SubzeroLT

Are you using a chiller or cooling fan? Isn't the skimmer placed in a location where water level is constant? And the return pumps in a section where the water level in that section does NOT affect the skimmer section? Yes, do consider an ATO. Very important to make reefing life easier.

For power failure, cloud based equipment like Apex or Caperplus can alert you of disconnection after about 30min delay. An alternative equipment is iSocket (uses SIM card) to send you an SMS immediately. This seems less popular nowadays due cost of equipment & regular SIM card replacement. For power failure, its also best to have a battery backup system to keep your wavemakers going. Personally i have 3 sets of battery (1 to each wavemaker).

Got complacent & ignored the growing corals touching the tonga pinkbirdsnest. Had to trim a lot away

There are many ways to set it. Proportion wise, set the whites around 15% (LPS) to 30% (SPS) with respect to your blues (eg. 100%). UV contributes to some fluorescent pigments to become more vivid. Mine is around 50% of Blues but don't foresee an issue moving it to equivalent to blue levels slowly over time once the corals are acclimatized.

That's why I need to consult Chun Wai. Thanks. I read in a recent edition of Coral Magazine about the various fishes bred in captivity. Something worth trying...more for interest & learning than for profit.

Hope you do get your AI cloud issue resolved. That's one of the fantastic features of the light set. An image of your light settings can tell a lot (eg. ramp time, peak timing etc). From 1st glance, you have a lot of white in proportion to your blues (i.e. can be reduced). That could be one of the sources of your issues.

I used to have serious diatoms. A couple of things that worked for me : - Reduced feeding or going with pellets instead of frozen food to fishes can help. Reduce feeding to corals. - If its diatoms, siphon out instead of blowing it away. Siphoning them out is the best way to 'export' the silicates & associated nutrients. Blowing it away is only a temporary/visual measure but it'll always surely come back - Reduce or stop dosing trace elements - Installed a waterfall ATS (worked for me) - Reduce lights. Perhaps you can share your light settings in your tank thread - Get big eater invertebrates (eg. Abalone). IMO, snails & sea cucumbers are very slow. Sea hare works but many find they die very fast.

What's your dosing or feeding regime like? Usually hair algae & diatoms appear with excessive feeding/supplement dosing + excessive light.

Gave some away. The rest didn't make it Found it troublesome/diffcult to manage water conditions for stand alone tank (eg. water cleanliness, evaporation etc) Was thinking of setting up a connected tank to house baby fishes in future. Maybe try more interesting gobies or mandarins. Need to consult Chun Wai.

Nice!

Thanks. Just lucky actually. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Paired Banggai Cardinals Can see the baby fishes inside the father's mouth Only managed to net out 2 babies this round. Witness several others get eaten by the wrasses Not a clear pic buts its nice to see the 2 spotted mandarins together most of the time. 2 six line wrasses Introduced the smaller yellow tang 2 weeks ago. OK so far. Bullied by the Square Anthias occasionally but ok with the other Tangs Barely see the Halloween crabs around.

These are very nice

Just came in. You can whatsapp Patrick (ReefmarketSG) directly.

My DIY calcium reactor flow rate 'meter' Able to visually see if the effluent slows down from the height of the dip stick.

New gadget again:) Magnetic probe holder for the pH probe. Both the wet & dry side are well sealed. This is acrylic, so the joints are usually very robust. Testing it out to hold an egg crate on 15mm glass. Works great to hold frags. Using it for the pH probe for now. These magnetic holders are convenient to place the probes/sensors or float switches at the right levels. Should have gotten 2 sets instead. I usually get a PMs on where to buy new gadgets I share in my thread. This one is from ReefMarketSG. Very reasonable price.

The one i'm using looks like this though other shapes & sizes area available. Its commonly used for scuba diving underwater photography. Available at local photography shops or search for yellow lens filter on ebay.

