My 125 reef journal

[EricB]

I got the LED's hung and programmed last night. I'm very happy with them.

Had to add 4 cross braces to the canopy. They're not exactly straight, but I built the canopy and I'm not very experienced at building stuff. I'm hoping that when it comes to the 150DD build I can practice a little more patience also.

I was originally going to hand the lights from a single O-ring (?) that was screwed into the center of each cross brace. With the canopy itself only being 12" tall I had to come up with something different because doing it that way left the lights 4" off the water. I ended up drilling two 1/2" holes in each cross brace and passed the hanging hardware through the holes. By connecting the caribiners at the top of each hanging kit it makes this system a little adjustable. This puts the lights at 8" above the waterline and there's not much adjustment needed anyways.

 

[EricB]

I would like to figure out how to mount the lights using nuts and bolts instead of the wire but since I have no idea of what materials actually exist it makes planning construction projects difficult. I'll have to swing by Home Depot and look around. The way I have it hung now works for this tank, but since I want the 150DD to be more 'professional' I'd like to know my options now.

 

[EricB]

My girlfriend is taking photography classes and took some pics w/ her nice camera. There's not much to photograph in the tank, but the images are clearer than anything I've been able to shoot so far.

 

[EricB]

Another new toy arrived today: GEO 618

 

[SeahorseKeeper]

Yay for new toys!!

 

[EricB]

More new toys arrived today

 

[EricB]

Got the Phosban reactor installed. It's not running though because I want to get a tee for the feed line since it has to be dialed back so much.

Here's a comparison of my old Reef Octopus CR-150 next to the Geo 618

 

[gcrawford]

Looking good! Following along....

 

[EricB]

Looking good! Following along....

Thank you! I'm really anxious to get some corals in the tank. 2 1/2 more weeks until the frag swap :bigsmile: It will be just enough time for me to tweak a few things, get a few water changes done and get more comfortable with this calcium reactor before getting it running.

 

[EricB]

Got the phosban reactor running. The feed pump is in my return pump chamber. The effluent line is in the baffles b/w my fuge and return chambers and I directed the extra line from the tee on the feed line into the fuge. (if that makes any sense)

Also, got MORE toys in the mail today

 

[EricB]

Got my MP40wES in the mail today for service. Luckily I live less than 300 miles from EcoTech so I'm hoping it'll be a quick (and cheap) turn around. Picked up a piece of LR w/ coralline on it to seed my tank.
I'm regenerating my Kati/Ani right now and will mix up a 30 gallon w/c for the weekend.

 

[EricB]

Still haven't heard back from EcoTech about my MP40. I was hoping to get it back by next Saturday b/c of the frag swap but that's looking doubtful

 

[EricB]

New additions:
Pink Birds Nest
Blue Milli
Pink Lemonade
Red Digi
Blue Tipped Turaki
CC Tricolor Bonsai
Cwards Tri Color Acro
Bird of Paradise
Blue Tipped Acro
Sunset Milli
GARF Purple Bonsai
ORA Green Slimer
Pink Acro
Purple Acro
Green Pocillopora
Teal/Pink Birdsnest
Blue Tipped Stag
Orange Monti Cap
Tyree Lime in the Sky Stag
Aussie Hornet Favia
Red Planet
Tyree Sunset Monti
Pink Milli
Tri-Color Stylo

 

[EricB]

I made a little work surface out of a cutting board. Drilled a few holes in it for frag plugs/ test tubes.

 

[EricB]

A few shots of the corals. Can't get the color correct b/c I'm using my iPhone.

Luckily, my better (more beautiful) half promised me that she'd take some images with her DSLR in the coming days.... The best thing I brought home from LEAR:

 

[EricB]

Testing my calcium reactor over night for leaks. So far so good. Hope to get it online tomorrow.

 

[EricB]

Calcium reactor is leak free and running. I have the pH controller set at 6.6, bubble rate of 90bpm, and 60mL of effluent every min

I also heard back from EcoTech... apparently I've been running my MP40's sans pin spacer when it really needed to be used. <facepalm> No damage was done and they did a little maintenance on the wet side at no charge. It should be in the mail on it's return trip later today. I put the pin spacer on my other MP40 and it quieted down considerably. It hummed before but I just figured that was normal- I've heard other people complaining of the noise and it wasn't all that bad so didn't think anything of it. Can't hear it now! Haha... I can't believe I did that for so long

 

[EricB]

I finally went ahead and placed all the coral yesterday and didn't bother snapping off the stems of the frag plugs that had them. I figure I'll get them where they're happy and then I'll worry about moving them when the time comes. Worst case scenario is that I'll have to put them on new plugs and then remove the old plugs and putty from the rocks with pliers.
I went to a concert last night after puttying all the frags and came home to an overflowed skimmer and micro bubbles going into the DT. I forgot that using a lot of putty will do that. I tossed a bag of carbon into the overflow box and lowered the skimmer level. Also noticed some tissue death at the base of the Tyree Lime in the Sky Stag (one of my favorite pieces). I removed it from the frag plug, broke off the unhealthy part and just puttied it straight to a rock. It's looking okay this morning.