wasp

Very welcome to drop in, anyone else also. For some reason business has been getting super busy though lately so pay to call first 479-5446.

It is generally considered that the absolute minimum flow for a marine tank is 10 x tank volume per hour, so that 250 litres per hour is just about there for a 27 litre tank. As Suphew said though, more is better. Just a couple of things, the flow might be a bit different coming from a HOB filter, might help to put an extension tube on the intake & have the intake other end of the tank from the outlet so the flow has to cover the whole tank. The kind of low light organisms you will keep also mostly like low flow so you're probably OK. Other thing is I'm not sure in such a small tank if 10 x flow will behave the same as 10 x flow in a bigger tank, so might be best to take advice from some of those nano guys about this. It's a thing with people moving to marine, used to fresh water flow rates. The marine organisms we keep may look frail, but are able to exist stuck to a rock, with waves crashing over them. It is lack of current that screws them up as they don't get that for long periods in nature. Having said that, strong current in only one direction can also be negative they prefer surging type current. Hence the reason for all the time salties spend talking about flow, it's a science.

Bomber?

Wow, thanks for all the nice comments! No joy with the full tank shot my lights are out of balance at the moment, one end shows up bleached while the other is dark. New bulbs are getting imported supposedly in the next few weeks so hopefully can get some nice pics then. As to the dosing schedule I'm now on the full zeovit program, although only started a few days ago, so am confident that in several months I will be able to show better pics once it has all kicked in. The red one is a pink pocillapora ( I think, somebody else may correct me ). The cyan one, sorry, I don't know. Quite nice but a slow grower. I'll post up the dosing schedule and some of the reasoning behind it but I'm not at home at the moment so when I get home I'll do it so I can refer to my notes. As most are aware zeovit dosing is contraversial because some people don't believe the reasons the manufacturer gives why it works. However I choose to accept their claims at face value and have proceeded on that basis.

Here are a few pics, as can be seen it is still a work in progress but coming along OK!

Skippy, yes those flasher wrasses were great, a lovely addition to the tank. But in my tank anyway, they jumped heaps. The last one I lost was the male, I knew it was coming he would get excited at feeding time & jump out right in front of me, not once, three seperate occasions he did this I picked him off the carpet each time. Eventually though he jumped out when I wasn't there, and that was it. Perhaps my tank is too small, but anyway I've decided not to get any more for now. KP, Thanks for the encouragement, and you are right about the bicolour blenny mine used to take the odd swipe at the sps's as well. I'll do a few pics, probably can't today though. I'm very pleased with the way the corals are improving but they still have a way to go, remembering how they have been in the past I think there is probably still a few months to go before they are really excellent, but things are moving in the right direction .

I am a saltie and have no idea what an aquaclear 50 is :lol: Someone else will have to chip in.

Usually a good sign, usually the better everything is, the more polyp extension. Noticed your pics are looking pretty good!

Probably a stupid idea but I'm wondering if something that would do a similar job could be constructed from one of those household fans that changes direction?

Thanks just curious now I've moved to a new kind of bulb. What brand was yours Minchton?

DE or SE? Proper ballast?

Yes! Thus far since setting up the new tank I've just been, with a few exceptions, running the zeovit basic 4 to get nutrients down & water quality right, but it's about there now so I've started the full zeovit program, just in the last few days. The response in the corals has been immediate, plus it's great to feed them & see the polyps come out within a few minutes.

What kind of bulb, how old, etc?

For your tank & the kind of corals you will keep not a lot of flow is needed just quite a small HOB would do, bigger won't hurt though. Wouldn't bother putting a protector over the heater. There's a number of ways to do it, but IMO a good way would be to have some liverock in the tank, around 2 or 3 kg, and in the HOB filter have a bag of carbon, and a bag of phosphate remover such as Rowaphos. This will keep the tank nice and clean and do away with the need for a skimmer. You'll probably get some other set up options suggested also, & they will probably work too, just take your pic which will suit you best.

Not much in there now the sailfin tang and 2 angels have been sold & the bicolour blenny jumped out, also every single flasher wrasse jumped out I won't replace them. All that's in there now is just 2 clowns, yellow tang, copperband, 6 line wrasse, algae blenny, two firefish, and royal gramma. The angels had been nipping at the corals and polyp extension did improve after they left. I think the lower fish load has also been good for the corals they are coming along nicely.

This guy loves his coral vital......

Not a story I thought I'd ever tell, but the first time I saw one was a real big specimen in a tank at Hollywood, looked pretty, I asked how much? Complements to the sales person, they kept a totally straight face while telling me I really DID NOT want one!

I'll go with that, now that I have 2 fans hooked to a temperature controller the chiller hardly ever comes on. Does increase evaporation but it is certainly affordable. A temp controller is not essential an eight dollar timer from the supermarket can do.

Looks pretty good how it is to me, although another couple of baffles might not go amiss although you never quite know till you actually fire them up. 4 x flow is a little light, most often 5 or more is used. When you think about it the skimmer is cleaning the water in the sump. The faster the turnover, the cleaner the water in the main

Nice and clean, nice colours, and everything looks very healthy!

Nah. Hofer Gurgle Buster's all the way!!

Kyle and Chimera - What do you think?

Wow, that gurgle buster looks like the gears, better than a durso OR a standpipe! ( Runs and hides! ) Seems like it's 1/2 way between a durso and a standpipe. Anyhow it's so good I've cut and pasted from Reefs link Quote "After all this time..I finally got my overflows to run completely silent. After tinkering with the Durso's for the past 5 months trying to get them to shut up and stop gurgling..I yanked all four of them out and replaced them with the four Hofer Gurgle Buster's I made but never used. Man..these things work great..I don't know why I never tried these before. Within 10 minutes..I have these adjusted to run completely silent....how easy was that..geez.... I wanted to post a link to the Hofer Gurgle Buster construction page, but for some reason, it has been down for a couple weeks..will post it when it comes back up... Here is a pic of one of them I constructed.....very simple (and cheap) to make btw..... Quiet operation......

Ouch! Might just stay with my 4 footer after all.

Nice!