Some up to date pics of my tank
- Thread starter cav
- Start date
Never had described like that before lol. When you say barracks in your location is that military?
Looks very good. Could you give a rundown of your current specs, additives (if any) and equipment?
Ok, I'll give it a go lol:
Tank:
180 litre Juwel Vision bow fronted tank (no sump)
Lighting:
Currently an Arcadia luminaire running 2 x 24w ATI tubes, 1 x Blue plus and 1 x blue special both supplemented with a TMC Aquaray LED light unit.
I'm awaiting the delivery of a 4 x 39w ATI Sunpower unit, I have in the cupboard waiting for it 2 x 39w ATI Blue plus and 2 x 39w ATI Blue special tubes.
For moonlights I have a 2ft strip of blue LED's
Schedule:
1000-1100 - Moonlights
1100- 2100 - 2 x 24w ATI tubes
1200- 2000 - Aquaray LED's
2100- 2200 - Moonlights
Filtration:
Around 24kg of live rock. For flow I have:
1 x Sun Sun 3000lph powerhead
1 x Koralia 3 3200lph powerhead
1 x Karalia 1 1500lph powerhead (this is in the bottom corner behind the rockwork).
These powerheads give me 7700lph which in my tank is around 42 x tank volume turnover an hour
Aquamedic Turboflotor Multi SL 1000 skimmer as hang on.
External filter (rated at 600lph) which is used for running floss/carbon (changed weekly) and purigen (changed every 1-2 months).
The outlet of the external is fitted with a T piece, on one side this is tapped off and forces flow through a Vecton 400 UV (15w), the tap is used to reduce the flow down so that the UV has around 200lph running through it meaning the water has more contact time with the UV bulb.
The other side of the T piece is also tapped off and leads the flow through my in line phosphate reactor which holds about 15 teaspoons of Rowaphos, flow is slowed so that the rowa is just bubbling away nicely, there is another tap fitted after the reactor so I can shut both sides off for media changes which is about every 4 weeks.
Other information:
Heating is provided by a 200w Rena smart heater controlled by an ATC300 which keeps my tank temp between 25.5 and 26.5 degrees.
Top up is via a Tunze Osmolater. Top up water container is around 15 litres, I lose about 25 litres a week in evaporation. I buffer my top up water with Sodium Bicarb (2 tea spoons every week). This keeps my alk around 9.6.
I add 1/2 a teaspoon of Calcium Chloride 4 days after my water change.
The addition of calcium and the buffered top up water keep my calcium and alkalinity in good balance:
Calcium - 430
Alkalinity - 9.6 - 10
The only other additives I add are Seachem Reef Iodide, 2 caps after a water change to boost levles to around 0.04, Seachem Reef Trace 4 days after water change to replace any elements removed by my skimmer and Seachem Reef plus twice a week, 2 capfuls after water change and 2 capfuls 4 days after water change.
My PH is constantly monitored by, you guessed it, a PH monitor lol.
I produce my own RO with a four stage 50gpd RO unit with DI filter and in line TDS meter.
I do a 30 litre water change every 8-10 days depending on my work shifts with Seachem Reef Salt.
This is my normal testing regime:
Tank tests day before water changes:
Salinity
Phosphate
Nitrate
Mag
Cal
Alk
Ph (just to make sure monitor is reading right)
iodide
15/20 mins
RO test:
Phosphates
Nitrates
about 5/6 minutes
RO/salt water mix tests:
Salinity
Phosphate
Nitrate
Mag
Cal
Alk
Ph
15 mins. These tests are carried out so that any levels that are lacking in my salt (usually mag) can be sorted before my water change, I boost my magnesium level in my salt mix using Magnesium Chloride/Magnesium Sulphate in the correct quantities.
24 hours after water change:
Salinity
Phosphate
Nitrate
Mag
Cal
Alk
Ph (just to make sure monitor is reading right)
iodide
15/20 mins
All tests are carried out with Salifert test kits except for phosphate which is tested with D&D Merck po4 test kit.
Salinity measured with a refractometer.
Tank has been running since June last year but was moved from my old house to my new house in November so I have started it's birthday from then so on the 22nd of this month it will 4 months old.
Fish:
1 x True Perc
1 x Cleaner Wrasse (coming up a year old)
1 x Scarlet Hawkfish
1 x Yellow Watchman Goby
1 x Royal Gramma
3 x Chromis
I also have 1 banded serpent starfish and 1 boxer shrimp (soon to be 2 years old).
I had a wipeout in about August last year where I lost all my fish except my cleaner wrasse to Brookynella.
My water params as of this week are:
Salinity 35ppt
Temp 25.9
PH 8.34
Mag 1350
Alk 9.8
Cal 430
Po4 0.008
Nitrate 25 (I disturbed a lot of the sand this week when moving some corals around)
Iodide 0.04
Hope that all makes sense.