Some pics taken with yellow filter Using this thread to keep track of maintenance done. Replaced the CR media of the secondary chamber. Original media was the finer grade type & got quite mushed up due to accidental low PH in the past. Replacing with larger sized Rowalith media. Calibrated all the pH probes : For Calcium reactor, Sump, Alkatronic & handheld one

Your tank stand & piping seems interesting. What's the filtration system like?

Don't think there are any strict rules about this. Suggest check it monthly for accuracy (eg. with calibration fluid). If it drifts beyond your comfort levels, then re-calibrate it. So far, I've ended up calibrating it about 1-2 times per year

Nice. More pics please. How big is your tank?

There are some guidelines for minimum posts (50) & time registered (30 days) to be able to post in the pasar malam section. Don't despair....you are almost there. "This forum exist for the exchange of useful information among hobbyist, and this pasa malam section are a privileges for those members who support this forum mission. Also in order to protect our members against fly by night seller, you need to have at least 50 " Meaningful" posting in the forums and have been registered for the last 30 days, before being able to start a selling thread here in this section"

Did a short write up on refractometers & best practices when mixing salt water. More details here :

A short write up on common issues reefers face when mixing salt water. This article aims to covers a couple of areas: Consistency issues with large buckets of salt mix (top vs bottom) How optical refractometers work. Selecting the right refractometer. Calibration method Other processes that may adversely affect the water parameters (eg. Prepare salt for specific gravity of ~ 1.025. But when you measure the Ca, Mg, KH parameters, it’s NOT as per published numbers) Hands on with branded vs ‘cheap’ refractometers. And cross check with a calibration fluid. This article focuses on the handheld optical refractometers. Some are mine. Some are borrowed. Examples of why inaccurate salinity measurement is detrimental Prolonged incorrect salinity parameters will negatively impact coral growth or reproduction rates Ineffective hypo salinity treatment for breaking ich parasite cycle or quarantine. Incorrect target Ca, Mg, KH parameters. More effort needed to compensate with dosing methods Mixing salt Some salt brands mention to remix the bucket of salt but some don’t. The reality is that for any brand or type (evaporative or synthetic salts), smaller/heavier elements like magnesium will sink to the bottom of the bucket due to vibration during transportation. You end up with more calcium salt at the top & more magnesium salt at the bottom. This means that the water parameters of a new bucket of salt can be fairly ‘different’ from that from the bottom of the bucket. While some feel this difference does not matter, some others are very particular on chasing water parameter numbers but ignore step. One best practice for ensuring consistency is to remix the dry salt – Split the salt to different buckets then recombine back for storage. Just a 10 minute task. Mix it manually or roll the partially filled bucket to mix. Then recombine all the salt back into the original bucket for storage. Salinity & its relationship with specific gravity. Salinity The important unit of measure for seawater is “Salinity”. This is a measure of the weight of salts dissolved in 1000 weight of water (eg. 35g of salt in 1000g of water) The salinity of most seawater ranges between 34PPT-36PPT (parts per thousand) depending on the location. Hence the widely accepted practice of targeting the average of 35PPT It is this total amount of salts that give you the final water parameters. Putting more salt (eg. 36ppt) will naturally give you higher Ca, Mg, KH numbers compared to 35ppt. Specific Gravity (SG) This is a relative density measurement. That is, a ratio of density of a given substance to the density of water. Specific gravity is a good alternative and practical method of measuring salinity. Having said that, it is important to understand various aspects around specific gravity. A common mistake is that most reefers shoot for is a specific gravity of 1.025. However, this number does not necessarily get you 35ppt salinity. Factors such as ambient temperature and refractometer calibration accuracy affect the target specific gravity. Refractometer Many of us use hand held optical refractometers for practical purposes. It works on the fundamental physics principal of light refraction (bending light across a surface), and comparing the relative difference between the refraction of pure water vs salt water. Liquids with higher salinity has a higher refractive index & will bend light more. This