Carbone's 2000 liters reef

[Carbone]

An update from sunday

[Carbone]

and a few more ....

[Bello]

Brilliant!!!!

[Carbone]

thank you !

[Newbie Aquarist]

Ceautiful looking tank C.

[dave.m]

Terrific colours! Maybe you could update us on your current lighting and filtration, i.e. how are you running this tank to get such excellent results?

Thx,

Dave.M

[Carbone]

currently i have 2 x ATI (8x54W) and 2 x ATI (4x54W).
as for filtration, i'm using 2 bubble magus skimmers (with 2 aquabee 2000/1 pumps each), 2 buckets with zeoliths and GFO if PO4 gets readable on hanna.
Additions are done with an automatic dosing pump for alk and CA. The trace, Sr, Fe and I are made manually each week.

I tried in the past biopellet, but had some tehnical problems with them (the reactor was clogging when power gets down).

[dave.m]

Are there any parts of your set-up that you would change if you could afford to? Are there any maintenance routines you are planning to automate in the future? What additional fish/inverts are you hoping to add, or is this it for awhile?

Thx,

Dave.M

[kimacom]

Wowo

[ghellin]

Amazing!

[FishM8]

What a nice collection!

[Carbone]

Originally Posted by dave.m

Are there any parts of your set-up that you would change if you could afford to? Are there any maintenance routines you are planning to automate in the future? What additional fish/inverts are you hoping to add, or is this it for awhile?

Thx,

Dave.M

The only thing that I'm missing is the shimmering lines. I tried once to put some CREEs to help with this. The effect was very cool and noticeable, but I needed more than one line of LEDS. Also for some reason every 2-3 months one of the LEDS burn, so after a few LED replacements I droppend them. I'm thinking to put 4x20W LEDs infront of the ATIs and see how it looks.

Another thing that bothers me is that I syphon the sand bed each time I change the water and this takes about one hour (almost 3 square meters of sand ). But the water that comes from the sand is a brown nasty junk. From time to time it passes my mind to just remove the sand, but I don't like the look without sand.

Regarding automation, the only automated things in my tank is light on/off and dosing. Even the ATO is done manually each day (my dad is doing it).

As for livestock, the options for SPS are very limited. I'm travelling 2500-4000km to buy some nice corals
In the near feature I like to add 5-6 pyramid butterflies and one box fish.

Regards.

[dave.m]

Thx for your reply, Carbone. The manual top-up suggests an obvious opportunity for automation some day (unless your Dad really enjoys doing this manually ).

Your "nasty brown junk" from cleaning the substrate suggests overfeeding, especially if it is always like this every time you do a water change. Try to reduce the amount fed so that no food reaches the sand.

What sort of clean-up crew do you have? If you don't mind, I suggest you get something that works beneath the sand surface such as: diamond watchman goby, nassarius snails, cerith snails, and especially fighting or tiger conchs. A great sub-surface cleaner, though rarely imported, are chitons. I would stay away from hermit crabs.

Dave.M

[Bello]

Originally Posted by Carbone

currently i have 2 x ATI (8x54W) and 2 x ATI (4x54W).
as for filtration, i'm using 2 bubble magus skimmers (with 2 aquabee 2000/1 pumps each), 2 buckets with zeoliths and GFO if PO4 gets readable on hanna.
Additions are done with an automatic dosing pump for alk and CA. The trace, Sr, Fe and I are made manually each week.

I tried in the past biopellet, but had some tehnical problems with them (the reactor was clogging when power gets down).

Could you tell us more about the Zeoliths?

1. How much are you using?
2. Do you change it often?
3. Is it run in a reactor?
4. Are you dosing any carbon source?

Apologies for the extra questions, but I have about 10kgs of zeolith with me, and was hoping I could use them

Thanks!

[Carbone]

Originally Posted by dave.m

Thx for your reply, Carbone. The manual top-up suggests an obvious opportunity for automation some day (unless your Dad really enjoys doing this manually ).

Your "nasty brown junk" from cleaning the substrate suggests overfeeding, especially if it is always like this every time you do a water change. Try to reduce the amount fed so that no food reaches the sand.

What sort of clean-up crew do you have? If you don't mind, I suggest you get something that works beneath the sand surface such as: diamond watchman goby, nassarius snails, cerith snails, and especially fighting or tiger conchs. A great sub-surface cleaner, though rarely imported, are chitons. I would stay away from hermit crabs.

