Feelers

Ummm, well it looks like a squirrel cage fan - I dont actually know if it is. As to whether it's DC or AC - surely if its from a car its D.C?

I am trying to build a laminar flow hepa filter - basically a small cabinet where you can work in sterile conditions - as the filter blows pure air out by blocking all the microorgansims. This is for my future plant biotech/mycology aspirations , and as always I'm trying to get there on a budget. Heres a good link on a flow hood overview... http://www.orchideenvermehrung.at/cgi-l ... /index.htm http://www.orchideenvermehrung.at/cgi-l ... /index.htm Anyways - I have gone to the wreckers and bought the fan that blows hot air around the car from inside the dashboard. - a "squirrel cage fan" The info on the motor says 140W, and since cars use 12V does this mean I need a 11.66666 Amp transformer? I am wanting to be able to adjust the speed of the fan aswell - so I will be putting a suitable vairable resistor on there too. I know practically nothing about electronics - what do I need/where do I find what transformer I need to make this thing go, and go well? How the hell do you find an 11 amp 12V DC transformer? I have rigged it up to a computer power pack - I think that its drawing too much current and shorting out, although it did go - just not fast enough. I know many of you guys have a good understand on these things, so any help would be appreciated.

I had the weird problem of only being able to look at New Zealand websites - a phonecall to ihug was useless, they couldnt even answer the phones to take calls as they are based in auckland. :lol: I was stoked about the telecome thing, they have been shafting NZ for ages, right back into the 80's. It started with local calls- somehow the most expensive in the world. Excuses excuses, now its continuing with cell phone rates. It really annoys me. I'm glad the minister made his inappropriate comments too, even more off the share price. The annoying thing is the government owns 40% of telecom? so it's partially in their intrests to rip us off. Ugggh!

Have you seen wikipedias article on IQ? Its huge. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_i ... rt_opinion Seems theres way more to it than my lecturer led us to believe. :roll: Looks like a minefield of a topic. But I digress... :lol:

Wasp I wouldnt put too much faith in IQ testing. We have been learning about them a lot in psychology. The tests are always biased to those who write them. The only way that they are useful is when comparing people of the same cultural backgrounds and of the same age - and at the same point in history. Otherwise they are pretty pointless. For example the average black american has an IQ of 15 points less than the average white american - but this has got nothing to do with race, it has been proven time and time again it's totally due to the childs' environment. Our lecturer used the analogy of sowing wheat seeds - there is the same amount of variation between the races - its just that some receive more fertiliser. A funny trend was noticed that average IQ's go up about 15 points every thirty years, so new tests must be constantly revised. (we arent evolving, its just that technology has meant we use are brains more) A weird thing about those results is - they standardise IQ tests so the mean is 100, with a standard deviation of 15. If you have an average test result of 96 - you dont have an IQ test.

http://www.korallenriff.de/29interzoo/A ... uarium.jpe Youll have to link to it.

Man I cant figure out what half that german stuff does, some interesting looking items. I thought the above thing was quite cool, if you have that much cash and a really big stool I can see it being an option.

That's crazy! I was expecting a big molecule but that one is enormous. Yeah I have a flatmate doing mechatronics - He's also the fastest "cuber" in Australasia, - his best rubix cube record is 17 seconds :lol: , and he's learning how to do it blindfolded. He was on Good Morning for cubing lol. I look at some of the stuff engineers have to learn.

You should round them up and try to get them to grow. Perhaps trapping them between two fine pieces of mesh, or against a rock. Very cool.

I thought pretty much all closed loops were drilled? It could obviously be done out of the water, but isnt that the point of them? Streams (or seios ) would be what your after?

My flat is so damp I think the equilibrium would actually end up putting water back into the tank when its set up. Mould growing on clothes and mushrooms spouting out the floor is generally a sign that its a bit too humid. :lol: Since I'm into fungi its actually pretty interesting!

I can definately see it as a possibility. There's a fish that lives in small ponds in africa that has grows to different sizes depending on whether there is a predatory fish present within the pool. Can anyone remember what this is? (I think it might be a killifish and a chilid but not sure) That's a more bizzare example of environmental cues directly affecting fish growth. Its a definate possibility, but I'm sure there must be info on it somewhere.

Very nice. How'd you go from an empty tank to supporting corals in 8 days? I'm surprised it took such a short time to "re-cycle" even if you had it all ready in another tank??

