FarmerTy

(SHAWN) In my tank right now I have: 29 g BioCube · Apex (By the way I calibrated the PH probe and it looks to be doing well so far. Did the 7 and 10 ph and it hit 7 in distilled so I think I am okay for now) · Lighting... There is only one bulb working in the tank and it is this: http://www.marinedep...IAQRPBL-vi.html I know that is not good, this is why I need to order the Steve's LED's today · Flow: a cheap koralia that came with the tank. I really like the rw-4 that you showed me. I think that I will get that. · Filter: In-Tank Media basket. Layer one: filter floss, Layer two: Purigen, Layer 3: Chemi-Pure Elite. Livestock: · Clownfish · Yasha Goby & Pistol Shrimp · Fighting Conch · Red Foot Conch · 5x blue hermits · 2 turbo snails · Money Cowrie · Emerald crab My water parameters last I checked a couple days ago were: Salinity- 1.024 Calcium- 255 Magnesium- 1160 Phosphate- 0.5 Ammonia- 0 pH- 7.9 - 8.0 Nitrite- <0.1 Nitrate- <5 I know the calcium is low, so I have been some calcium supplement that came with the tank to get it back up http://www.marinedep...IADCALC-vi.html I think that I am closer to 325 now. In terms of husbandry: I do a 5 gallon water change (15-25%) once or twice a week with pre-made water from Aquadome. It is hard for me to keep my water parameters in check in terms of minerals because it is super complicated. For instance, I know that there is a direct relationship between alkalinity, PH, Calcium, and Magnesium, like when you dose one raises and another one of them fall and that Magnesium has some ability to ease that transfer, but the more I read about it the more confused I get. I put up a hospital tank and that seems to be doing well as well. I do daily water changes in that tank and am dosing copper. Thoughts? In terms of acclimation: I came home and floated all the bags for about an hour to get them up to temperature. Side note: I keep my tank at around 80-81 degrees because I researched a lot of forums and people said that was great for coral growth and that fish dig it. Would love to hear your opinion on the topic. As I was floating the bags I went to Home Depot and got the equipment to make a shelf. I had to do it really fast so it was not the best job in the world, but I will try again tonight with more time. After acclimation I put the zoas in distilled water for 3 min and put them in the tank. Everything else I cut open and put them on the shelf. Oh I almost forgot... As soon as I put in the green star coral... I saw two small white bristle worms crawl right out of the live rock into the sand... sigh... I might be a lost cause. ha!

