Gofor's 60"L X 30"W X 24"T Upgrade

[gofor100]

Here's some tank shots over the last week or so... the cyano is cutting back on the rock, and I'm getting a little green algae on the sand in spots, but overall, things are looking good to me.

I'll probably be a little less generous on my feedings (per feeding), but will still be feeding 3 times/day with a my frozen seafood medley and pellets. One of these days I'll find the balance, but as long as my fish are thick and happy, and the corals have good colors and decent growth, then I'm good.

Speaking of thick and happy fish...

I want to see if I can get some growth comparison shots of some of my corals, some corals have really branched out while others are encrusting pretty good... so that'll be my next RC project. One little hiccup that may have momentarily stunted my corals growth is apparently one of my doser pumps stopped working (the one feeding alkalinity) and so my alk dropped to about 6.7 using a Salifert kit. No deaths, but I noticed that the PE was not as good as normal and some of the corals colors were fading a little. So I brought it up slowly a couple of weeks ago, and things seem to be back on track.

Thanks for looking!

-Chad

 

[gofor100]

You got that much coraline growth in 2 weeks? Or did I read that wrong. Looks great, sorry for the losses.

Thanks Bean... not all of it is coralline. Some of it is cyano, but the coralline is popping up as well, but it's been over several weeks.

The cyano seems to be in retreat and I suspect that it reared its ugly head when I had that hair algae suddenly conquered. With all of that die off of algae, the bacteria probably had a field day and lead to cyano.

That's just my best guess, but it seems to be getting better every week.

Thanks again,

Chad

 

[lowbudget]

nice chad. if you have trouble with hair algae use those turbo snails they work wonders on my frag tank. i am amazed even on egg crate i am a believer again

 

[gofor100]

nice chad. if you have trouble with hair algae use those turbo snails they work wonders on my frag tank. i am amazed even on egg crate i am a believer again

Thanks for the heads up... but luckily the hair algae seems to all be gone. I seemed to have killed it all off when I fixed some problems with my sandbed and return pump. But now some cyano has shown up on the rock which seems to be going away.

Thanks!

-Chad

 

[gofor100]

So here's a comparison shot of my ORA Purple Stylo (can't capture all of the color with my iPhone but you get the idea)...

April 1, 2012

July 8, 2012

Here's one of the ORA Red Planet (maintaining a decent green base that can't be seen in my washed out photo... seems to be encrusting more than growing vertically, but growing nonetheless).

April 1, 2012

July 8, 2012

I'll try to get more comparison shots later.

Thanks,

Chad

 

[lowbudget]

looking good.

 

[gofor100]

looking good.

Thanks bro'!

-Chad

 

[gofor100]

Geez... time flies when life gets in the way!

I can't believe it's been almost A YEAR since updating this thread. Well, lots of things have happened in a year.

1) Cyano and algae started overtaking my tank, but I've seemed to finally beat it after trying a number of things that ended up only providing a temporary fix. Biopellets seemed to have done the trick, which I put online about 2 months ago I believe. Started really slow, only putting in 1/4 of the recommended dosage and haven't added any since. Still waiting to see what this amount does to the algae, and so far so good.

2) Haven't really gotten many new corals, just letting my existing corals grow out. However I have recently added some new fish and everyone is getting along great!

So here's some pics of the fish:

My Potter's Angel, which has been with me now for over a year...

My Yellow Longnose Butterfly, who has gotten fatter since this picture, and is doing really well...

My pride and joy, and king of the tank... my Moorish Idol. Been with me for over a year now and has grown a ton.

A few recent additions include my juve Harlequin Tuskfish (not sure if it is Aussie, but, regardless, he's pretty awesome) and my Powder Blue Tang (who from the very beginning has deferred to the MI without the MI having to assert his power at all).

And finally, my FTS...

Thanks for looking!

-Chad

 

[reefes pieces]

man you're one lucky and talented SOB to have that many tough fish living! Definitely envy your fish list man! Simply gorgeous!

 

[gofor100]

man you're one lucky and talented SOB to have that many tough fish living! Definitely envy your fish list man! Simply gorgeous!

