Perry's Shallow Water Acro Dominant Build Thread

[Perry]

The tank and corals look great with the T5's over it mate. I'd love to see a trend of people getting back into T5 and MH.
My favourite tanks over the years have always been lit by them. Including your old 120
Hope the corals do well mate!

Thank you for the kind words my friend!
I happen to agree with you, and while LED'S are proven to work, there is something that really appeals to my eye with t5's. The light is more white than most tanks around, and to pull colors is much more challenging, my buddy Scott mentioned to me the other day that you can't hide corals that are off a bit in white light. Anyway, at ghis point I will be happy seeing them live, lol.
Cheers

 

[Mattres]

Thank you for the kind words my friend!
I happen to agree with you, and while LED'S are proven to work, there is something that really appeals to my eye with t5's. The light is more white than most tanks around, and to pull colors is much more challenging, my buddy Scott mentioned to me the other day that you can't hide corals that are off a bit in white light. Anyway, at ghis point I will be happy seeing them live, lol.
Cheers

Agree with you on all fronts there, I used LED on my previous tank and could not fault them. Nothing works the same as a royal blue LED to make corals pop! For daylight viewing though I love a bright halide and/or the soft even T5 glow with a 'whiter' look.

 

[drawman]

Same here I've always liked the look of T5 but I grew up on it lol.

 

[naterealbig]

Bump for an update Perry!

 

[drawman]

Hope you and the tank are doing well Perry!

 

[Perry]

Hey guys,
So much to unravel here, but tank is running pretty much coral-less at the moment.
1. Foul rock since start, months after starting the tank I found oak leaves in the rocks, apparently the rock was left open to the weather, not discussed that way in purchase of tank and rock.
2. Hair algae!!!
3. Hair algae consuming nutrients, coral starvation.
4. 2 days ago I noticed a smell coming from the skimmer, had turned off a few days, and when turned back on, it smelled like electrical burning smell. Pulled skimmer, wire fried at base connection point to pump.

Before Covid, I lost all SPS frags, then got a bit gloomed out, and ran tank with just a few shrooms, and fish only. I decided prior to skimmer outage to add carbon source and bacterial source, with only blue led strip. Most hair is gone, coraline started to explode. I ordered a new skimmer, Aquamaxx ConeS CO-1, rated for 90gallon heavy. Also, @naterealbig has been holding some donated frags, to kick start a reboot. So despite being furloughed, I am making the best of things.
Monday I will remove remaining hair algae manually. I will do a large water change, and will hopefully make it to see Nate sometime next week.
Note: using Aquaforest zeolites, and phosphate minus stacked in a reactor, alsi using carbon in a mesh bag. I am dosing 3 drops of NPPro, and Pro Bio S daily. Will continue until I get a feel for skimmer and performance. I was never happy with the I-Tech 200, it was rated for a 200 gallon heavy stock tank, I believe it too was a chink in the armour. Thanks for following, wush I had a better report, lol

 

[drawman]

Hey guys,
So much to unravel here, but tank is running pretty much coral-less at the moment.
1. Foul rock since start, months after starting the tank I found oak leaves in the rocks, apparently the rock was left open to the weather, not discussed that way in purchase of tank and rock.
2. Hair algae!!!
3. Hair algae consuming nutrients, coral starvation.
4. 2 days ago I noticed a smell coming from the skimmer, had turned off a few days, and when turned back on, it smelled like electrical burning smell. Pulled skimmer, wire fried at base connection point to pump.

