iChillum's 55 Gallon Acrylic

[iChillum]

Rock and sand have been here for a few days; I had to let them torture me as I went on a camping trip with the family :yo:...just waiting for me.

BRS "Reef Saver" Eco Dry Aquarium Live Rock

Pictured is 55lbs of this stuff. I'm VERY pleased, some great pieces that they sent along, and I haven't even opened the other box that weighs 29 lbs! They must have overcompensated a little bit, but regardless it seems to be an amazing product with amazing service.

[attachment=62227:name]

The sand is now in the tank...but let's all be honest, it's kind of boring. I will be aquascaping soon, so I'll drop a picture on here prior to getting the water in (and the 12-48 HRs I'll wait so you aren't looking at a milky tank)

 

[iChillum]

And...here is my first go at aquascaping it. There are a few good caves and swimways. Going to sit and stare at it for a while before I call it an end product :bowl:

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[CRW Reef]

Looks good and glad to see it finally taking shape. Did you leave room in the back for water circulation back there so you have less dead spots for detritus to build up?

 

[iChillum]

A little bit, but probably needs a little more now that you mention it. I'm going to take a look to see if I can shape it a little bit :acne:

 

[iChillum]

Looks good and glad to see it finally taking shape. Did you leave room in the back for water circulation back there so you have less dead spots for detritus to build up?

Fortunately I left a fair amount of room in the back from the get go...but did some slight adjustments after you pointing it out.

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It turned into a long day working on the tank...but as of last night I got the bad boy filled with saltwater. With the canister filter and protein skimmer...it was only cloudy for about 2 1/2 HRs!

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(And don't worry...lights on the tank are off so I'm not growing algae...but a dark tank isn't exactly ripe for photo opportunities. Also, this is with just the actnics on.) :sleeping:

[HR][/HR]
If anyone knows for the education of the audience, do dry goods normally go through a curing process from the distributor? I'll of course make sure I get through the ammonia spike before I start putting critters in...but wouldn't you think dry rock and dry sand would be easier to cure and prime?

This also could be my impatience talking...:devilish:

 

[cdrewferd]

Looking good man.

 

[iChillum]

Also at the risk of spamming the forums ("Don't ban me bro!"), I just posted up a thread on the Lighting & Equipment forums:

Experience with Aquamaxx HOB-1?

Long story short...the skimmer is working, but boy is it wet right now. I've got it adjusted to the maximum height position...and am just curious whether or not this is part of the break-in period that folks talk about with this product. Any words of inspiration are appreciated!

Also, I can take a picture if necessary...I walked over there about 15 minutes ago however and it wasn't filling the reservoir as aggressively, and the lighting wasn't really that great yet this morning in my house.

 

[iChillum]

*YAWN* :yawn:

Yesterday night I turned off the protein skimmer, and dumped in a bottle of Instant Ocean BIO-Spira to hopefully give the tank a kick in setting up it's bio-filter. With how clean the dry rock and sand I put in the tank is...I'm sort of thinking I'm also going to invoke the cycle a little bit since the organic matter in the tank isn't going to build up the bacteria levels as much as I'd like...or at least that is my thought.

Well, just took some initial (albeit basic) readings of the water:

PH: 8.0
Ammonia: 0 ppt
Nitrite: 0 ppt
Nitrate: 0 ppt
Salinity: 1.0225

Put in a little Marine Buffer to get the PH up a bit, and adjusted the salinity to 1.024 for now.

I think I'm going to run out to buy a chromis today so I can get him to start kicking some ammonia out along with the scraps left from feeding :encouragement:. On a related note, I'll probably have a giveaway chromis in about a month! :heh:

 

[cdrewferd]

Do you have tests for Alk, Calc, and Mag? If those 3 are in line then your PH will be in line as well.

 

[iChillum]

Good point...and no . I was planning on buying test kit / probes as the tank marched forward a little bit since I wasn't worried about coral growth yet. Now that I've said that though...it's probably inhibiting for coralline algae growth as well. :baby:

 

[iChillum]

Do you have tests for Alk, Calc, and Mag? If those 3 are in line then your PH will be in line as well.