Hahaha... thanks! There's always some luck involved when keeping fish, but I'd have to say careful planning and quarantining go a LONG way.

Thanks again!

Chad

 

[gofor100]

Well, the cat is officially out of the bag... if it has seemed like I haven't been focused on my tank as much the last several months, its because my wife and I have had more important business to tend to... meet "Baby" Gofor100.

My wife is just about 14 weeks along now and we definitely feel blessed. Don't know the gender yet, but this has been a long time coming.

Thanks,

Chad

 

[solitude127]

Congrats. That's the ultimate frag growing right there

 

[Usingthejohn]

Well, the cat is officially out of the bag... if it has seemed like I haven't been focused on my tank as much the last several months, its because my wife and I have had more important business to tend to... meet "Baby" Gofor100.

My wife is just about 14 weeks along now and we definitely feel blessed. Don't know the gender yet, but this has been a long time coming.

Thanks,

Chad

Congrats man. You have about 30 odd weeks left in quarantine!

 

[reefes pieces]

Congrats! Another future reefer in the works!

 

[bullitr]

Congrats chad and wife


Sent from my outdated iPhone 5 using Tapatalk

 

[gofor100]

Congrats. That's the ultimate frag growing right there

Congrats man. You have about 30 odd weeks left in quarantine!

Congrats! Another future reefer in the works!

Congrats chad and wife


Sent from my outdated iPhone 5 using Tapatalk

Hahaha... Thanks Guys! The wife and I are extremely excited for this and have been waiting a LONG time for it to actually happen. Reefing has probably been my only escape from the stress of it all.

Thanks again,

Chad

 

[gofor100]

AUTOMATION/MAINTENANCE REDUCTION

Again, one of my goals with this build is to minimize the daily/weekly/monthly maintenance so I can enjoy the tank more and have more time with the family. With that in mind, I tried to initially focus on some of the tasks that are either high frequency (need to occur multiple times per week/month), and the tasks that are simply time consuming per occurrence.

Auto Fleece Filter Roller:

I already discussed this before, but felt it was worth mentioning again under this section, since, from my experience so far, I LOVE not having to change filter socks at least weekly.

Auto Top-Off:

I've implemented this on all of my tanks before, but it is worth mentioning. However, something that is different with this ATO is that, with it being housed in my shed, and in close proximity to my FW reservoir, it is extremely easy to refill when the time comes.

• Tunze ATO Osmolator 3155: I know there are other options out there, but this seemed to be one of the more reliable options on the market for a piece of equipment that can easily fail and in a bad way.

• Advanced Acrylics 18”L x 18”W x 18”T (approximately 25 gallons) ATO Reservoir: I figured I might as well get a matching ATO with my sump from Advanced Acrylics!

Water Changes using DOS:

My plan here is to rely on a DOS to do my core water change daily (totaling about a 26 gallon water change weekly, or just over 10%), then, on top of that, I’ll likely still do some manual water changes once a month of another 10 gallons or so to keep the sand bed and sump clean. In all, about 115 gallons (or about 50% of total water volume) water being changed monthly.

Dosing using DOS and Ecotech Versa:

I’ll get into my plan for adding supplements (e.g., Calcium, Alkalinity, etc.) a bit more later, but I will, at least initially, be dosing the elements rather than using a Calcium Reactor. Obviously not wanting to do this by hand, I’ll be using two DOS pumps to add the Ca/Alk/Mag, and the Versa to add my Kalkwasser (separate from the ATO which is just fresh RODI water).

Auto Feeder Using the Eheim Automatic Twin Feeder

I ended up going this route (at least initially) since I do not have power cords running from inside the house to the sump shed, and, therefore, cannot connect the auto feeder to the APEX (otherwise, I would have just used the APEX Auto Feeder). Not a big deal though, as I now work from home, don’t travel nearly as much, and will likely only place this feeder on when I know that I’ll be away for most of the day or on vacation.

Future Expansion for Automation

APEX Trident: I’m really tempted to add the APEX Trident at some point in the future, as I know that testing can take up some daily/weekly time. So this would obviously be a pretty great timesaver.

 

[gofor100]

Whoops... posted in the wrong build thread. This one is from YEARS ago