(SHAWN) Hey Ty: I have a ton of questions to get us started. Good news. I am in possession of a used apex system! I found a guy selling the full system with the lab grade Ph, and with the netgear wireless adapter! I felt like that was a pretty good deal and jumped on it. So, I stayed up until about 2 a.m. and have it up and running. On the not so good news side, a couple of the frags that I bought yesterday looks as though they have died in the transition And the worst is the jack-o-lantern. It is turning white in places and it was pretty darn expensive--I'm bummed. I think it is because of my lighting... it sucks... and so does my flow. That said, it is time to put this Apex to work. Here my list of questions: 1. I see that the Jebao pumps are the way to go. I mean the Vortechs and the Tunzes are like $250 per controllable pump. So, I am thinking that two controllable WP10s would be great. I know that in a 29BC one could be enough, but my thought process is that I would rather run a couple at 50%ish in cool patterns than 1 at 70-90% in a pattern. Do you think this is a good plan? 2. My second question is that there is no wire to connect Jebaos to the Apex! I see a bunch of DIY forum posts out there for creating these, is that what you did? If so, where did you get the parts? 3. Lighting! I want to do a retrofit kit for my BC. Currently my lighting is terrible. So, after a ton of research I think the best bang for my buck is from steve's LEDs. Here is the retrofit kit here: http://shop.stevesle...-SPS-BC29RF.htm. I know that you're not running LEDs, but I was wondering if you are running 12000k or 14000k? I am not a big fan of the major blue colors, however I want the coral to grow as I imagine that is what this small tank will be used for long term. I think that is it for now. Please let me know your thoughts, and thank you ahead of time for the time and patience. I very much appreciate your willingness to mentor. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (TY) Great find on the Apex Shawn. I saw it for sale and its not common to find a used Apex system. The people who own them love them and won't ever sell unless they get out of the hobby, such as this person. 1) One thing on the lab grade probe... unless it was stored properly, ideally in a pH4 solution but workable as long as it was capped with liquid at the end of it, then it is probably no good anymore. You can get calibration solution at most LFS, closest to you I guess would be Aquadome. Hunter or Gary can help you out with that. 2) For you question regarding the cable, you can look up Reef Angel Jaebo cable and order two of them. I would get in touch with Victoly on the club and PM him to modify the cables. He was the one who did my cables for me. 3) I think one WP-10 is sufficient. You are correct in having two blowing back and forth and causing all kinds of interesting effects and patterns, but I feel it might be overkill in your 28, as well as they are bigger sized pumps and two may be an eyesore in your tank. I'll leave that to you as far as preference is concerned. Perhaps look into the newer RW-series of pumps from Jaebo. Still controllable but have a smaller footprint and their flow is more dispersed, like the Vortechs, instead of more directional, like the Jaebo WP-series. 4) Your corals dying scream to me water quality, more than lighting or flow. How old is your MH bulb? What spectrum? What are you using for flow in the tank? When's the last time you tested the water? What are your parameters? 5) With lighting, growth is always best at the lower kelvins, 7k, 8k, 10k grow coral much quicker than 12k, 14k, or 20k. Honestly, I would just settle for whatever your main tank is going to be. I've experimented with growth and spectrum and in my own experience, yes, you get a little more growth but its nominal, and not worth the spectrum change for the corals. Bringing them from 10k to 20k stresses them out and they also take a little while to color back up. I found it tedious to have to move all my frags that I wanted to sell to my 14k lighting and have them color up before selling. I'd aim for 12k or 14k since you don't like the overly 20k look. 6) As far as LED recommendations, that is where I will fail you as a mentor. I have not kept up at all and so a general question to the club would benefit you more greatly. 7) When you get a chance, can you update me on your process for bringing the corals home and acclimating them? I know we only had a little time to run over the process at the swap but I want to make sure they are getting acclimated properly, as that may be part of the reason for some coral loss as well. Also, can you fill me in on what you currently have in your system and a basic rundown of your husbandry procedures (water changes, lighting period, parameters in tank, livestock, etc)? I want to get the whole picture here so I can best help!

I'm in, I'll finalize something soon!

Do I get naming rights?

Agreed! When can you start setting up the experiment? I will feed you all the Vietnamese Banh Mi sandwiches you can eat during your stay. Just tell the wife you're sampling in Corpus. I do agree with you, it wouldn't take more than 5-10 mins even at a low CFM to vent out the humidity. My lowest setting that I can select is 30 CFM and I can see that clearing out the humidity in no time at all. Since I already have the cart (or is it the horse?)... the vent fan arrived yesterday... I'll do an installed test and just see how the humidity and temperature react. Jim, the volt meter is reading 115 volts going through the red line when it is connected... so I guess it does pass along the voltage. In that case, I assume the SSR you first linked would be the best option, correct?

+1

Sold!

Hello ARC, Shawn and I are excited to be able to be a part of this exciting program that El Jefe (Mike Frame), the big honcho of the board, has been developing in the background for some time now. His vision was to take the summation of our reefing knowledge and preserve it in a format that is helpful for the casual reefer to follow along with to aid in their own decisions for the setup, maintenance, and execution of their tanks. What better way than to follow through the process of a new reefer as they start their new reef and all the stages and decisions in between to their ultimate goal? During this process, I hope to aid in the decision-making of our first mentee in the program, Shawn, and document the planning and decision making associated with his 29g starter build. The goal is to help Shawn achieve a broader understanding of the care and maintenance of his new tank and the biological functions that are occurring within it. As Shawn and I had already discussed up to this point, the goal is not for me to say, if you do these specific things, run these specific reactors, and dose these specific things to your tank, you will magically have a functioning and healthy tank. There's no magic formula though there are many techniques and practices that do assure a higher success rate. My goal was to help Shawn read his tank, observe how it reacts regarding nutrient levels, livestock additions, parameter levels, etc, and be able to implement a custom program to maintain the success of the tank and work with what the tank is responding with. There will be some growing pains to kicking off this new mentor program, so bear with us as we work out the kinks. In the end, hopefully we can achieve a build thread that is entertaining as well as educational. I'll leave Shawn to tell us a little something about himself, his goals, and about the specifics of his tank that we will be working with. Cheers, -Ty