Can you not use damp rid? I'm geussing there's other ingrediants but it might be worth an inquirey for those who dont wanna go by the sack full

Just whinge and whinge. You'd be surprised how far you can get with persistance, like at the moment I wrote to the Human Rights Commission about bursary payments and how they are using age discrimination. Turns out - the HRC agrees, and hopefully it will mean an extra bursay payment for every university student. Definately a laugh. :lol: I have dealt with damaged packages before and if you get onto them about they should back down. At least you arent dealing with dead livestock. In this case they should pay up in the end.

Haha awesome. The whole time I've been on the board I have never seen a picture of pies tank. I even asked specificially for them!. I really like how the halides are arranged. Excellent. It's been worth the wait :lol:

This part of nanoreef will have some answers..... http://www.nano-reef.com/articles/

It can all be done without a skimmer - perhaps someone can find that awesome tank that had a dsb, no skimmer, small water changes and t5 lighting that was linked to a while ago?? Its probably a lot more challenging to keep things under control, but if your light on stocking it could be done.

It would be best if you could get live rock from someones tank, followed by live rock from the store, followed by dry base rock from the store. (this isnt accounting for cost) It would be nice to get some live rock for biodiversity, if you go primarily with base rock.

Wasp, you beat me to it!

There are a few confusing things with live rock. Base rock - dead, dry rock. Uncured live rock - wet rock, covered in life - often from being in the sea. (like my homemade rock is right now) Cured live rock - wet rock, covered in life but finished the below process (and what you want). When you buy uncured live rock its' got lots of delicate life living on it, and when it goes in your tank there is a big die off. This causes the rock to shed lots of dead organic matter as delicate organisms die and are consumed by bacteria. All the crud coming off the rock is obviously not good for your water parameters, and it can take many months before your live rock is "cleaned" of all the built up crud. This is one of the reasons new marine tanks typicially have algae problems, as the nutrients in the rock feed the algae untill they are depleted. Cooking rocks is basicially a quarantine tank for doing the above - the reasoning is that it is easy to change the water, and you can put it in your tank when its "clean", intead of having it stuff up your main tanks water. You dont need to seed your base rock, there are enough bacteria floating around to start it off, but it will go faster if it is seeded. You will also have more biodiversity in your tank if you seed it. As for buying it - find out what prices you are looking at, if you can ask if you can buy it off the guy whos tank you saw (sorry couldnt remember his name), as it will be cured and ready to stick in your tank. If you have to buy it, you can go either path with base or live rock, since its a small tank I'd probably go with live, its not gonna cost that much extra, but find out if you can even buy it from your lfs.

I need to know about plumbing my chiller too - at the moment its gonna be on the outtake of a cannister filter. What happens if the chiller goes dry? Will it cut out?

On the skimmer front most ppl here have good skimmers - mostly deltecs. Reef and jetski both import them, and they are quite pricey (they are really good though) I believe some people have tried the queen turbo skimmers - and I think thats a no go(modifications needed to make it even skim). You have a few options, the weirpro 2014, the weirpro 2011. http://www.trademe.co.nz/Home-living/Pe ... 310807.htm Notice the person above paid $300 for the 2011 two months ago, its the model down the 2014 - and I bought my 2014 online new for $140. Moral of the story dont buy them from shops. Dont buy a queen turbo skimmer. Other options are the jebo hang on back skimmer (I havent heard much of a review but it would probably be ~ok but worse the the weipro). That red sea prism thing which I geuss is around $300 (not worth it at that price). There are the needle wheels on www.deepblueaquarium.co.nz , they are the next step up, and I dont think anyone has tried one yet? Do you guys have a price your're looking to pay? If you can go second hand, do.

PJ the weipro 2014 is a hang on back skimmer primarily- (it can also be used in the sump). It would be perfect imo. (I have one myself, and it does actually skim) I wouldnt buy skimmers from your lfs - chances are they are outdated and way overpriced. However see if you can post what they are and how much they cost. The book sounds like it might be a little outdated.

PJ a good idea would be to get a marine keeping book. Can someone give the name of that good cheap one that was recommended a while back? It would be a good investment, it's good to have something on hand, when you arent totally sure of what your supposed to do. As for whats out there .... http://www.extremecorals.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc This is just a random vedor in america, but you can get some ideas of what the different organisms are. They have really good pics. Dont worry about the prices (they are whacked - america for you)