Dave.M

I already have an ATO, but is not in operation. Each time I try to install it, my dad complains that it is not necessary. I guess that he enjoys watching the tank and this is just an excuse to go in the tank room
Since the tank is located in my parent's house (50km from where I live), I only see the tank on weekends. But It may pass 2-3 weeks without any visit. My dad feeds the fish and he gives them one silverside each day (3.5 inches frozen fish) and also some nori. I also feed them a few times with the same amount and in less than 1 minute the water is free of any food. I suppose that the junk from the sand is just fish poop. The sand surface is very clean.

For clean-up crew I have 10-20 turbo snails, a few dozen nasarius and 7-8 urchins. I tried a few times with diamond watchman goby, but they die after about one year (starvation). Also they tend to put sand on top of the LPS

I also have some chitons from the live rock. They really live the rock white and clean behind.

I also test for PO4 with Hanna Phosphate checker and NO3 with Salifert. Both tests show 0.

[Carbone]

Originally Posted by Bello

Could you tell us more about the Zeoliths?

1. How much are you using?
2. Do you change it often?
3. Is it run in a reactor?
4. Are you dosing any carbon source?

Apologies for the extra questions, but I have about 10kgs of zeolites with me, and was hoping I could use them

Thanks!

Since last summer I used a DIY zeo filter (6-7 litters), but my father was not shaking the stones very well, so I disabled the reactor. Now I'm using two plastic containers full with zeo stones (about 1 bucket of salt - 50lb or 23kg full with zeolites) and I shake them monthly before a water change.
Those plastic containers looks like this http://static2.indio.ro/img_art/mare/1288128692.jpg

I change some stones very 3-4 months (about 20-30%).

I tried carbon dosing in the past with different methods:
- biopellets in a reef octopus reactor (the big size), but the biopellets stick to each other in a power outage and also some biopellets escape on the reactor input and clog the pump impeller. To start the reactor again, you need to get the impeller out, put the escaped biopellets back, start the pump and shake realy well the reactor to liquidize again the pellets.
- vinegar and vokda: for this you need to monitor the tank daily. Since I only visit the tank in weekends, the risk was too high and I dropped the idea

Anyway, since my NO3 is still zero, why should I bother with carbon source ?

[Bello]

Thank you very much for your reply

I used zeo/carbon dosing over the last 4 years. I stopped Zeo last year (cost issues), and only dosed carbon source (zeostart3). Later, I completely stopped carbon dosing (was trying to see if I can manage without), and my NO3 has now reached 5ppm....

To reduce, I have started the new All In One biopellets for the last month. Thankfully, we rarely have power outages, so it should be ok for now. No changes in NO3 levels noticed so far. Since I already have the zeoliths, I could start with a smallish amount, just as additional filtration, as you have described .

If I cannot reduce NO3 with the above, I have considered removing shallow sandbed and replace with white acrylic sheet (I dislike bare bottom as well, but no choice).

It's an achievement that you can maintain such an amazing reef, with only weekend visits . My goal is to try and maintain a similar system with minimal maintenance.

Thanks!!!

[Carbone]

Originally Posted by Bello

Thank you very much for your reply

I used zeo/carbon dosing over the last 4 years. I stopped Zeo last year (cost issues), and only dosed carbon source (zeostart3). Later, I completely stopped carbon dosing (was trying to see if I can manage without), and my NO3 has now reached 5ppm....

To reduce, I have started the new All In One biopellets for the last month. Thankfully, we rarely have power outages, so it should be ok for now. No changes in NO3 levels noticed so far. Since I already have the zeoliths, I could start with a smallish amount, just as additional filtration, as you have described .

If I cannot reduce NO3 with the above, I have considered removing shallow sandbed and replace with white acrylic sheet (I dislike bare bottom as well, but no choice).

It's an achievement that you can maintain such an amazing reef, with only weekend visits . My goal is to try and maintain a similar system with minimal maintenance.

Thanks!!!

I also have shallow sand bed. Maybe you can try to syphon the sand each time you do water changes. Just go slowly when vacuuming so you syphon as much as possible.

Hope it works for you.

[Bello]

Thanks for the tips, I'll give it a try for the next month

Will be following your thread

[Carbone]

here are some pictures from today. not very much grow since august.
just a little bit of color change in some corals.

[Carbone]

This one is the same size as 2-3 years ago. Not even 0.5mm grow


Can anyone ID this ? (Acropora Abrotanoides?) - started to have some nice red tips

[Carbone]

A short video uploaded today
(1080 HD)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbDCdHYT-Gw

[sandyland]

Amazing growth on your corals!! The video is awesome. Love your tank. Subscribed

[Newbie Aquarist]

You have a very beautiful tank. Love the video.

[paul.asty]

Congratulations Cristi
your aquarium is impressive
and corals have wonderful colors