Elos 160XL set up

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Seabeck is on the Hood Canal about 6mi due west from Silverdale (just north of Bremerton) if that helps! I don't know Thor but I imagine he might be checking out Jeff's (DolphinLVR) set up in La Conner maybe?
 
dragoneggs said:
Seabeck is on the Hood Canal about 6mi due west from Silverdale (just north of Bremerton) if that helps! I don't know Thor but I imagine he might be checking out Jeff's (DolphinLVR) set up in La Conner maybe?
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Yes he is going to check out Jeff's system. He will get some PAR reading from his PS LED fixture. If possible I'm going to ask Jeff to get a reading with the fixture 16'' from the surface. His tank is 24'' tall too so it should give me and others a good idea of how the 1w led do at that height.
 
dragoneggs said:
Here are a couple of FTS with the 1w whites only on, and other with 1w whites and 1w blues on. This not full lighting as I don't have the 3w whites on in either picture. I am very happy with the rock work. Lots of valleys, tunnels, cravasses, and a very 'airy' bottom to the reef for circulation. You can also see on the floor in the back, the control units for the LEDs.
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Oops... just realized I missed attaching the pics and got the wattage wrong too for this post! Let's try again... I just finished programming the light schedule. 3W Blues on 10am, 3W Whites on 11am, 30W Whites on at 1pm... 30W Whites off at 7pm, 3W Whites off at 9pm, 3W Blues off at 10pm. This gives a total light cycle of 12 hours with peak lighting for 6 hour duration. This of course can be tweaked once I see what this will do for growth. There are also four 1W violet moonlights that are on while all others are off giving a nice night feel.

First pic is 3W whites only, Second is 3W Blues and 3W whites... more pics coming.
 
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More rockscaping from different angles

Here are a few more pics from different angles...

I am very happy with the way it turned out. Thanks again Eric!!! Only 11 monster pieces of live rock that basically filled the tank. Tons of places for the fish to swim and have all kinds of prime perch locations for coral, zoos, rics, all right! Notice the caverns all over the place. Sorry for the hazy pics. I don't have any filtration hooked up yet so I am just stirring the tank will a couple of mini tunze that I dropped in to help mix the salt and keep things moving.
 
More news... got the mini tunze's on the DT back wall near the bottom and and pushing forward at the quarter points. I think I got something here!

Oh, and the skimmer is fired up just cycling in my sump since the water has no place to go (no plumbed to DT yet) but... oh boy, looking good. Pics later.
 
roscoe said:
Looking good! You going BB?
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No way! I gotta have sand for all the critters I love. Starfish, snails, wrasses, you know the drill. I am though worried about sand size... I like the sugar white but I plan on putting a couple of vortech MP40s. I want to mount them on the back (out of sight) and blow under my reef towards the front glass hoping it will lift everything up and over my reef flowing towards the back at the surface. The mini Tunz are temporary stirring units until I get the MP40s ($$$). But... and the big but is how whether I will have a sand storm. I might have to go with a coarse sand mix which never is white enough for me.
 
dragoneggs said:
No way! I gotta have sand for all the critters I love. Starfish, snails, wrasses, you know the drill. I am though worried about sand size... I like the sugar white but I plan on putting a couple of vortech MP40s. I want to mount them on the back (out of sight) and blow under my reef towards the front glass hoping it will lift everything up and over my reef flowing towards the back at the surface. The mini Tunz are temporary stirring units until I get the MP40s ($$$). But... and the big but is how whether I will have a sand storm. I might have to go with a coarse sand mix which never is white enough for me.
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I don't know if your sand will stay put. I have suger grain size. I have mines on opposites end of each other on the long side of the tank. The reason for that is. There is no way the sand will stay put if I mounted the MP40 on the back of my tank. The flow will be too much and it will bounce off the front glass tumble down and displace all your sand in the front of the DT. I have trouble keeping sand in the front of my tank due to having the tunze on the Wavy Sea. When the WS rotates towards the front glass the flow clashes with the VT and it creates an underwater wave that pushes most of my sand back towards the middle of the tank. However like you mentioned you might have to go with something more coarse. I know the sugar isn't working out for me.
 
roscoe said:
I don't know if your sand will stay put. I have suger grain size. I have mines on opposites end of each other on the long side of the tank. The reason for that is. There is no way the sand will stay put if I mounted the MP40 on the back of my tank. The flow will be too much and it will bounce off the front glass tumble down and displace all your sand in the front of the DT. I have trouble keeping sand in the front of my tank due to having the tunze on the Wavy Sea. When the WS rotates towards the front glass the flow clashes with the VT and it creates an underwater wave that pushes most of my sand back towards the middle of the tank. However like you mentioned you might have to go with something more coarse. I know the sugar isn't working out for me.
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So the big question for me... is there such a thing as coarse white sand? That's what I would ideally like.
 
Possibly a mixture of coasre and sugar might do the trick maybe a 25/75 mixture will still give you that white fine sand look and still have enough weight to keep them from getting displaced by the flow.
 
roscoe said:
Possibly a mixture of coasre and sugar might do the trick maybe a 25/75 mixture will still give you that white fine sand look and still have enough weight to keep them from getting displaced by the flow.
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I don't know... but I am really worried on this aspect. I have spent a lot time in the planning and doing it right phase and this part I don't feel I have it figured out but it might be worth an experiment. Thanks!
 
So you say you're going to have "corals". Zoos, ricordia, and what else? I'm mostly curious if you'll be putting in acros?
 
Okay the hardest working members of my system... the mean Vertex Alpha 250 skimmer and SequenceTarpon pump. Still need to figure out my saltwater mix tank which I think will go directly beneath my RO/DI storage tank and plumb it all, but I did fire up the skimmer and it is running in the sump. The pump will handle the significant head (about 12ft) up to my DT. Oh and another FTS now that the lights are lower. Still can't get over the clean (no canopy) top with so much access to the tank. Also the lower height to the rim means I can reach in and touch the bottom no problem! Oh and no euro brace to fight with too. Sorry... just enjoying being wet again!
 
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Bricky said:
So you say you're going to have "corals". Zoos, ricordia, and what else? I'm mostly curious if you'll be putting in acros?
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Yeah Brick, good to hear from you!... everything and stuff I never had before, like Chalice, Scoly's, Aussie Acan, I don't know but I got lots more room now without a center overflow and trying to accomodate a island tank with four sided viewing. I got depth! Big beach... I am excited! Oh and my Superman that Eric has been parenting during my hiatus! And Dang, I know he will help me out as I will have to rebuild my SPS that never got enough time before I had to tear down. I need to see some new pics of your ocean (to put it mildly) for inspiration.
 
Mark, I'm glad you like the rock and the rock work. That's not the home grown Florida junk.. that's the good stuff. Glad to see that you got the tank filled and ready for the next visit. See you in a few days and we'll get er finished up and running..

Tx Eric
VA
 
If your looking for a good mix of fine and coarse substrate, check out Indo-Pacific Black. It's a good mix of white and black sand. Has a really cool salt and pepper look. I have used it now in 2 different tanks and it works pretty good. My MP20's are mounted on the back of my display and they do push the sand back a little from the front, but not so much that its bare.
 
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