My BioCube 29 Journal

[BaritoneJP]

Water change today and all seems good. I've decided that I'm going to have to do a larger water change that 20% to get nitrates lower that 10 ppm. They seem stuck there for some reason. But not having a RO unit makes that hard but ill line up getting more water this week.

I have a frag of watermelon zoa that is melting away. I have stock lights on my biocube 29 so I doubt its the light. My two frags of button polyps are fine and are open and growing. I'm just not sure what happened with the other. I hope they recover.

I'm looking at getting the AI Prime for the price pint and built in controller.

I need to also get a good test lot for alk, mag, and calcium. Not that I will really know want to so if any of those are off numbers.

Baby steps.....

 

[BaritoneJP]

 

[BaritoneJP]

Tank parameters are about the same, however my nitrates are still hi - 20 ppm as of yesterday. I put a shave brush plant in the tank about a week ago to try and recycle nitrates. I haven't seen any results from that, however one plant in ~25 gal of water may not be enough. I'm doing weekly 20% water changes.

 

[BaritoneJP]

Just put an AI Prime on my biocube ... Now to learn more about light settings. Neat feature on the prime is a coral acclimation setting that takes your settings, reduces the intensity for a configurable amount of time... Gradually brings up the intensity to the configured parameters.

As a side note, it is past time to get a RODI ...I wonder however if a water softener would be second best. I know of one the removes chlorination and outputs a TDS of 004... I have seen RODI units do worse than that.

 

[philfree]

Two things.
First, Get an RODI unit. You wont regret it.
Second, Arent the AI Primes cool?! i got one for my 18x18 cube when i started it last saturday, its been really fun tinkering with it.

 

[BaritoneJP]

Two things.
First, Get an RODI unit. You wont regret it.
Second, Arent the AI Primes cool?! i got one for my 18x18 cube when i started it last saturday, its been really fun tinkering with it.

I'm going to get a RODI ... I just agonize to much over things...

Yes, they are cool lights what settings are you using?

 

[philfree]

This is what I last set it at after playing with it last night. Likely gonna adjust it to get more blue or 20k look once I get corals in there

 

[BaritoneJP]

This is what I last set it at after playing with it last night. Likely gonna adjust it to get more blue or 20k look once I get corals in there

This is what I'm using currently, I'm using the spectrum to set instead of the manual or auto. I don't understand about setting LED lighting but I understand spectrum the most if only by a little.

Starting in the morning at deep blue, then ramping up slowly to 14k to 15k, then to 10k by around 6 then back down to the deep blue.

I have the coral acclamation on, so all of these settings are reduced by 25% for the next 2 weeks.

 

[BaritoneJP]

Picture update on my coral

 

[Bones]

Looks like your coming along nicely. I have a 29g BC as well that I removed the lid and made rimless. I'm running it BB SPS dominate with AI Prime as well. Here's a pic of my BC and my prime schedule.

 

[BaritoneJP]

Looks like your coming along nicely. I have a 29g BC as well that I removed the lid and made rimless. I'm running it BB SPS dominate with AI Prime as well. Here's a pic of my BC and my prime schedule.

Thank you and I like your set up. Never thought about having no sand... I like the look.

I see a coralife skimmer, how is it working for you? What else is in the back part?

 

[Bones]

Thank you. This is my first BB(bare bottom) tank and I'm liking it so far. I wanted to have heavy flow and it can be challenging with sand in a small tank. The skimmer is a Tunze DC9001 and it does a good job pulling crap out of the tank. In the rear chamber I currently have IM desktop reactor (running GFO), carbon in mesh bag, rubble rock, heater, and return pump. I had a in tank media basket but I felt like to constricted the flow to the return so I ditched it. The only other thing back there is the tube and clip for my ATO.

 

[BaritoneJP]

So, here I am over two months in to my new tank and I am enjoying it but I am also frustrated. Well I thought everything was doing well especially for and new person and a new tank, but my red monti cap that I got as a tester is dead. It was fine and even exhibiting growth for that whole time but in one week it died.

I have lots of advice, but no real money to venture off in any direction. Foolish or not, I was hoping to get away with not dosing and dealing with that (not that I really know how). So I have much to learn to even know were to start.

I have other coral that are doing well and growing, even other SPS. But I thought I could do this ... not so sure anymore. I'm going to stay at it for a year at least as I have been told it takes at least a year for a tank to even remotely become stable, whatever stable is ...

Just feeling a little down about the whole reef tank thing at this point in time.

 

[Virtualbasil]

It's just a small setback don't be discouraged! what kind of salt are you using?

 

[BaritoneJP]

It's just a small setback don't be discouraged! what kind of salt are you using?

Thank you ... I'm using instant ocean reef crystals.

 

[Tahoe61]

This is a hobby with a lot of up and downs. There will be the tank Nirvana days and the days when you want to throw the tank off a second story building, and the rest of the time you're tinkering and trying to dial the tank in.

Stay away from sps if you do not want to dose and make your over all tank maintenance easier. There are a ton of fantastic corals out there, sps are my personal favorite but it does take time and a lot of commitment to grow them successfully in a nano, I know because I keep nanos.

You can do it, just do not set your expectations too high. Be happy with a softie tank, gorgonians, zoanthids.....

In the images the tank looks very good for a first tank. It's a hobby not a race, your tank does not have to look like anyone else tank.

Go slow and enjoy.

 

[Lonely reefer's]

Imo you don't need to dose anything for what you have
Just need good salt mix and offen water change
Here're pic of my 29 bio cube

 

[BaritoneJP]

You can do it, just do not set your expectations too high. Be happy with a softie tank, gorgonians, zoanthids.....

In the images the tank looks very good for a first tank. It's a hobby not a race, your tank does not have to look like anyone else tank.

Go slow and enjoy.

Thank you for your comment ... My zoas aren't doing that good, we'll some are and some are not. Some are growing like wild and some will not open while some are withering. I have an AI prime that I'm running at 70% max mostly in the 14 to 20k range over an 8 hour period. (With a small bit of moon at the start and end)

Imo you don't need to dose anything for what you have
Just need good salt mix and offen water..

Thank you for your reply ... I do a weekly water change of 20% with instant ocean reef crystals mixed at 1.026 and is aerated overnight. (At same temp as tank +/- 2 degrees)

 

[BaritoneJP]

Most recent AI prime light schedule ...

 

[namkiii]

Most recent AI prime light schedule ...

How much temps did you loose by switching to the ai prime? I'm having trouble with my tank getting to hot so I put a fan on it and it gets about a gallon of Evap a day