There's always room for more tech! I currently run my clip-on fans based on temperature in the tank. I thought about doing the same once I install the vent fan and enclose the entire tank. For me, the issue was the added element of humidity building up now that the tank was enclosed. I decided to purchase a Panasonic vent fan rated for continuous use at a lower CFM with a triggered option to jump up to a higher CFM. For me in theory, having that run continously will alleviate any humidity issues I may encounter in the enclosed tank area. The option to ramp it up will be triggered by a VDM port on the Apex hooked up to the relay Jim helped me pick out. This will allow me to trigger it to the higher CFM and have my Apex trigger it based on my tank's temperature. I was afraid with just a time based or only a temp based trigger, that my humidity level would be ignored and may cause problems down the line in regards to electrical equipment failure, mold, rusting of the stand, or rotting of the wood for the canopy and sides. Sent via Tapatalk

Pending Sent via Tapatalk

Pending Sent via Tapatalk

Pm'ed back Tickle Fish. Sent via Tapatalk

Yellow watchman goby for sale... extra grumpy. $10. PM is the key. Thanks. -Ty Sent via Tapatalk

Got a blood/fire shrimp I'm not interested in putting in the main tank. $20 for the shrimp. PM is the key. Thanks. -Ty Sent via Tapatalk

James might as well be our BRS/ARC liason! I'll jump on this order. Sent via Tapatalk

Shhh, don't say anything about the experiments! You'll scare Shawn away! Nothing to see here! Once we get the mentor page setup, we'll give it a good test run and all of those interested can come along for the ride! I'm excited for the opportunity to contribute back to the club as I have received so much great advice over the years from ARC.

I've heard the same but since I haven't seen solid research on it and my tangs are still looking good and healthy, I will continue with the toasted variety. Occasionally you'll see the dried version at the MT supermarket but it's not consistent. Sent via Tapatalk

Never tried Lavar but I've been feeding the toasted variety for a few years now and they eat it up with the same gusto as the dried version. Sent via Tapatalk

They look like trash palys to me Rjohn. While there isn't really a database of which types of zoas or palys have toxins or not, from other reefer's experiences over the last couple of years with this particular one, I think the evidence points to them releasing amounts of palytoxins when stressed or disturbed. Sent via Tapatalk

This was my first frag swap as a seller and as an attendee. It was great fun and I had a blast chatting with everyone and getting to meet some of the new members on the board! Manny, Seth, you guys are just jealous that they would let me in the bounce house and not you guys. Thank you to everyone who made this swap possible! It was so much fun...When's the next one? :-) Sent via Tapatalk

Debacle overcome! Farmer Ty en route! Sent via Tapatalk

Thanks all. I'm dealing with the carnage but looks like I may be back on track. I will still have zoas, fungia plates, and maybe some purple stylo. I need a good lesson from Richard or Sherita. I'm a remote frag tank setup newb! Sent via Tapatalk

Btw, may be a bit late too but I'll update this post when on the way. Sent via Tapatalk

Looks like Richard will be the savior for us who just have a few random frags :3 He sold that one Makena to someone who will be setting up a tank so I wouldn't count on that being available. I just had a major chemical warfare disaster in my frag tank setup this morning so I'll have room in my 24 x 24 frag setup. The setup isn't pretty but should work. The carnage Needless to say, I won't have any purple stylo or screaming green birdsnest but should have some softies to sell off. I should have some room for folks and their frags if needed. Sent via Tapatalk

Agreed. To me, the ideal user of zeovit is one that has an SPS dominate tank, who's already collected 90% of what SPS species they want in the tank, already has great success of growing colonies from frags, and has great color on their SPS already. Then you take it to the next level and use zeovit to give it that extra umph in color. The reason I even mention having 90% of their SPS stock in tank is because I've heard from people who have used zeovit in the past, to have trouble acclimating new pieces to the very specific conditions in a zeo tank. Price is also a huge variable to think about as it isn't cheap, and if you run the full zeo system, you can really break your wallet doing it. Also, the full system has you dropping all kinds of different products into your tank daily or weekly. If you are just keeping a few SPS, I think you'd have better results just dosing amino acids instead of dabbling in zeo. Zeo is more for the hardcore SPS enthusiast. Plus, it's harder for you to crash your whole tank with just aminos. I've seen some very large, established SPS tanks come crashing down with a simple overdose of one product from zeos line of products. Use with caution! That being said, they are some of the most beautiful SPS specific tanks I've ever seen on zeo. Sent via Tapatalk