YES - BIG PROPS TO MARINE AQUARIA. I've known the owner since he was in high school. He's gone above and beyond for me. He's opened the store later at night just so I could get a bulkhead and plumb my tank. Last night he personally came to my house to pick up the "test" fish because I didn't want to kill it. He was closed but made a special trip to pick up the fish and bring it to the store. He has given me beer at the store (it was a plus 32 day last week). He has taken in my dying damsels. He even offered his freshly mixed store saltwater so I wouldn't have to wait for my R0/DI to fill. I declined cause I didn't want to take advantage of him. I know I could get some stuff cheaper online, but I like supporting local vendors. I know that he's worked his @$$ off to get to this point and taken on a lot of debt just to cater to us hobbyists.

Thanks for the comments about this build thread. Hopefully I'll get outta this hole and maybe you'll be able to see the tank in person one day since you are in Edmonton.

Alright, despite the setbacks here are some pictures of the other progress that has been happening. Last week I set up my skimmer - nothing special, here are the pics.

It's an old PM Bullet 3 skimmer.
http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/t...g?t=1248922836

You can see the auto top off in this picture, it's nothing fancy. That Kent float valve came with the sump. It's hooked up to my RO/DI. I do have an electronic ATO system and I might use it but I'd have to find time to make an acrylic float switch holder. I don't know if I want to get fancy with all these extra backups. We'll see how I feel down the road. This works for now.
http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/t...g?t=1248922879

For some reason everybody always like the foam pictures.
http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/t...g?t=1248923012

And I got an Aqua Controller III so I hooked it up tonight. I love it. I can control my pumps and heaters down in the basement from upstairs. I wasn't gonna get a controller but I picked this one up for cheap with the two DC8's. Endless possibilities. I'm not a computer guy so it took me a little while to program it.
http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/t...g?t=1248923055

Under the stand:
http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/t...g?t=1248924173

In the basement:
http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/t...g?t=1248924245

Other updates. My 40 gallon frag tank is full of fresh salted and heated water, so tomorrow I'll go and get another fish to see if it's the salt that's causing my problems. Enjoy.

I don't think its the 5 year old rock. The rock I got from your cooking tank for my nano has been in there with a tailspot blenny for over 2 weeks and the fish is still going strong. I'd lean more towards bad salt.

Good point Rich, I didn't even think about it that I gave you some of that rock. Well, I got another test fish today and it is not labouring or breathing hard at all and seems well. There is no rock in the tank though. So now I could probably safely put rock in with him. I'm thinking some big water changes and I should be okay. Whatever was leached in there should be diluted somewhat by now. I mean, I used the same water to change half the water in my mantis nano tank at work and the mantis is going strong. We'll see I guess.

:confused:Do you feed your skimmer via the return pump?

Glad to hear this fish is still going strong. I really can't see it being the rock either. Does the tank with the fish in it have the same salt tho?

Sure do.

Yes it does. I used a complete pail of IO salt and I used another bit of a pail of IO salt that I had. And the 40 gallon frag tank has the SAME salt and same RO water as the original fill. I was trying to keep all of the variables consistent. Well, we'll just see from here. I had a bunch of rock in with the fish overnight and the SAME fish seems to be doing just fine without and labouring or hard breathing.

I.M.O. skimmer should get pre-filtered water to get the best of it!
That way you take out of the water not only the d.o.c but also different organic particles, sort of mechanical filtration.
Maybe you want to consider drop feeding it or a separate power head from the first chamber of your sump.

I have a filter sock (200 micron) that will take care of fine particles. Other then that it'll be the same water no matter where I pump from. Thanks for the feedback. All the other baffles are just bubble traps. And even if I pump from the first chamber, the water's going through the filter sock anyway.