My First Tank (56K = rake some leaves) *updated*

[Richer]

Here are some pictures of my first ever SW tank. I did at least a couple years worth of on and off research in keeping a reef. After some debating, and a bit of experimenting, I decided to go BB on this tank and hoped that I'd have enough flow going through the tank to catch most of the crude in the sump. Currently I have a Mag950 going through a SCWD with two Ocean Motion Revolutions on the outlets. I also have a Maxi-jet 500 and a Maxi-jet 750 running to provide surface aggitation (yes, they are old PHs, but they work perfectly). I figure I have a turnover rate of about 30x on this tank. As for filtration, I have two 1 inch" drains with Stockman Standpipes going to a 15 gallon sump. The sump is a combo settle out/fuge design with a bakpak 2 skimmer on it. My main tank has 192 watts of PC light (one 10000k and 1 actinic) over it, and my fuge has a 36 watt 6700k PC bulb over it, which is slightly overdriven, because the PC ballast is actually designed for a 55watt bulb. I use kalkwasser for my topoff via float switches, a bucket full of RO water and a kalkwasser reactor I bought off of Dez. All of my LR I bought from a couple members off of this board, and the baserock I got off of my girlfriend's dad.
So far this tank has been running in its current condition for about 2-3 weeks... before then, all the rocks sat in a holding tank for an additional few more weeks while I got this tank ready. My tank conditions are pretty much perfect... everything is at zero, and my pH ranges from 8.2 to 8.4 from the morning till the evening. Even after a couple of weeks I've noticed coraline growth on nearly all of my rocks... so I figure calcium and alk. levels are probably good too.

On with the pictures!

Here's the full shot of the tank:


The tank had just gone through a diatom and red cyano outbreak... as you can see from the overflow and on some of the rock, I still have some algae left over from that.

Here's another full shot from a different angle:

You can sorta see the sump area under the stand and the corner of my bakpak skimmer. Notice the pile of sand in the middle of the tank... the sand came from the rocks (I never was able to get all the sand out), and it seems like thats a lower flow area in my tank... crude tends to build up there a bit.

Here's a shot of a Xenia frag Harvey gave me:

The thing has about double in size since I got it... its pretty much a self sustaining coral, I've done nothing but accimilate it and ploped it in my tank.

Here's another shot of the Xenia frag:

I love this thing... I could stand there and watch it without getting tired. Although my girlfriend swears it gives her the finger whenever she watches it.

Here's a shot of a mystery mushroom that I found on a tonga branch:

Any idea what this is?

Here's a full shot of my 15 gallon sump:

I pretty much ignored most of the advice I got when I was asking about how to design a sump... and stuck with the KISS rule. Seems to be working out quite well IMO. Notice all of that sediment on the bottom of the sump? Thats crude that had come from the main tank... before I started everything up, that bottom was completely clean.

Here's a closer shot of the fuge area:

I got the Chaeto off of Al. It has grown from the size of a golfball, to something about 10x bigger than that. It must be doing a good job at keeping my nitrates down... because those are undetectable in my tank. Once again, notice how the settling out area of the sump seems to work quite well.

I did get a few mushroom frags from Patrick... unforunately, the rubber band I had on them was not strong enough to hold them, and they went flying around the tank. So no pictures of those. I forgot to clean the glass before I took the pictures, but I think you can get a pretty good idea at what I've got right now.

Thanks for reading

-Richer

[muck]

Nice Setup. Pictures don't do it justice...
That Xenia was just tiny when I seen it.

[Beverly]

Richer,

Can't see the BB on the main tank. How much crud acccumulates in there? If any, how do you get at it to siphon it out?

Also, whether or not you have nitrate in your system, I'd be getting rid of as much crud from your sump as possible. Crud always equals algae blooms of some sort if left in the system.

It's been almost two weeks since I set up our first BB tank. No sump to collect the crud, so I have to siphon out the crud from the main tank. I have left lots of area on the floor of all my new BB tanks so I can (relatively) easily siphon out the crud that settles on the bottom. Dang, I wish I had time to get pics together of the three tanks.....

[Richer]

Oh, I do plan on siphoning the stuff out... its just, with my vacation coming up, I've hardly had time to look at this tank because of all the loose ends I needed to tie up.

Initially, I attached a small piece of hose to a power head in the tank (the powerhead on the right), and used that to blow all the stuff off of the bottom and into the water column. It did work, but obviously it would cause a storm in the tank... so I think I'll just go with the old fashion way and siphon the stuff out with a tube.

I'll take more pics of the BB when I get home this afternoon.

-Richer

[Beverly]

Originally Posted by Richer

Initially, I attached a small piece of hose to a power head in the tank (the powerhead on the right), and used that to blow all the stuff off of the bottom and into the water column. It did work, but obviously it would cause a storm in the tank... so I think I'll just go with the old fashion way and siphon the stuff out with a tube.

I use a turkey baster to get crud into the water column so my mechanical filters catch it. Have been using this method for many years. Only problem with "storming" the tank is that much of the crud settles on the rock and corals, though some is caught by the filters which are cleaned after the crud settles. AMAZING how much crud is caught in the foam filters though

Getting the crud off the rock and onto the floor of the tank is also worthwhile as more crud is exported during siphoning.

[Richer]

Yea, having the stuff settle on my rocks was the biggest reason why I was going to stop using the powerhead method. I guess I'm going to have to go find myself a cheap turkey baster =)

-Richer

[Richer]

Here's some more pictures of the tank.

A few of BB pics just for Bev

Right Side:

Notice the small pile of sand near the middle of the picture. That stuff is apparently a bit too heavy to get put up into the water column and down into my sump... there is no crude there, just sand.

Left Side:

I got pieces of rock and such covering most of the viewable part of the bottom of the tank on this side... but if you look from underneath the tank, its completely free of any kind of sand or crude.

Middle:

This is the only place where crude gathers in the main show tank, its easy to access, so I'm not complaining .

Right Side:

Another shot of the right side of the tank.

Left Side:

Another shot of the left side of the tank.


Here's a shot of the entire setup I have for my tank... that spare tank on the side there is going to be my reservoir for top-offs while I'm on vacation... I figure 30 gallons worth of RO water should be more than enough for 3 weeks. Afterwards, I hope to turn that tank into some sort of fuge/frag combo tank. You can kind of see how cobbled up my setup really is... the only things I bought brand new were my lights, the mag950, the scwd, and the revolutions. Everything else was either given to me, or bought 2nd hand.


I found this bi-valve on one of the rocks I bought from Dez.

-Richer

[Beverly]

Thanks for the pics, Richer

I see valonia on one of the later pics. I have it it one of my tanks. It's a horrible menace. If you can remove the affected rock, scrape off the valonia, rinse rock thoroughly in outgoing changewater, you will get rid of some of it.

[muck]

Richer,

How about a few updated pictures?? hehe...
I am curious to see how much bigger your xenia is already.

[Richer]

Sure! Pictures to come when I get home from work =)

-Richer