A few of the newish additions

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_2.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_3.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_4.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_5.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_6.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_7.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_8.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_9.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...1/coral_10.jpg

Nice additions and excellent photo skillz. I see you are a fan of the Acans.

Quite the macro skills you have there SP! Keep em coming!

Thanks! And yes I like acans especially when Brett sells them dirt cheap :mrgreen:

Here's a quick FTS

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...1/coral_11.jpg

[quote=sphelps;728364]

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...11/coral_6.jpg

Can you ID this one for me....

Awesome collection

I believe they are just some sort of mini clove polyps, they are very small, that's a chalice in the background. They are kind of a hitchhiker and will likely become a problem but I enjoy challenges. Thanks for the comments.

You've got that thing just about stuffed mang!.....a sweet collection for sure.....a great looking LPS dominant tank:thumb:

These guys have been in my frag tank for a while now but will be going into the display soon enough.

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...02011/lion.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...011/lion_1.jpg

I love fuzzy's! I got to get me one now

ooohh those are nice;)


when the time comes and you frag the orange snakeskin chalice(the one above) we will have to talk trades lol :P:P:P

Unfortunately I have an update in the significantly negative form. While away out of town the tank suffered a complete crash. It's really one of those once in a million type of events where several pieces acted together screwing up something that you assume to be full proof, but of course nothing is really full proof. This is what happened:

Profilux float somehow has failed in the on position, it somehow became non responsive, not just getting stuck but actually somehow sorting out completely. Normally not an issue, profilux has max on time, shuts off top off and sets alarm, remaining off until manually reset.

However it seems for whatever reason there is another way to reset the alarm, if the power is shut off and turned back on it resets the alarm. Again a single power cut would still not be enough to cause any damage.

But I also seemed to have left town during the one time in the year the power company decides to apply rolling power cuts to my area. I've lived here close to 2 years and not a single power cut that I remember. Regardless the top off is capable of approximately 10 gallons before the alarm is triggered. Based on the new tank salinity over 100 gallons of fresh water was added meaning the power was cut approximately 10 times which neighbors have confirmed.

So the result was a huge drop in salinity, most fish seem to have survived but virtually all coral is toast. I'm in the process of changing water and correcting salinity but it's going to be a do over for sure.

For those using profilux in a similar manor be sure to check for this, an alarm is pretty useless if it can reset itself.

Wow, that completely sucks. Your tank was looking amazing, hopefully everything will pull through. I wish my system was more established and I could offer some replacement corals :sad:

So sorry to hear this! Every reefers nightmare. Here we think we build in as much redundancy as we can, but even then Murphy finds his way in.

wow!....sorry to hear this Steve......you had a bunch of sweet stuff:sad:.....

Holy crap man. That sucks so bad. I'm terrified of power outtages, you never know when it'll happen.

Sorry for your losses Steve.

I'm sorry to read such terrible news

So no water damage ?

Terrible!

Oh no :sad:

Yes there is some water damage but it's not that bad. I did actually had an overflow drain added when I rebuilt the fish room however I didn't get around to actually connecting it up to the drain before I left. I also had salinity control ready to go as well but again didn't spend the time on it prior to leaving as I didn't really want to add such things so close to my departure. In hindsight these two things would have saved the tank and prevented damage but it's not worth thinking about now.

The damage is minor as the new tile contained most the water limiting the damage to replacing the carpet underlay in the adjacent room. The basement only being partially developed defiantly saved a significant amount of work and parts that will need to be replaced.

'nuff said

sucks to hear about this, but is there a possibility of setting it up with a manual float valve some how so that if the water is full and no top off is needed, it can't get to the tank? might have to use a PSI relief valve in conjunction which will relieve to a drain if the float is closed and the proflux wants to pump.

Steve

The top off will be certainly be reconfigured to prevent such failures in the future. Such things have always seemed unnecessary in the past and profilux staff has confirmed many times in the past the use of additional safety is not required.

Ugh...that's about as "worst case scenario" as you can get. Sorry to hear about it.

NEW Auto Top Off Config
 

So I did some planning today for a new ATO system and would like some feedback.

I've added salinity control which really is just something I wanted to add anyway. I've used this saturated salt method before with success on other systems. This will allow for automatic water changes if I add later.

Note some features may be disabled or modified for vacations depending on length and given circumstances.

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...202011/ATO.jpg

I like the mechanical float, but I tend to like a mechanical failsafe on electronic stuff :mrgreen: I have never heard about the saturated salt mixture thing befor, is there anything that I can read to explain what it does and how it works?

Steve

The float does work with a solenoid and timer to control how long it can activate for and when. I could have added another electronic float but that just seemed pretty pointless as the tank also has a overflow drain so worst case involving that mechanical float is I waste a little water.

The saturated solution method is just something I came up with a few years ago and I experimented with it on a couple tanks I was caring for. I never looked much into it to see if others have done it so I can't suggest any links. The idea is for auto water changes but rather than storing a large container of say 100 gallons or constantly having to refill and mix up a smaller container this method utilizes your controllers salinity probe if available and uses up very little space. You use a container around 20 gallons as the example above and you add a full box of salt. You obviously end up with supersaturation but with proper settings controlling display tank salinity, the controller will switch between the two top off containers to keep tank salinity constant. You can then program a pump to remove water from the sump directly to a drain and the two top offs keeps salinity constant. Best of all, all that's needed is every so often is to add another bucket of salt when you notice little to no undissolved salt. The key is setting an alarm when tank salinity drops too low which will turn off the pump that removes water encase you forget to add more salt from time to time.

The only concern I had before I tried it was relating to solubility of various elements in the salt causing a constant imbalance. However, I constantly measured a system over a year and saw no noticeable fluctuation of measurable elements. It's probably not much different than only mixing a small portion of a salt container per water change which is common practice.

ya, looks good, just make sure you add cleaning the mechanical float valve to your schedule. I used to clean mine once a month, or right be for I would go away anywhere.

as for the saturated salt, neat idea. I had wondered about that but was worried about chemicals falling out of solution at a saturated level. have you had any issues with that?

Steve

I was originally worried about the same thing as I mentioned before but didn't notice any measurable issues. I think even if there is an issue, a build up in the saturated solution container can be prevented by allowing it to run out of salt every once in a while which insures everything from the salt mix is eventually added.

What about using just sodium chloride for the saturated tank ?
Then you can still maintain your params with other methods

So it's official, the tank is coming down and will be sold within a couple months. If anyone is interested in the tank itself let me know, otherwise I'll post it for sale once it's out and ready to go.

Sad to hear this...are you putting something else together?

thats too bad, such a nice tank im glad i got to see it before the crash i loved the layout, will you downsize to a nano or something else??

Sorry to hear about this man... Was a very nice tank!

Upgrading after it's sold?

No need for condolences, I was never super happy with the placement of this tank. Decided since I'm starting fresh anyway and the basement is near completion, I'm going to setup something new. It's around 275gallons and built into a bar area. Stands already in place thanks to Grizz and tank is on order thanks to Dave.

Glad to hear you're starting over and not getting out of the hobby, and sorry to hear about the ATO failing :sad:

yay!! if you need any help im down:)