GAM_GAM’s Red Sea Reefer 750

[GAMGAM]

Post # 1, That new forum smell.

I figured I’d document the journey this tank goes through, it’s coming from a 10 year old 120 I set up back in 2012. It was pieced together from a undrilled 5 foot 120 with a u-tube style overflow box that went down to a 15 gallon Rubbermaid sump. It had varying levels of success over the years, but between its lack of sophistication and my lack of discipline in maintaining it, it never really found it’s stride. You can find my old threads on the old reef central forum under the same name. Here is the last pic of the ole girl before it was tore down

At this point the new tank has been set up for like a week now but over the next couple days I’ll post the journey to today and get some opinions on my direction for the future.

 

[Idoc]

This will be a good project and journey to watch!

 

[GAMGAM]

The plan is sps dominant, stick head tank but wait…. No… come back. Lol. This tank is going to be the epitome of heavy in- heavy out. The heavy in,

mini fridge autodoser. I’m currently dosing 150 grams of frozen brine a week at a rate of nine feedings a day (fish are pretty pumped). I have plans to add acropower and other coral foods as well but dosed over night.

the heavy out,

DIY sulphur denitrator for the nitrates and currently 1ml of lanthanum chloride every evening for the phosphate.

even feeding 9 times a day my current nitrates are under 5 ppm and phosphate stays under 0.05 ppm. So I’m on the right track.

For mechanical filtration I picked up one of these.

reefmat 1200. It has been rolling out the particulates at about 16 inches a day.

for a skimmer I went with one of these

My trusty ole SRO-3000sss.


I am thinking I want a non-photosynthetic level of food in and out, but with water quality high enough for sps.

feel free to fire away with the questions.

 

[GAMGAM]

Tried to upload vid.

 

[GAMGAM]

Down the end vid

 

[dixons_reef]

Nice setup

 

[GAMGAM]

Learning how to download vids.

 

[GAMGAM]

Lighting.

it turns out my 8x80W ATI Sunpower is old. Lol. Have a look.

old bulbs and crusty old reflectors. Gross.

I ordered new reflectors and bulbs.

so much better. My current photoperiod is I run 6 bulbs from 9am to 3 pm, then all 8 bulbs from 3pm to 5pm, then just 2 bulbs from 5 pm to 9pm.

Because of how my house is the tank runs hot typically so I have added extra fans in the sump and across the surface. But as an added safety when I built the canopy I added a big fan which is attached to a ink bird temp controller to keep a handle on things.

have this set to blow air in if it gets up to 79*f.

I covered the canopy with white vinyl to match the stand. It looks pretty sharp if I do say so myself.

 

[GAMGAM]

Some quiet time.

 

[SaltyT]

Congrats on the new setup, you've done a really nice job!

 

[GAMGAM]

Feeding time. 9 of these a day.

 

[GAMGAM]

Todays nutrient levels.

P04
0.036ppm

N03

tank water on the left. Under 5ppm
Sulphur denitrator effluent on right 0ppm

 

[GAMGAM]

Denitrator drip rate.

 

[GAMGAM]

on the right rinsed brine shrimp. On the left all the juice I rinsed out. The plan is to feed the fish the rinsed shrimp during the lights on period, I’m going to pump 100ml of the juice every night at 3am and pump in 8ml of acropower at 1 am.

I’m going to pump more or less to fine tune my nitrate levels.

any thoughts???

 

[GAMGAM]

 

[GAMGAM]

First frags.

ordered these beauties from Adam Sutherland at Frag Garage. Great experience, lots to choose from.

see what happens.

 

[GAMGAM]

I was enjoying the tank and caught the auto feeder going off, i figured someone would enjoy these little porkers doing their thing

 

[GAMGAM]

Built a recirculating C02 scrubber to boost ph.

Used a large icecap C02 scrubber, to hold 2KG of media that runs to the skimmer. i drilled out the skimmer cup lid and glued 3/8 elbows into it and ran it to an empty canister housing that functions as a liquid knockout for the humidity that builds up. It then runs back to the C02 scrubber.

I picked up a Reef Octupus skimmate collector that runs from a 3/8 elbow on the bottom of the skimmer cup to act as a safety shutoff in case of an overflow.

went from a overnight PH low of 7.95 to 8.20 on the first night. so its looking good so far. See what the daytime high looks like.

 

[GAMGAM]

I replaced my Kalk dosing pump with a Versa for continously dosing kalk overnight.

 

[ShepherdReefer]

Very interesting on some of your equipment. Following