Micro-Reef Build

Duane Clark · Dec 21, 2017

about 1 1/2 months old so far.

Biocube 14

Filtration:
Pump - Cobolt Aquatics MJ900
Filter Basket by InTank
Filter Media - PhosGuard, ChemiPure Elite, Purigen, Fluval sponge (changed to filter fiber - poly fill), Algone

Water Maintenance:
Hydrofill ATO TI

Substrate:
20 lbs Gulf live sand from Gulfliverock

Live Rock:
17 lbs Premium live rock from Gulfliverock.com

Salt:
Fritz PRO RPM salt

Heater:
Cobolt Aquatics Neo-therm 50 watt

Additional Water Movement:
Current USA 6000 eFlux wave kit

Lighting:
Nano Box Mini M

lighting cycle:

Morning - start at 6:30, length - 150 minutes, morning ramp 90 minutes
Royal blue - 60%
White/lime - 5%
Violet - 70%
Cyan/blue - 60%
moonlight 0
Fan 86

Midday - ramp 90 minutes
Royal blue -80%
White/lime - 30%
Violet - 90%
Cyan/Blue - 80%
moonlight 0
Fan 86

Evening - length 180 minutes, evening ramp 90 minutes
Royal blue - 60%
White/lime - 15%
Violet - 60%
Cyan/blue - 55%
moonlight - 3
Fan 85

Night - start at 7:30, ramp 60 minutes
Royal blue - 5.5%
White/lime - 0%
Violet - 0%
Cyan/blue - 0%
moonlight -1.5
Fan 0

nautical_nathaniel · Dec 21, 2017

Looking great so far! Keep it up

Best Fish-Jake · Dec 21, 2017

I like those Acans[emoji1360]

Duane Clark · Jan 7, 2018

latest pic

DSC reef · Jan 7, 2018

Coming a long nicely

Duane Clark · Jan 7, 2018

Thanks. It's a work in progress. lol Not real pleased with the mystery paly I have in upper right corner. I have moved it up 3 times and it still stretches. Lights are not at peak yet BUT just not what I thought. I thought it would be more like a larger zoa. I am running a nanobox mini tide light that is supposed to be cranking our about 250 PAR in the direct center (I don't have a par meter to really check though) so just not sure why the necks are so long.

DSC reef · Jan 7, 2018

There are palys with long stalks, doesn't mean there stretching. We have a colony and I actually like them. I wouldn't worry about them at all.

Duane Clark · Jan 19, 2018

month 3 pic

Duane Clark · Jan 25, 2018

my sexy shrimp are in and good to go. Quick pick of two of them hang'n

damselindistress · Jan 27, 2018

Duane Clark said:
my sexy shrimp are in and good to go. Quick pick of two of them hang'n

I have a pair of sexies and they are my favorite things to watch, they live in my BTA and are very serious about their relationship with him/her lol.

Duane Clark · Jan 27, 2018

damselindistress said:
I have a pair of sexies and they are my favorite things to watch, they live in my BTA and are very serious about their relationship with him/her lol.

Ha...yeah definitely PG13 material going on. Lol

Duane Clark · Jan 27, 2018

It took me forever...I am not very handy at these kind of things but removed all my resin media and installed a chaeto reactor. Just using carbon and filter floss otherwise. Wish me luck.

Before and after pics (yeah...it was way too messy)

Duane Clark · Feb 2, 2018

Chaeto reactor has been up just short of a week. Nitrates are already zero and diatoms are almost gone as well as algae. thought I would post a pic of the tank. 3 months old. everything appears to be doing well

NanoDad · Feb 2, 2018

Wow man this looks great. Can you explain how you built the cheato reactor?

Duane Clark · Feb 2, 2018

NanoDad said:
Wow man this looks great. Can you explain how you built the cheato reactor?

Sure, it was a piece of cake. components are a standard media reactor, small pump, about 10 feet of 1/2 in ID tubing, and some LED lights. (and some chaeto of course). I purchased a kit from Marine depot to make it easy on myself and just added 5 ft of tubing (it comes with 5 ft already). I will say that I had to purchase some additional elbows so I could make a retuen back to my nano cubes return chamber (chamber 3). otherwise the hose would crimp when making the curve into the tank.

The LED's are standard white so I may get some red but right now it seems to be working great. I have noticed my tank temp increased by about .5 degrees as a result of the lights and possibly the slightly larger pump than I had in there previously.

Duane Clark · Feb 16, 2018

Updated tank pic. will be 4 months old in about 7 days.

Duane Clark · Feb 24, 2018

Well the tank is at the 4 month mark. Everything seems to be running fairly smoothly. I am having some challenges with alkalinity though. It is NOT very stable. It drops fairly considerably each week. This last test was 7.1. previous week was 7.5, the week prior was in low 8's. I have been adding sodium bicarb per the BRS calculator but it still drops. After this last result of 7.1, I have been a bit more aggressive increasing it over the past couple days. I also increased my kalk in my ATO to 1 1/4 tsp per gallon of fresh RO/DI. It is now sitting at 8.9. pH has been solid at 8.1 for some time so I am not worried about that.

One thing I did notice, and I think these are valuable observations for my continued education and that is as my alk has been dropping my calcium has been increasing. I believe that is due to the corals inability to use the available calcium when the alk drops. I also notice my paly's and one specific zoa appear to be very good visual indicators of alk. as the alk dropped around 7.5 they started to close. at 7.1 they closed completely and would not open. as soon as I raised the alk back up to 8.9...boom...they opened right back up gain.

Here is the 4 month tank pic Fancy and spike hid when I tried to take the pic but they are still there.