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by **Len** » March 1st, 2005, 12:43 pm

Unleashed's 's official thread:
Use this thread to document updates to your Nano Reef Buildoff project.
Please note: this thread is reserved for the entitled registered member only. Open discussion about ideas or specific entries should be posted in the Nano Reefs forum or the General Reef Discussion forum.

by **Unleashed** » March 16th, 2005, 1:34 pm

I'm alive!! sorry for my lack of attention here, I've just been SO sick. So sick that I'm actually happy to have survived it. Damn nasty chest flu.
Nasty nasty nasty

Do not fear, my chest is okay now. LOL :twisted:

Ok, so I've finally recuperated enough to make it to my computer. First I had to sort thru FIFTEEN bloody pages of emails. I whittled it down to three pages... took hours. Now I need a couch potato break and a cup of tea to rebuild my reserves of strength

Being sick sucks ass. I notice Guy has admitted a nice bottle of Scotch to our competition. I think that's the smartest thing I've seen in a long time

My tank is going to be a 20 gallon (standard 24x12x16) with a metal halide pendant. With prolly just a single powerhead for filtration/circulation. Dunno yet. No skimmer. No sump. No hang-on refugium. Simple but effective, hopefully

Evaporation will help with calcium addition, I will have to keep an eye and moderate the speed of evaporation. Might need to add some type of acrylic cover to slow that down. Hmmm. Which means I might have to remove the acrylic sheet from the MH pendant. Don't want to have to, but I might. I wonder what difference it would make to have two sheets of acrylic between my corals and my pendant? *ponder*
I will duly record all test results, naturally.

I've been quarantining a striped fangfish for well over three weeks now (bought him just before I got sick) and the tank is still housing him. My plans are to empty it, scrub it down with baking soda, refill with newly mixed saltwater, and use newly-purchased limestone lacerock to create a nice look. The 1" to 3" deep aragonite sandbed will be livesand that I plan to steal from my 90g.

I have been wanting to set up a tank with lace rock for a while now. The lace rock comes in such fascinatingly artistic shapes, I can't wait to see how this turns out. Of course there will be no coralline or anything on it, it's bone dry in a box right now. I'm interested to see how fast I can grow coralline

My only concern is toxicity from the lace rock, like streaks of any heavy metals in it. I don't feel like sacrificing my new fangfish to this experiment, so I will run Chemi-Pure or Purigen in the powerhead to remove anything that may be there. Hope that works out

Aside from the fangfish, I have NO idea what livestock I will be adding, I plan to go store-to-store shopping and see what treasures I can find.

Hey, getting there is half the fun

by **Unleashed** » April 20th, 2005, 10:05 am

Okay. Update time. I was planning to give up, but changed my mind..

Long story short, on March 23 I set up the 20g with RO/DI water, well rinsed brand new lace rock, live sand, and my beloved fangfish. Fangfish died within three days of being in the new set-up. Did that ever piss me right off :evil:

Anyways, while mourning my beloved fangfish, I bought some damsels (yes, actual damsels, ohmy) and stuck them in the tank to see what would transpire. Of course they have survived nicely :roll:

so I decided to try something trickier, and added a pretty little carpenteri wrasse. He has been keeping himself busy kicking damsel ass. Kewl fish

but he came down with a nice case of ich. Like the dumbass I am, I had a bit too much wine one night and decided the tank needed copper added. What was I thinking?!? *whacking forehead against nearest wall* Anyways, the ich cleared up, wrasse is still kickin ass, and everyone is alive and well in this tank. Got a minor case of diatom algae, is about all. Looks great..!

Problem is, I do not want to use this copper infested tank in this competition now.

*sigh* I guess that tank will just stay as it is...my quarantine hospital tank. It seems to like it that way. Therefore, time to change my plan. The time factor bothers me...the end of April is near and I haven't even thought up a new plan yet. However, I have been reading everyone else's threads, and you guys are really inspirational

I will get back in the saddle, come up with a new plan, and have some fun.

Damn that fangfish. I can't understand why his death is bothering me so much. I've lost fish before. Dammit.

by **Unleashed** » April 21st, 2005, 11:20 pm

Ok. I decided to trade the 20g tank in for something new. So I bought a 20 long. Nice, much shorter, therefore better for lighting. Longer, so more floor space to pile rock on..

I spent the evening taking down the 20g quarantine tank. Removed all the lace rock, and the water, and transferred the damsels and wrasse into another tank. It was then moved over to the other side of the room and I put my rainbow crab in it. Might as well use the sand, eh? He is thrilled, and proved it to me by threatening me with his big nasty claws

Once the q- tank was moved, I put the new tank into its place. Yay, it fits on the same stand!! I was pretty sure it would LOL then I poured in some brand new aragonite, about an inch in depth. I added some newly mixed saltwater, but I decided to continue using the lace rock, even though it was coppered....it's just so darn purdy!! I rinsed it off and put it into the new tank, and added a powerhead loaded up with Kent Reef carbon.
The animal of choice to test this new set-up is a flower anemone. Cute, I paid a whopping 12 bucks for him. I dripped him into the new tank while I watched CSI. Then I placed him in a nice spot at the front of the tank on the sand (we ALL know he will not stay there.... :evil:

)

My digital camera still has no frikkin batteries, I keep forgetting to buy them. I promise to do so tomorrow, so I can actually post pics.

*grumble*

I still need to hang the MH pendant above the tank, but it's late and I gotta work 12 hours tomorrow.

