Come pick my brain...I know there are more beginners out there.

[Krish]

I think this thread has almost reached it's end. With just over 2% brain capcity left, Seth will soon leave the building. You won't be missed :spit:

 

[Peppie]

Seriously, I do have a question for you Seth,
I dont run a sump. I do run an ATO. It is a 20gal tank sitting in the stand. I run the floatswitch to the pump in the 20gal freshwater holding tank. It is pluged into a Timer that comes on for 1 min. 6 times a day.
How would I hook up a Kalk reactor to this unit? Or should I mix my kalk before I add the ro/di water to the holding tank?
Thanks man, You are doing a good job.

 

[akunochi]

Krish- his will never end there are always questions! I'll just have to start asking my self questions....


Peppie- Good talking to you. I am labeling some pics now and will upload them in my next post.

 

[akunochi]

Here is a labeled pic of the flow through my reactor

 

[crystalemmaanaava]

we are moving a 100 gallon tank this weekend and are very much hoping to find a cheaper place to rent/buy buckets/water containers other than home depot? any suggestions would be great!

 

[Peppie]

Google.. Used food grade barrels

You may also find them on CL.
Make sure they are food grade

 

[akunochi]

we are moving a 100 gallon tank this weekend and are very much hoping to find a cheaper place to rent/buy buckets/water containers other than home depot? any suggestions would be great!

Between Canyon road and portland Ave there is a home that sells 55G food grade barrels for 20$. You'll need to rinse them out, but they are great for storing water.

 

[dtd87]

Regarding my refugium, I have a decent amount of rock and plan to add some chaeto. Should I add a sand bed? medium depth? It's 20 gallon Long with baffles 9 inches high

 

[akunochi]

A sand bed in a refugium should be a deep sand bed if it is going to be used. It should also consist of several different grain sizes of sand. This will allow the maximum diversity of life in there. The sand will also act as a PH buffer if the light is ran on a reverse cycle from the display tank.

 

[Peppie]

I would like some more info on the sand bed for my fuge also.

How deep is deep?
You stated different sizes. How much of each and in what order?
Does this bed need to be cleaned on a regular basis? If so how often and how deep?

 

[akunochi]

For example my last fuge was appx. 20Gallons. The sand bed was about 8" deep. I never cleaned it either. As far as teh granule size I mix them together vs doing a layered approach. I then add in my LR rubble throughout the top 3" of sand and finally place my actual LR pieces on top.

 

[wsboyette]

Don't be intimidated come pick my brain guys. If I can't help you I will find someone that can for sure or find the answer myself. I see a lot of guests browsing everyday and would love to help. Besides I have nothing better to do on vacation so please fire away. There is no such thing as a stupid question I promise.

I am setting up in a rather thin (front-to-back) 45 high, and plan at present to use powerheads in the lower rear corners to create some flow thru the lower half of the live rock structure - which I plan to aquascape in sort of a "V" arrangement, with little or no rock in the center. When using powerheads in this manner, specifically where should their output nozzles be aimed for best circulation thru the reef ?

 

[akunochi]

To clarify are you aquacaping like an atoll with the rocks forming a harbor in the center or more like an arch? I only ask because it will make a significant difference on flow placement.

 

[wsboyette]

More like a harbor, may be no live rock in the center. Wish I could sketch it for you. Just saw some Coralife power heads that seem to have a much larger output nozzle than the old-school ones, will probably use them.

 

[wsboyette]

"Aquarium Safe" Adhesives

A local aquarium shop operator told me of a concern he has that some adhesives, epoxies, etc. that are touted as "aquarium safe" are not safe. Is there any validity to his concern; how about the stick epoxies sold by online reef shops ? What experience have you had with these adhesives ?

Thanks,
Wade

 

[akunochi]

More like a harbor, may be no live rock in the center. Wish I could sketch it for you. Just saw some Coralife power heads that seem to have a much larger output nozzle than the old-school ones, will probably use them.

My setup is the same just go look at my build thread. With an atoll setup it will be difficult fo you to prevent dead spots without some sort of flo pushing from the front into the atoll area. If you are determined to use just 2 powerhead I would place them at the back near the corners pointed at teh front of the side panes. this will cause the flow to bounce off the glass around the front, clash in the middle of the pane and hopefully be directed into the atoll. The problem is you will only be generating flow on the bottom half of your tank. I would go with 4 powerheads minimum.

A local aquarium shop operator told me of a concern he has that some adhesives, epoxies, etc. that are touted as "aquarium safe" are not safe. Is there any validity to his concern; how about the stick epoxies sold by online reef shops ? What experience have you had with these adhesives ?

Thanks,
Wade

I have used the two part stick epoxy (where you roll it to mix the internal and external colors) with no issues at all. For adhesive on rocks I always do it while they are dry and use great stuff the foam or pond stuff. For acrylic I use weldon and for glass I used Momentive 103. i have used momentive to build my 200 gallon cube, weldon to build my sump and great stuff to bond my rocks together without any adverse actions at all.

 

[wsboyette]

Thanks so much for clarifying those things to me. Now one more thing (as Colombo use to say): How long can the live rock stand being out of water ? How much time will I have to aquascape and fill the tank. Filling will take a while as my RO does only 50 GPD and my mixing barrel is only 15 gallons.....

 

[cadillactattoo]

You will have some die off immediately because some bacteria is anaerobic. It won't really matter though because you will have to cycle the tank anyway. Just leave your skimmer running during cycle to remove the dead organics.

-akunochi via the tattoo shop

 

[wsboyette]

Thanks, I had gathered that I must run the skimmer with no lights during the cycle.....

 

[akunochi]

I run lights during my cycle so the algae cycle will take place as well.