Myka's 69 SPS Tank 2015

[Myka]

EDIT: Wow, just because I type at 72 wpm doesn't mean I should write a dang novel! Sorry guys!

Today it's cold and raining outside. I wanted to get the stand panels cut, but hubby doesn't want to move his old truck out in the rain to make room to do the woodworking. So I decided to tackle the right side rock structure that's been driving me nuts. I spent an hour messing with it and I'm still not content. I think the tallest point of it is too tall and that the right structure looks too much like the left structure. Ugh... While I was doing that I epoxied 5 frags/mini colonies to the rocks (Hawkins "Echinata", A desalwii, A sarmentosa, A lokani, A insignis) and now I don't think I'll sleep tonight as I worry about Epoxy Tank Brown Freak Out (herein referred to as ETBFO) Episode 2.

I bought a couple of 5' pieces of 1/2" aluminum tube and a tube bender to make a couple light brackets. I bent the first one and it went smooth. I bent the second one and it broke. So I drove halfway across the city to go get another length cut. I bent that one, and broke it too! They are closed now until Tuesday, so no light hanger this weekend.

The tank is really starting to color up now, though a few pieces are still struggling. There is noticeable weekly growth too. I started taking photos of every piece on the 1st (or close to) of each month. So I will have some pretty cool growth sequence photos in a year.

I picked up a Hanna ULR Phosphorus checker, and my tank reads 0 ppb. I've been feeding the fish 3x a day, and lots too. I added a Cleaner Shrimp to help clean up the mess I'm making. I've been allowing my filter pads to sit in the sump for 2 weeks without cleaning. I've been dosing a homemade Sodium nitrate solution to supplement NO3 and the tank has been going through about 0.25 ppm per week. Is the tank "using" the nitrate or is it "processing" the nitrate? I don't know.

The sand bed is driving me nuts. It is Caribsea Seaflor Special Grade, and it's so uniform that it looks fake to me. I have a small bag of Caribsea Super Reef sitting on the table beside the tank right now, and I'm humming and hawing about adding it. What to do? What do you guys think?

The other thing that's driving me nuts is the salt mix I'm using - H2Ocean. As the years roll by it seems the alkalinity slowly gets higher and higher. I tested today's new bucket:

Cal 415 ppm (Salifert)
Alk 9.6 dKH (Salifert)
Mg 1230 ppm (Salifert)

Unfortunately, only Instant Ocean, Reef Crystals, and H2Ocean are available locally. We had Tropic Marin Pro Reef for one batch, but my LFS didn't bring it back in. I tried to convince him to order a pallet of Reefer's Best when it was on sale this summer, but I couldn't pre-sell enough to convince him. So I bought a bottle of Muriatic Acid, and I'm going to lower the H2Ocean's alkalinity. I like to do 50-75% water changes 3-4 times per year, and I can't do that with 9.6 dKH when my tank is 7.0 dKH and full of SPS.

Cool new screen! I have a buddy that has a 3D printer and I got him to print me up some custom round screen frame corners to fit into my one-piece eurobrace. I notched a hole in the two back corners to accept the wires for the powerheads. The corners are sweet! These are V1.0, and he's working on improving the design a bit. If anyone else wants some made, send me a PM!