dp's 300 gallon build

[dpruter]

A little bit yep. Shame on me for not researching the company before purchasing. Shame on them for treating their animals and their customers so poorly.

 

[bribo12]

Yeah man. Sorry about the frags.


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[dpruter]

On a better note, I've seen some great growth in my corals this month!







Starting to work through backup systems for potential of El Niño here in SD now. Ordered battery for gyre and now looking at generators. (More fun than trying to get my money back from reef ripoffs)

 

[dpruter]

Decided to get a grown up magnet scraper finally. That mag float just wasn't cutting it.

 

[ImACoolguy]

Awesome! That's some great growth.


Caleb

 

[dpruter]

Coming along!

 

[dpruter]

Stray Voltage

Interesting experience today...Was reading about lateral line disease and made me think I should check for any stray voltage in my tank. Hooked up the volt meter and sure enough, .8 to 1 Volt was cranking through my water. Started unhooking equipment and finally narrowed it down to my UV sterilizer as the cause. At this point I'm going to leave it unplugged. Ordered one of those titanium ground rods from brs thinking that would be good to have in place. Anyone ever hear of a UV sterilizer creating voltage in aquarium? (without any obvious signs of quartz sleeve leaking) Hum...

 

[Sniperhank]

Just about anything is possible with our devices. That said, I still have yet to see any real proof to UV sterilizers being productive towards daily use rather than helping to clear up an issue like green water...

 

[dpruter]

I'll run the system without the UV a few weeks to see if I notice much difference. (in the meantime I think the fish will appreciate not getting zapped)

 

[Sniperhank]

Nothing in your tank probably even noticed the voltage since nothing was grounded in the tank. I've read arguments about if one should even ground a tank or not from people that have lost their tank when it was grounded and something went off and so on down the line. I'm far from an expert, so couldn't tell you which direction to go in besides removing the UV sterilizer since it was creating a current that could hurt YOU.

 

[dpruter]

Ran it a few weeks without the uv and didn't notice any behavior changes. I did notice water wasn't as sharp and when I took the uv apart I found that the glass sleeve was covered in hard white (calcium?) stuff. A little vinegar soak and it came right off.

Uv is back online and the grounding rod is in place. Fish and corals all appear happy.

During Black Friday, I picked up a gfo/carbon setup (two different canisters) from brs. Helped get my phosphates down from .2 to .1 which feels good! chugging along!

 

[Sniperhank]

Sounds great. That achilles though! Wow...
You have to take apart UV's to keep the bulb cleaned off so they can do their job. Same even with home water systems. My parents have one on their home line, since their well water is under a field that has crops treated with manure and it raises the fecal count in the water to pretty bad levels depending on the time of the year.
In a saltwater tank, I would want to clean it during the weekly water changes to simply ensure no coraline is building up on it like was beginning to happen to yours.

 

[dpruter]

Your folks have a uv on their house waterline?

 

[Sniperhank]

When the fecal bacteria count on your drinking water goes above 'healthy' levels...yes you do. Though it didn't hurt me for the first 20 years of my life.


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[dpruter]

Wow, I guess so. Good to hear you're healthy though man, despite...

Some of our water is now coming from the Pacific Ocean here in north San Diego from the new desalinization plant. I'm hoping it will help cut down my ro filter changing frequency. (And oh yeah, be healthier for us) ha, funny the priority order of my thinking!

Ahhhh, Drinking my coffee as the tangs wait for chow as we talk water...a nice sat morning! Have a good one!

 

[Sniperhank]

It'll be interesting to see how your RO/DI is effected with the water change. What was your water source before?

 

[paul87]

That is looking amazing! Great job on building it!

 

[stan450z]

Nice setup. Do you think this would be possible to do in a cold weather state? I guess this looks your sump and chiller are in some sort of enclosed greenhouse.

 

[NeonRasta]

The damsels have been little bastards especially the Sargeant's! They have grown incredibly fast! None of them mess with the clowns though. They chased the blue tang when introduced but prob because he was 1/2" long and likes to sleep in the rocks near them.

I've been using the mag float as well every few days. I also use some scrub pads to work on the coraline which has been insane. The tank is acrylic so it scratches very easy with the smallest grain of sand in the magfloat. I've learned to shut down all pumps and take my time while cleaning. I've also since purchased some very fine sand paper and have learned how to fix some of those scratches. ?

There are specific cleaning pads for acrylic tanks of you don't have them

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[dpruter]

Sorry for delayed response. Been a bit slammed! To answer your question, yes I think you could do this in other places if it's well insulated for winter and ventilated for warmer times of the year. Consider high humidity so use mold resistant products inside. Also think about mice and other critters that may want in. Good luck and share pics!


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