chimera

:roll: in your opinion or everyone elses? hence why it was stated as an irrational number, not mathematical fact. beauty is in the phi of the beholder no leap to conclusion was made. phi has simply been shown to be the ratio used by many famous people to design works of art or construct the 'perfect' face and body, amongst many other things. this post was made as simple consideration to others if making their next tank. i would be interested to see if a tank made on the golden ratio was aesthetically pleasing to the eye as opposed to the standard (and imo boring) rectangular shaped tank that seems to be the norm these days.

sorry? crack pipe? dont you be smoking none of that around here!

isoproply would be my choice, coca cola (aka paint stripper) second. save the vodka... and just make sure you leave a little coke to go with it when you're finished

wtf? the zoo covered rock looks like an octopus' tentacle!!! wicked aquascaping, well done bro.

good, its working then 8.4 is too high. 8.1 is ok.

what model deltec is that?

yeah, if the teacher says im good i get a star. when i get 5 stars, i get a free packet of rowaphos

i do, but only coz i got a electronic pinpoint meter so its quick and easy I only check it every 3 months or when calcium levels drop

I finished "water change plan #1" today - plumbing up the 3-way ball valve to empty water straight down the drain. Couldnt believe my luck when the 3 metre 40mm drain pipe I bought reached the drain EXACTLY. no cutting required went and got 200 litres from Arkles bay today, water conditions were perfect (also met a young fella who works for Michael at Pet Planet, very enthusiastic dude ) Changing water is unbelievably easy now. Emptied 200 litres into a 40 gallon drum, turned on pump, turned handle on ball valve. 200 litre water change done in 5 minutes. Stoked. Still can't believe it's already been 9 days since the last 200 litre water change, time flies. "Water change plan #2" is going to be done next (the blue drum on its side from the pic above) "Water change plan #3" is welding up a frame on my trailer to a large plastic tank, together with a bilge pump to collect water. Collecting with five plastic 20 litre pales (twice) is far to painful for a Saturday afternoon when Rugby's on and BBQ's are to be had Also bought a little whiteboard and marker and hung it on the wall in the sump room. Always good to keep a note of when the last water change etc was done Going down now to dose some zeovit... joy!

Yeah, a common problem when first adding a calcium reactor but not understanding how they work pH out of a calcium reactor should be around 6.5 - 6.7 which is required to breakdown the calcium carbonate media but of course you want to aim to keep your tank around 8.2. Dont forget though that the calcium reactor is adding alkalinity which helps stablise pH (and the fact that the drip rate is so slow - but of course over time pH can still drop). You can also set it up so the drip feed back from the reactor to the tank is near good air/water circulation. I drip mine back into the sump right on top of where the pipe from the refugium enters the sump. This helps "degas" any excess CO2 out. Another method that will help is adding kalkwasser to your top up water. Essentially kalkwasser (limewater) has a higher pH which compensates against the calcium reactor effluents low pH.

if you are careful enough, start the first two then use a screwdriver and "whack" the others, works a treat

17mm is actually 20mm or 3/4" (17mm is inside diameter of pipe) and 13mm is actually 15mm or 1/2" (again - 13mm is inside diameter of pipe) Put "water out" bulkhead at 1" (25mm) and put "water in" bulkhead at either 3/4" (20mm) or 1" (25mm) Enlarge the holes directly from the pump (so the plumbing to each bulkhead is the same size as the bulkhead itself) Later on, if you want more water movement (ie: upgrade to a larger pump) you can do so without needing to replace plumbing or bulkheads. Main rule of thumb to stick to is never restrict the size smaller than the outlets of the pump. Also too large a pipe on the pressure side will reduce effectiveness of the pump (sucking harder than its pumping out) As a guesstimate you could go up to 1/2" larger than the pressure side hole before losing any form of velocity (and thus effectiveness) back into the tank.

you cant use those two sentences together reef!!! i recall you managed to drop po4 significantly when also starting rowaphos. above remarks make it look like the vodka did all the work go rowaphos, its awesome stuff.

hahaaa. you should have got dewalt if you were spending that sort of dollars. its the best there is, leaves all competition for dead!

hopefully no where, he is good value

yeah this is common(ish) and tried by some on this site i believe... and the fish just love the blackcurrant vodka best :lol: (not!) do a search here and you'll find some other posts on dosing voddies. personally, i'd rather drink it myself

hahaaa, funny you say that i was at cookie's last night and his "chair" was only just balanced on top of the other rocks the rocks and corals are fixed together with marine safe putty

check trademe 3 foot tanks are plentiful, if you were in auckland i'd give you a 3 foot tank free

i certainly recommend against that valve. while it seems a good idea, you want the maximum size hole going into the durso. restrict it and you are asking for trouble. nice place for your thermometer,... but give it a few months and you wont see it!

cookie - try this... with auto exposure on, point your camera at somewhere bright in the tank and hold the button down half way, move the camera back to your coral and take the shot (needs to be the same focus obviously) - the pic will be darker. point your camera at a darker area in the tank, hold the button half way down, move the camera back to your coral and take the shot - the pic will be lighter.

change camera settings from auto to white balance if you have that setting.

I wanted to take a pic to show how different a coral can look under different exposures. This is a pic of the same coral, taken at the same time in the same location. The true colour of this pocillipora is somewhere in the middle of the two. Just goes to show someones tank can look exceptionally better than others by using good photography skills

yup, definately put me down for one of those purple beasts steve c u 2moro

for a test run you'd be better off with about a 3 foot, 90 litre tank.

I agree wasp, get a large high quality skimmer to strip out as MUCH crap (yes, even the good stuff) as possible then add back in what you take out. Benefit of this is you can control addition of good trace elements back to your tank by way of water changes, calcium reactor etc This is way easier than trying to take only the bad stuff out of ya water Berlin method is the go.