house. After 6 months I got the itch and dusted off the old college nano and set that up on my desk at work. When we had my son, I went out on paternity leave and brought the nano home. During paternity leave I build a 16 gallon reef. After 2 years of that I built my current 60 gallon reef. The wife and I just decided now that the pack and play is out of the living room, we now have room for a large built in tank (120 gallon +). Let the fun begin!
My current tank is a Deep Blue Pro 60 cube. I built my own stand for it. It has a 150 watt HQI xm 10k running on an M81 ballast with a Helios reflector. I have 12 Luxeon RB and 4 semileds hyperviolet 3.0 running at 700ma to handle the actinic and give a little pop! This is all in a floating canopy. Circulation is handled with two Jebao RW-8’s. I kept the original durso overflow and return. The overflow flows down and half is directed to a homemade ATS. It’s a 4x6 screen in a homemade acrylic box. It’s lit by 4 660nm and 1 rb led on each side. The other half of the overflow water goes to a filter sock holder which is primarily left empty! Both the scrubber and sock feed the first chamber in the sump that houses a 300 watt heater on a controller and a Coralife Super Skimmer 65 (more of aeration). The next chamber holds the return pump (Rio 3100 plus) and float switches and temp probes. I have a homemade top off system that uses an aqualifter and a 10 gallon reservoir. I manually dose BRS 2 part.
The current livestock is:
True Perc Clown
Ocellaris clown
Pseudochromis
Melanurus Wrasse
Copperbanded Butterfly
Heniochus Dipherues
1 cleaner shrimp and a clean up crew.
I have a Blue Hippo in QT as we speak which is the final fish as we are overstocked!
I have 2 Rainbow BTA’s
And a bunch of SPS, LPS, and Zoas.
That’s me and my involvement in the hobby in a nut shell.
My current tank is a Deep Blue Pro 60 cube. I built my own stand for it. It has a 150 watt HQI xm 10k running on an M81 ballast with a Helios reflector. I have 12 Luxeon RB and 4 semileds hyperviolet 3.0 running at 700ma to handle the actinic and give a little pop! This is all in a floating canopy. Circulation is handled with two Jebao RW-8’s. I kept the original durso overflow and return. The overflow flows down and half is directed to a homemade ATS. It’s a 4x6 screen in a homemade acrylic box. It’s lit by 4 660nm and 1 rb led on each side. The other half of the overflow water goes to a filter sock holder which is primarily left empty! Both the scrubber and sock feed the first chamber in the sump that houses a 300 watt heater on a controller and a Coralife Super Skimmer 65 (more of aeration). The next chamber holds the return pump (Rio 3100 plus) and float switches and temp probes. I have a homemade top off system that uses an aqualifter and a 10 gallon reservoir. I manually dose BRS 2 part.
The current livestock is:
True Perc Clown
Ocellaris clown
Pseudochromis
Melanurus Wrasse
Copperbanded Butterfly
Heniochus Dipherues
1 cleaner shrimp and a clean up crew.
I have a Blue Hippo in QT as we speak which is the final fish as we are overstocked!
I have 2 Rainbow BTA’s
And a bunch of SPS, LPS, and Zoas.
That’s me and my involvement in the hobby in a nut shell.