Before Covid, I lost all SPS frags, then got a bit gloomed out, and ran tank with just a few shrooms, and fish only. I decided prior to skimmer outage to add carbon source and bacterial source, with only blue led strip. Most hair is gone, coraline started to explode. I ordered a new skimmer, Aquamaxx ConeS CO-1, rated for 90gallon heavy. Also, @naterealbig has been holding some donated frags, to kick start a reboot. So despite being furloughed, I am making the best of things.
Monday I will remove remaining hair algae manually. I will do a large water change, and will hopefully make it to see Nate sometime next week.
Note: using Aquaforest zeolites, and phosphate minus stacked in a reactor, alsi using carbon in a mesh bag. I am dosing 3 drops of NPPro, and Pro Bio S daily. Will continue until I get a feel for skimmer and performance. I was never happy with the I-Tech 200, it was rated for a 200 gallon heavy stock tank, I believe it too was a chink in the armour. Thanks for following, wush I had a better report, lol

Glad to hear from you Perry and good luck! Also glad you got to that skimmer wire before anything went bad!

 

[Perry]

Glad to hear from you Perry and good luck! Also glad you got to that skimmer wire before anything went bad!

Thanks Tim,
In the myriad of issues, I suspect stray voltage can be added to the list I swear, it shouldn't be this difficult, lol. Hopefully the skimmer will be sized better to the system. I will continue to run carbon source and bacteria source to deeply exhaust any laden nutrients bound within rocks. If I didn't have 11 fish and tons of inverts, I would pull the rock and kill it with muriatic acid and bleach baths, so using this approach to cleanse rocks. Take care buddy!

 

[naterealbig]

Hey guys,
So much to unravel here, but tank is running pretty much coral-less at the moment.
1. Foul rock since start, months after starting the tank I found oak leaves in the rocks, apparently the rock was left open to the weather, not discussed that way in purchase of tank and rock.
2. Hair algae!!!
3. Hair algae consuming nutrients, coral starvation.
4. 2 days ago I noticed a smell coming from the skimmer, had turned off a few days, and when turned back on, it smelled like electrical burning smell. Pulled skimmer, wire fried at base connection point to pump.

Before Covid, I lost all SPS frags, then got a bit gloomed out, and ran tank with just a few shrooms, and fish only. I decided prior to skimmer outage to add carbon source and bacterial source, with only blue led strip. Most hair is gone, coraline started to explode. I ordered a new skimmer, Aquamaxx ConeS CO-1, rated for 90gallon heavy. Also, @naterealbig has been holding some donated frags, to kick start a reboot. So despite being furloughed, I am making the best of things.
Monday I will remove remaining hair algae manually. I will do a large water change, and will hopefully make it to see Nate sometime next week.
Note: using Aquaforest zeolites, and phosphate minus stacked in a reactor, alsi using carbon in a mesh bag. I am dosing 3 drops of NPPro, and Pro Bio S daily. Will continue until I get a feel for skimmer and performance. I was never happy with the I-Tech 200, it was rated for a 200 gallon heavy stock tank, I believe it too was a chink in the armour. Thanks for following, wush I had a better report, lol

Great to hear you are powering through Perry. Man, just one thing after another - sounds like you've got a great handle on things, and they will only get better from here.

Just let me know when you can swing by, and come grab whatever you want.

 

[Perry]

Great to hear you are powering through Perry. Man, just one thing after another - sounds like you've got a great handle on things, and they will only get better from here.

Just let me know when you can swing by, and come grab whatever you want.

Hey Nate,
Much appreciated man, your generosity is amazing!
Bad luck with the setup, I guess you could say that, lol. Despite the bumps in the road, I still have a good head about it. Life on the reef! I will be reaching out to you tomorrow to coordinate something this week or early next week.
Thanks Nate!

 

[Perry]

Alright, some decent news, it appears my skimmer arrives Weds!!!

 

[Rick5]

Despite the bumps in the road, I still have a good head about it.

Glad to hear this, Perry. All you can do is keep your head up. After all, it is a hobby.

 

[Perry]

Glad to hear this, Perry. All you can do is keep your head up. After all, it is a hobby.

Hey Rick,
Life on the reef!
This setup continues to test my skills, or lack thereof, lol. But, I am feeling pretty good, basically the longest cycle I've ever had, but at some point, the tank will mature Thanks for hanging with me here, hopefully I will turn things around for good.
Cheers buddy!

