Greg's 75g

gregzz4 · #1 02-03-2012, 02:24 AM

Monday was a whole lot of fun. I got to be the first one to ruin our new carpet Woohoo

I was plumbing the pumps from the sump in my office and some spa flex was not co-operating. So I decided to spin a bulkhead that had been tight for over a week. Next I water tested it. Not the brightest thing to do in the middle of the night. I should have just waited 'till Tuesday and bought a new bulkhead as I knew the gasket would leak.
Long story short, I had to pull all the gear out of my office and roll the carpet & underlay back. I ran a blower fan for 2 days and just now finished putting the carpet back. Plus I washed every towel we own as I used them all sopping up the leak.
Thankfully it was only RO water.
I have also decided to NOT run my pumps external. Call me a chicken, but even while I was installing new bulkheads today, I was having issues with the whole shebang, so I ran out and bought some glass squares to cover the bulkhead holes. The silicone is drying now and I will test the sump on Sunday.
There is enough room in the sump for both Eheims and that is the new plan.

Lets sum up my booboos thus far;
-Blown ballast
-Destroyed ballast
-Soaked new carpet and underlay, which now will not sit as flat as new
-Wasted 2 bulkheads, and have 2 more I shouldn't have bought

gregzz4 · #2 02-03-2012, 02:35 AM

On the plus side, I finally bought some Live Rock. Timing wasn't on my side and I ended up buying it from J&L instead of a member. I picked through 2 160g Rubbermaids and only bought 14lbs, but it will do for a start. It's going to cure while I put things back into perspective. Too bad I didn't buy some 2 months ago, but ce la vie.
Like the wife says, 'What's the rush?'
Maybe this rock won't need to cure ... I'll find out soon enough. It has been sitting @ J&L for quite some time already.
So, to end ...
It's official, I'm a Dad again. I have so far spotted 6 brittle stars and a very shy crab.

The Grizz · #3 02-03-2012, 03:31 AM

Ummmm........... Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh..............hmmmmmmmmm........... ........

We need more pics!!!

gregzz4 · #4 02-03-2012, 04:00 AM

You wanna see flood pics, go watch 2012

There's nothin' to document at the moment, but I will definately put 'em up when there's something worth lookin' at
As for the stars and crab, there's no way I could get you pics of them in the rubbermaid. They are, for lack of a more manly word, teensy

gregzz4 · #5 02-03-2012, 04:31 AM

OK, OK, pics
Last weekend I managed to get 2 circuits for the tank and sump run, and a third for the office AC. The tank outlet is not visible as it is on the other side of the wall, but you can just make out the back of the stand.
What you see here is the 20A for the AC and my guitar amp on the left, and on the right is one of the 2 15A circuits I ran. This one is split between a regular and surge outlet. The surge is for things such as the RKL and ATO. The other duplex is for simpler things like the pumps and some ( lots ) of GFCIs. I am only surge protecting the solid state stuff.

Next is a shot of what the base rock might end up looking like.

And this last shot is of my puny Live Rock purchase. Do you see the stars and crab? Ya, I thought you could

gregzz4 · #6 02-05-2012, 06:20 AM

Happy to finally have critters again. I see amphipods, brittle stars, at least 3 different types of crabs and a worm that sorta looks like a Baseodiscus hemprichii, except it's center red line is thicker, and the outer white is thinner, if that makes sense. It tried to have sex with the heater, until that came on. Then it curled up really fast to be blown away by the powerhead. I thought it was dead at first, but it hooked onto the edge of the rubbermaid and carried on.
The rubbermaid got a 100% WC today.
I've had no ammonia since thursday, nor nitrites, and the nitrates are well below 5ppm ( almost unreadable ). Plus no Phos.
Maybe I'll get lucky and be able to put the rock in the tank in the next couple of weeks.
Tomorrow I'll carry on re-testing the sump and put it into place. Then I'll consider plumbing the overflow, or maybe run some more wiring.
There's enough left to do that I won't run out of projects.

gregzz4 · #7 02-07-2012, 03:02 AM

No luck re-testing the sump yet as it's been too cool outside.
With my wife's help, I got the backdrop finished up. It's a sheet of black nylon ($6 Fabricland) and some industrial velcro to 4 corners. I haven't decided yet whether I will be cleaning the back glass, or let coraline cover it.
I cut the eggcrate for the tops and overflow

#8 04-20-2012, 06:59 PM

Hi Greg, this is amazing. I remember reading the first page and pointing out to my wife that he was able to steal the bathroom for his RODI station. She scolded me on that comment.

I don't know if you answered this or not already, but won't you have a detritius trap underneath that stand for your protein skimmer? It doesn't look like the water flows underneath that first baffle, but rather it goes over top.