Thanks for bringing me sanity cdrewferd. After being out of the hobby for a while...I must have developed a twitchy trigger finger. Go figure...after raising my salinity levels to the desired levels, my salt mix took care of the rest and PH/Calc/Mag are all in check.:crazy:

[HR][/HR]
Updates:

Last Wednesday (08/15/2012), I decided I was going to stimulate the ammonia spike a little by adding some small hardy livestock to the tank. I've added a pair of Ocellaris tank breed clowns since I'm thinking about an RBTA anyway. I sat there looking at damsels, and started having flashbacks to my last tank cycle. I used a few damsels...and when I decided that I didn't want them in my tank any further, I had to pull all the rockwork to catch those little buggers! Ugh. :sick:

As of 08/20/2012, the fish are as happy as can be! They'll need to be knocked out of their thrown at some point, you can tell they are getting a little smug since they have the whole 55 gallon tank to themselves.

Far from the most exciting video in the world, I threw something up on YouTube to document my journey. You'll see the tank empty, but with lots of potential. And of course, you'll get an opportunity to check out the "clownies"

55 Gallon Reef : Part 1 The Setup

[HR][/HR]
For those of you that decided to watch my stunning cinematography...now it's time to ask some questions:

• Is there TOO much rock? This is 75 lbs of the BRS dry rock...it's so porous that I'm wondering if I shouldn't knock it down to 55 lbs.
• Suggestions on aquascaping?
• Any other general suggestions or thoughts?

Let me have it...I'm so early on in this task, that any action I take will be minor in comparison to the future!

 

[iChillum]

Oh...and the water level was a little low in this video due to getting my evaporation on the tank figured out...

Also, I just turned on lunar LEDs for the video, I've kept my T5s off at all times to mitigate algae growth.

 

[iChillum]

Well...since I last posted on this thread, I went CRAZY :faint:

As I had mentioned earlier, I had been adding nitrifying bacteria to accelerate my tank cycle and wouldn't you know it...success! As of about Tuesday last week, ammonia levels had been gone for days, and nitrite levels had risen and were now also on the decline. I felt confident that I was about ready, so I stocked up a few corals last Thursday and everybody is thriving and happy even going into today.

I've been able to edit some of the pictures I've taken...and figured I'd share with the audience. More photos soon, and I may be adding 1 or 2 more corals in later this week if the levels continue being as stable as they have been to-date.

 

[iChillum]

[attachment=62377:name]

 

[iChillum]

As of about Tuesday this last week...Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate showed all 0's...sweeeeeet :hail:

I must say, if I wasn't an advocate before, I'm definitely on-board with supplementing nitrifying bacterias. I'm positive however that no two solutions are made alike. I personally used Instant Ocean Bio-Spira, and successfully made it through the nitrogen in 3 weeks while successfully reducing the toxicity for some of the tank mates that were along for the ride. I've heard tale that Dr Tim's "One and Only" is supposed to be some of the best ones out there. I've read about several individuals that setup after 6 days using this, and reportedly Dr Tim himself setup the London Aquarium with this stuff within a week.

http://www.drtimsaquatics.com/treat-aquarium-nitrite-ammonia-levels

All things considered, everyone has to choose their own path and there will be certainly a lot of opinion along the way! I personally had the time to dabble and successfully made it through in 20 days so I won't complain.

I have sort of gone livestock crazy in getting small frags in the tank, and things are really starting to take shape. I'm dealing with the algae bloom at the end of the cycle, however set my skimmer to a bit "wetter skim" which seems to have helped.

Still working on getting better shots...however wanted to take a moment to post of some of my latest pics opcorn: The distributor I've been using can be a little fruity on frag names (per the blastos)...so if anyone feels like identifying further to something a bit more common please feel free!

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"Holy Sh$! Batman Blasto"

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"Inkblot Explosion Blasto"

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Hollywood Stunner Chalice and a Ponape Bird's Nest. Picked these up from drawesome420 yesterday (thanks buddy!)

[HR][/HR]
All in all? Off to a roaring start...and have quite a few frags to show off now. It's just a matter of finding the time for taking a good shot and doing photo editing in the midst of my career and parenthood. I'll also try to get a good full shot of the aquarium. Boy does it feel good to start seeing it come together...

 

[iChillum]

Another week in and I figured I'd post an entire tank shot for everyone. The algae bloom at the end of the cycle is finally over, and everything is happy and growing!


View attachment 8962

 

[cdrewferd]

Looking good.

 

[Craigar]

Looking good is the Hollywood stunner bleached ? Or is it your camera

 

[iChillum]

The tips were a little bleached when I got it... And the camera didn't do too much to help flushing it out. I'll try to get a good picture today as it looks quite happy ^_^

 

[09bumblebee]

You should sell me the holy **** batman blasto haha