FarmerTy

I don't think you'll have any issues. Since its a frag tank, I would assume no livestock so your nutrients would be pretty low anyways. Macro should be sufficient for nutrient export. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Sounds great Jimbo! I do love staycations! Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Thanks Kim! I like to share the results in case anybody finds it interesting as it is fascinating to me. I have restarted my biopellets (solid form carbon dosing) about 1.5 weeks ago and while waiting for it you ramp up, I have been conducting the experiments. I'm sure there is some repercussion of removing it too fast but the SPS that are already weak didn't show more signs of stress. Hard to tell though, kind of like looking at a really beat up car and trying to notice if someone added another dent to it. My mainstay was biopellets as it held my nitrates in check in my last system and gave me such an awesome SPS dominant tank while having a large bioload as well. I'll have to start over a bit with my SPS colonies in this tank but I welcome the challenge and the fun that comes with growing colonies from little frags. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Been a little busy the last couple of weeks and haven't gotten to experiment anymore on the tank until recently. At the expense of some of my corals, and perhaps my copperband (RIP little guy), I was still going back and forth with experiments using macro, biopellets, and even vodka to manipulate nitrate and phosphate concentrations in my tank. To recall, the last thing I did was add potassium phosphate to my tank to increase the phosphate level in my tank so that there was enough readily usable phosphate for the bacteria in the tank to consume it along with the excess nitrates in my system (>50ppm). Well, I left it alone and my nitrates slowly drifted back up again after reducing it down to <10 ppm (let's give some latitude to the accuracy of the readings as I am using a simple API test for nitrates) and went all the way back up to 40-50ppm. This is with reduced feedings and I have been skimming wetter. I had already stopped using GFO during this entire timeframe as well and the phosphate level creeped back up to 0.10 ppm, when it usually is in the 0.04-0.05 ppm range. So what's a guy to do with 50ppm of nitrates and 0.1 ppm of phosphates? Invite carbon to the party! I dosed an absurd amount of carbon in the form of vodka. Again, I must state, please don't do any of this as I am just experimenting with my limits of tolerances. I want to know the furthest I can push it so that in the future, when I need it, I can know how far I can push it. I just don't want to be blamed if someone decides to pour a whole bottle of vodka in their system! So, I added roughly 20mls/day of vodka in my system, left the lights off (main reasoning for this is cyano is a big fan of carbon as well and when you remove the carbon limited environment, the bacteria will take off but so will the cyano... the key difference is cyano needs light... bacteria don't... so leaving the light off allows only the bacteria to make use of the carbon without having to compete with the cyano), and ran my skimmer wet. Results after two days was interesting. My phosphate went from 0.1ppm to 0.02ppm and my nitrates went from >50ppm down to ~10ppm. Now, to give scale, that's removing ~40ppm of nitrates and ~0.08 ppm of phosphates in roughly 250 gallons of volume! That's roughly 37.9 grams of nitrate removed in 2 days by bacterial consumption! Converted, that's 0.086 lbs of nitrates! I'm sure I must have miscalculated that so someone check me... or I'll check myself later when I have time! Anyways, part of the reason most caution to overdose vodka is because it will cause a bacterial snow storm as the bacteria will quickly multiply, cause the water to get cloudy, and use up readily available oxygen, and possibly suffocate your fish and kill them. This was averted with having a giant skimmer (they are not just for removing dissolved proteins, but aerate the water as well) and very high water surface/air ratio in the system. My water was cloudy and my skimmer went nuts. The bacterial bloom engulfed the nitrates and the phosphates in my system, as well as carbon and oxygen, and then got pulled out by my overrated skimmer (rated for 550 gals and being used on a 250 gal total volume). Anyways, fun experiment, some corals paid the cost via STN because I left the nitrate levels so high and let the phosphate levels creep up as well during the experiment. All in the name of science! -Ty

Naturally my gas runs out on a holiday. I'll check them out tomorrow. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

In all fairness, I should have said mothra instead of Godzilla.

Since my sea cucumber decided to play Godzilla on my ORA Jeremy's monti I will take that as a sign that it's time to frag it. Selling little baby colonies of the coral (roughly 2-3" with multibranches). Great grower and not very common Austin. I picked it up in California the last time I was there. Here's a link to the ORA website. Says it's a monti, growth is similar to a digitata but has larger corallites. It's virtually unkillable since I put it through super high salinity and super high nitrates and it didn't bat an eyelash. For those interested in trying SPS, this is a good coral to start with. It's basically easier to take care of like most montis but branches instead of encrusts, looking similar to most acros. http://www.orafarm.com/products/hardcoral/montipora/jeremys-green/ Save them before my urchin bulldozes them! Selling them for $15/piece. PM is the key.

I would go with your first guess. Let it color up first and then try to identify later. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Hit up victoly. He made mine with the reef angel cable. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Yeah, what victoly is saying about the tee. My last tank I just added a tee to the setup and used the appropriate plumbing parts to downsize it for tubing. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Get one of those taps they use for RO/DI and just tap your return line. The ball valve is also for shutting it off while you service your CaRX. When you throttle the effluent down, you will create some pressure with the higher amount of water going into the reactor. Really depends on the pump you use too. For me, I use a small water flow throttle to lower the input into the reactor since the pump I feed off of runs 5,550 gph, I felt safer pulling it back a bit. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Looking forward to the build bud! Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

I'd just tap your return flow if possible. Put a ball valve on it to be able to meter the flow and you're done. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

I consider the stunners purely ornamental on my tank and don't even calculate them into the amount of par. I am using a blue setup purely for dawn to dusk lighting. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

I think you got the right plan sir. I wouldn't read too much into the +/- 3ppm right now and just see how it looks over a week since you are only seeing minute changes in ppm. That could just be read error margin on the Hanna Alk checker. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Guessing you mean 115 ppm, right? Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

Agreed. Neat functionality but probably not a useful metric in the long run to track these two parameters. The required monthly plan killed it for me back when they first came out a couple years ago.

That's awesome bud! You got some mad skills!

Wow! That Dr. Pepper is smaller than your drain hole! What is this Oceans 3500 thing?

Those Skimz skimmers are solid! Well thought out designs and made from heavy duty acrylic. It's nice that yours doubles as a vase as well. Mine is an internal one and I can't tell it is on half the time since it is so quiet. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

This is going to be awesome! You should put something in the next picture for scale just so people have an idea the size of this monstrosity! Can't wait for this to be online! Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

I think that tank well look pretty nice in the garage man cave. Don't you? Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

It burns! Ouch! Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

My arms have atrophied from not doing water changes all these years. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk

I'm stoked! I'll bring my snorkel and goggles for whenever you need to clean your glass! Good thing a fellow reefer saved me from having to move this thing Sunday and made me work! Pheww... I mean, sorry I missed out bud!