 

[Perry]

Update:
Skimmer arrived today, and started skimming 5 minutes after install. Very nice foam head, and sized much more appropriately for the system. So far, I am pleasantly surprised

 

[Perry]

For those of you following the journal, it just keeps getting better and better
So for a couple of months now, been running tank bottom open, as to be able to do maintenance easier as well as being lazy.
So my male chihuahua "Bobo", who is a trip and a half, can say mama, as well as a cool trick of playing fetch with himself. The wife gives our chihuahuas those chicken sticks or as she calls them chicken loli's. So they both chew the chicken off them, and occasionally chew on the rawhide leftovers, but needless to say, there are some lying around at all times.
Here we go...
Today, after getting skimmer set in place, as well as normal look over of the sump, I noticed one of the chicken sticks in my sump, yep that's right, all nasty and gnarly, clearly breaking down as it was quite soft and pliable.
So the adventure continues, and oh yeah, NO3 at 50-75ppm, no joke! Ughh, so a massive water change brewing
Just can't make this stuff up!
Cheers

 

[Rick5]

For those of you following the journal, it just keeps getting better and better
So for a couple of months now, been running tank bottom open, as to be able to do maintenance easier as well as being lazy.
So my male chihuahua "Bobo", who is a trip and a half, can say mama, as well as a cool trick of playing fetch with himself. The wife gives our chihuahuas those chicken sticks or as she calls them chicken loli's. So they both chew the chicken off them, and occasionally chew on the rawhide leftovers, but needless to say, there are some lying around at all times.
Here we go...
Today, after getting skimmer set in place, as well as normal look over of the sump, I noticed one of the chicken sticks in my sump, yep that's right, all nasty and gnarly, clearly breaking down as it was quite soft and pliable.
So the adventure continues, and oh yeah, NO3 at 50-75ppm, no joke! Ughh, so a massive water change brewing
Just can't make this stuff up!
Cheers

This is epic!

I view this slightly differently, though. You're never getting dinos with 50+ NO3, so Bobo's looking after you as far as I'm concerned.

A loli a day keeps the doctor away.

 

[Perry]

This is epic!

I view this slightly differently, though. You're never getting dinos with 50+ NO3, so Bobo's looking after you as far as I'm concerned.

A loli a day keeps the doctor away.

Lol, too funny, not a speck of dinos or cyano, a few tiny patches of hair, but nothing worth sweating over. I remember Bobo staring into the sump like a week ago. Just did a 20 gallon water change yesterday afternoon, so hopefully that and skimmer will lower soon. Not putting corals in the tank until water is testing within acceptable ranges. So this could delay my seeing Nate until next week, giving me the weekend to do more water changes. I am also strongly considering adding chaeto in the sump as well. Pulled zeolites and phosphate minus yesterday, only carbon in mesh bag. That's about it for now
Cheers

 

[Perry]

Cleaned up the tank, scraped glass, cleaned pumps, and did a 20 gallon water change. Here is the scape of what I am working with.
Cheers,

 

[Perry]

Anyone wondering about Aquamaxx-cones-co-1-in-sump-protein-skimmer? Here is my collection since Friday, first initial skim dumped as skimmer went live Wednesday last week, once broken in, I decided on this setpoint and here is what the skimmer has done in 3 days
Cheers

 

[Rick5]

Anyone wondering about Aquamaxx-cones-co-1-in-sump-protein-skimmer? Here is my collection since Friday, first initial skim dumped as skimmer went live Wednesday last week, once broken in, I decided on this setpoint and here is what the skimmer has done in 3 days
Cheers

Fantastic!

How's the noise level?

I have a Bubble King Mini collecting dust, but I'm looking for a smaller/small-ish skimmer for a Red Sea Reefer 170 potentially. I'm considering Tunze's DC offering, but I'm curious about the AquaMaxx now that you mention it.