Slapshots 150

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Here is a story, a story of a little reef that has grown oout of control. In August of 2006 I switched from a 15year old FOWLR and built it into the wall. The actual aquarium is in the garage, in a insulated closet, with the 100 gallon sump, refugium and filter in the basement. The tank is a custom 4 feet wide, 32 inches high and 20 inches front to back with a central overflow. As you can see it is mainly an SPS reef. The main rockwork is two large pieces of lace rock the other 3 pillars are Figi. The design is a patch reef. Much as you see diving in Hawaii. I love to scuba dive and I love the islands so this is my little window to that world. The fish seem to really love swimming among the 4 pillars and a 8 inch brain. Each has staked out their own little territory.


The lighting is 2 400 watt Ushio 20 k supplemented by LED spotlights and t-5. The main display is 150 gallons. It is supported by an additional 300 gallons of water in the basemnet in variuos sumps.

This is what the system looked like in the beginning:

FTS


Left Side


Right Side


Before Project


After Project


Closet In Garage


Equipment In Closet


Filtration

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So here we are 4 years later and this is how it has grown in:


























Love these guys, they never stop working!





Free coral food! Both pairs spawn weekly. I consider this the proof my rockwork is right......a maroon pair and a Perk pair both in the same tank!

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Cooling and Heating:

I have a weird problem, 300 gallons of my water is in the basement feeding my 150 display. The heater and airconditioner for the house are in the same room as my fish room. So in the summer my tank is nice and cool. Pretty much the heater runs as the room temp gets into the 60s and I try to keep it stable year round so I am stuck with 79 to 80. Then comes winter and the heater takes the temp. up to 80 in that room. With fans, 5 of them, I can keep it at 79. I want 77 or even 76.

So, here is my solution. My water runs into an old trickle filter. It has a rain plate so the water rains down through the tower. I keep it because it has a built in skimmer and why not, extra water. I long ago took out the bio cubes and replaced them with a pile of live rick rubble.

Now the good stuff. I ran 4 inch flexible duck from and outside hole I drilled and added an in-line fan. This enters one side of the tower. With an elbow to direct the air down and to the oposite side. Then I ran a duplicate line to another hole located oposite and higher up and another in-line fan basically drawing out. Connected the fans to my controller and woohooo who a cooling tower. With this system I am able to keep the water at 77.2 all day long.

Chiller cost $600 to $900. My cooling tower $98.57 A couple of bonuses, no heat in the room from the chiller. Outside air for the PH issues, costs basically nothing to run. I did add $9.00 to the cost. I put draft guards at both ends so that when it gets real cold in the winter I wont have cool air blowing through when I don't need it. I also ran the air intakes from the skimmers into the vent tubing to further reduce the PH issues with the carbon dioxide from the closed up house.

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Filtration:

So step by step here is my minature world:

The water drains from the display and enters a 55 gallon drum. This drum has a airstone hooked up to an outside air pump. Other than that it has nothing else, no light no pumps. Call it a settling station or the deep sea if you will. It is 48inches tall. I syphon out the bottom every three months: (They are wrapped in insulation because with that much water in the basement heating it is a problem)



The water flow from this drum to another drum. The interesting thing is the first drum is full of sponges. The side are completely cover by them. This second drum has no sponges what-so-ever but is covered in tube worms, every inch. This second drum also has no light or pumps. There is a surface drain that drains to the protein skimmer and another that drains to an old trickle filter:



The water then goes through the protein skimmer, actually three skimmers on the sytem:



Then into an old trickle filter that the bio balls have been replaced by a pile of LR rubble. Half of the rubble is summerged the other half is exposed. This is where the heating and cooling take place. Another feed by-passes the skimmer and feeds a plate that basically rains on to the rubble.



The water then flows to a 50 gallon sump where it flows through a bed of Cheato:



The water then gets pumped in four directions.

Then goes into a 30 gallon deep sand (about 6 inches) bed/macro algae sump, then back into the cheato sump. I keep the macros sparse as this is suppose to duplicate a sea grass bed:



The other feed go to a carbon reactor and back into the trickle filter. I have recently added a Bio-Pellet reactor to help control the Nitrates.

pellets001.mp4 video by TSCWB - Photobucket

The other half gets pumped up to the display on the first floor.

I have tried to duplicate most of the ocean's enviroments that I believe contribute to a whole system. Until I treated for red bugs I had tons of pods and even needle point sized schools of pods/somethings in the fuges. They would school in these large masses. I hope they rebuild themselves.

My cheato fuge is lit 24/7 and my macro fuge is 12/12. I keep some invertibrates in there (a Hawaiian red reef lobster and coral bandit shrimp) so I feel they need the light and dark cycle. Both have enough light to support LPS. Some may call this overkill but I want the algae growing at full potential.

Lastly, there is a Tunze wavebox in there (go ahead and try to find it) and another tunze 6105 and a Korella 3 both hidden in the rockwork giving me the flow I need.

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Feeding:

Since I have entered the Dark Side and love the Azoox corals this has become an obsession with me. I have a fridge plumbed into the main return pipe. In it I keep a mixture of Fauna Marin, Reef Nutrition, several Phyto Concentrates. I mix this up in a container that lasts about three days. the tank is fed this mixture at a rate of 1/4 of a cup every hour via parristalic pump. This picture is from the testing phase so the containers were smaller. there is also an air pump pumping air into the contaier to keep things stirred up.



In addition I feed a mixture of pellets and flake food twice a day via a auto feeder. this is connected to my neptune so I can feed more or less if I want from anywhere via the internet. Also, nightly the tank gets fed a good amount of cyclopeeze and or Rods Food.

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Some Additional Shots:





Bad day for my Maly wrasse:

















My new favorite animal. He has almost doubled in size!



Can you find a more beautiful coral?

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[cg5071]

Sweet! Mad scientist,lol. I love your tank as I have said before. I was going to ask how you were feeding the non photo corals without disturbing the others with so much food. Do you have that problem? It doesnt sound like it.

[jolson10450]

very nice! i wish to get here some day! i remember seeing your photos on other sites, glad you posted them here! i love the wrasse eating clam photo!

[cg5071]

I have the same red starfish. They are cool and really active. I see him all the time in the 80g. I have also recently asked about getting a feather star. Probably fairly easy for you since you are feeding the non photos?