Over and out.

by **Unleashed** » April 24th, 2005, 11:09 pm

Update: Last night I added a quarter inch of live sugar sand onto the top of the new aragonite. Amazingly, it only took a couple of hours to clear up enough to see the rocks. Kewl. I started taking pics of the new set-up, and will start posting them as soon as I have time to upload them and sort them out.
Tonight: I brought home a flashy little coral banded shrimp (ALL attitude), ten nassarius snails, an orange plate coral, and an engineer goby. Damn goby better not get ich now that my q-tank houses a crab

Oh well, if he can't survive a mere car ride to my house, then fine, go ahead and die!

So, to tally things up so far: (Canadian retail local prices)

$31.99-20g Long aquarium (bought brand new)
$30.00-approx half a forty pound bag of aragonite (brand new)
$50.00-18 lbs of lace rock (find and doublecheck the receipt for actual price cuz it's late and I don't remember)
$39.99-Ebo heater (old one I had kickin around)
$49.99-Hagen 204 powerhead with attachment (old one)
$2.99-bag of filter floss
$50.00-tubular metal tank stand (used my old q-tank stand)
$12.00-flower anemone
$49.00-orange plate coral (fungia, bought brand new)
$19.99-convict blenny (juvenile, bought brand new)
$14.99-coral banded shrimp (spankin new)
$20.00-ten nassarius snails (new)
$9.00-live sugar sand
$400.00-metal halide pendant with 175w 10K bulb (bought slightly used since 6 monthes)

I still have to hang my MH pendant. I've been lying awake at night trying to figure out how to control evaporation without heat becoming a factor. Perhaps this week I shall endeavor to build a custom top that will hold the pendant, cut down on evaporation, and maximize light deflection. I also want a cute lil door for feeding and dosing purposes

Over and out.

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:41 pm

Been sorting pics

and doing some water testing. Water parameters are as follows:

NH4 = 0
NO2 = 0
NO3 = 0
TEMP = 77F
SG = 1.022 using a Seatest hydrometer (I will need to compare this reading to a Pinpoint salinity monitor and figure the difference for accuracy)
pH = 8.0
CA = 320

Calcium is low, so I started dosing with C-Balance. I forgot to buy a new alkalinity test kit so I didn't get to test my ALK. Might as well buy the Seachem Magnesium test kit, since it comes with the alk test too.

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:45 pm

More.

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:46 pm

Flower anemone. I think I will name her Skunk, after the skunk in the movie Bambi. LOL

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:53 pm

Now I have added a fungia coral, nassarius snails, and a convict blenny. When I first added the plate coral, I had it up higher on the rockwork so that the sugar sand wouldn't annoy it too much. As soon as the water cleared I moved it down onto the sugar sand.

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:54 pm

Moved!

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:56 pm

Convict blenny is busily digging himself a hole in one corner. He is one pissed off dude, lemmetellyou.

by **Unleashed** » April 26th, 2005, 11:58 pm

Snail! Check the speed LOL

I love snails. This one looks hungry

by **Unleashed** » April 27th, 2005, 12:02 am

Coral Banded Shrimp...I have named her Tina after our own CoralShrimp

by **Unleashed** » April 27th, 2005, 12:08 am

Metal halide pendant temporarily perched on two pieces of glass, for the benefit of plate coral and flower anemone (which has since been moved).
I plan to get that MH all fixed up tomorrow.
Note the powerhead with attachment (filled with Kent Reef carbon and filter floss). I will need to change out that floss tomorrow, methinks...

by **Unleashed** » April 27th, 2005, 12:12 am

I have not decided what to do with the back glass. Someone else here has already painted theirs to resemble coralline, which I thought about but now it would just look as though I was copying :lol:

I may get inspired again, but for now I will just leave it the way it is. My white wall looks fine

I am only leaving the halide on for a couple of hours a day. I will add an hour or two per day until I'm up to 5-6, and plan to leave the regular spectrum fluorescent on the rest of the time, for viewing (and actinic) purposes. The bulb in the regular output is a Coralife 50/50. The bulb in the halide pendant is a Coralife 175w 6500K. I will upgrade to an Ushio 175w 14000K sometime in the next few monthes, hopefully.

Over and out. Mostly out to lunch

by **Unleashed** » April 30th, 2005, 9:58 pm

Update: Bought some wood to build a cover to hide the nuclear glow from the MH pendant...it hits you right in the eyes when you're sitting down anywhere nearby.
Did not have time to actually build the cover yet, my job seems to take up SO much of my time :lol:

but I will endeavor to build it on my next day off. I realize this will put me past the final equipment deadline, but too damn bad

it's just a cover.

Recent additions of livestock are:

one small yellow scroll coral (turbinaria),
one platygyra frag,
one green button polyp frag,
and a frogspawn frag (snagged from local reef geek).

I want the tank to be entirely stony corals, but the green button was just too cute to resist, so in it went

I'm too tired to take pics, I will take some tomorrow.

Oh, and that evil convict blenny dug himself a bigass pit, then moved to the other side of the tank and is busily excavating another.. Make up your mind, already! :roll:

by **Unleashed** » May 1st, 2005, 10:27 pm

Time for more pics

The aforementioned frags pics, and I still need to build that damn MH cover so I can get that sucker hoisted without blinding myself.

by **Unleashed** » May 1st, 2005, 10:29 pm

Convict blenny has been busy. Check out the beginnings of diatom algae.

Yay :evil:

by **Unleashed** » May 1st, 2005, 10:30 pm

Frogspawn frag.

by **Unleashed** » May 1st, 2005, 10:33 pm

Platygyra brain coral. When I turn out the lights, all his little tentacles extend and he gets all squishy looking. As I recall, these corals have nice long sweepers, so I plan to keep him ALL ALONE in his little area

Note the green button coral just above him, damn thing closed up when I was taking pics of it alone... Camera shy?? LOL

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