shows up as the location of ‘blue line’ on the specific gravity scale. Some facts: Most refractometers from LFS or ebay in the US$30 range are designed for “brine”. Brine is a generic term for salt water which is composed of mostly sodium chloride. One common use of brine is for preserving food in salt water. Note that Brine is NOT the same as sea water (Chloride, Sodium, Sulfate, Calcium, Magnesium, Potassium & other minor constituents). Hence the behavior under the refractometer is different. If using a brine refractometer, be aware it has a salinity offset compared to sea water at various temperatures. The generic refractometers have a salinity scale from 0-100ppt. For our purpose, we measure around the 35ppt region only. While some may get by with generic brine refractometers, many prefer paying slightly more for seawater specific ones for better accuracy. Key differences are build quality & materials used. For example, the DD refractometer body is made of copper – this ensures quicker water/tool temperature equalization and also more consistent ATC (auto temperature compensation) Cheaper refractometers have a plastic or aluminum body which makes the temperature equalization slower & less accurate. As mentioned earlier, specific gravity is a measure of density (i.e. mass / volume). As temperature increases, water volume increase as well. Hence for a particular salinity level (eg. 35ppt), specific gravity change at different temperatures. Temperature is one of the single most important factors influencing accurate refractometer readings and is one of the largest sources of error in measurement. Refractive index is VERY dependent on temperature. The common refractors used in the hobby have ATC (Automatic Temperature Compensation). The ATC mechanism is simply a bi-metallic strip : an assembly of 2 different metals which expand/contract at different rates. Causing it to bend up or down to change the position of the visual scale to ‘compensate’ changes in refractive index of the water being measured. For the Auto temperature compensation to work properly, you must allow the test sample & refractometer body temperature to equalize. Best practice is to place your sample then wait 10-20 seconds before taking a reading. ** Image from http://www.refractometer.pl/hand-held-refractometer Calibrating refractometer. Calibration is to reset the 0 PPT / 1.0 SG point to ensure the refractometer is accurate for the operating temperature range specified (eg. 10deg to 40deg C). Essentially, what calibration does is to move the viewfinder scale up/down by tuning a small screw. Most refractometers have a label stating “20/20”. This means it’s designed & was originally factory calibrated at 20degC. The behavior of the bimetal strip ATC & optics is tuned to this set point. To do this properly in our warm climate, you need to cool the refractometer body to 20degC (eg. in a 20degC air con room) With the refractometer at 20DegC, place RODI water on the prism. Wait 20s. Then tune the screw till it reads 0 PPT / 1.0 SG A common mistake is to zero the refractometer at ambient condition that is not 20degC. Here you see a slight offset in reading RODI water. If you had done so, the salinity of the salt you are getting would be ~ 1.5ppt lower than your target. ** Pardon the unsharp refractometer reading pictures as they were taken with an iphone A common question is how the cheap refractometers compare with branded ones. As seen in the picture below, the unbranded brine refractometer reads approx. 1.5ppt higher than sea water specific ones. I personally prefer the rubber cap over the calibration screw port. Threaded ones are troublesome to remove & prone to water getting in. The DD one has a thoughtful design that minimizes chances of losing the cap compared the Brine or Red Sea one Target water parameters Only a few salt manufacturers publish the recommended salinity/SG/temperature mixture. Here is an example : https://www.theaquariumsolution.com/product/3035/124 Often, we use a water pump to help mix the salt in a drum/bucket of water. Care should be taken to prevent the mixture salts from precipitating. This means that an insoluble solid has emerged from the solution which can also alter the published water parameters. In most cases, mixing salt for 1-3 hours should be sufficient. Do not mix for excessively long periods. The heat from the water pump may cause calcium carbonate precipitate. Tell-tale sign is cloudy water if that happens. Avoid leaving the pump turned on overnight in an open container. This can draw CO2 from the air into the water & change the chemistry of carbonate towards bi-carbonate. This also leads to some precipitation Parting notes I hope this short write up highlights some areas to watch out for when preparing salt mix – selecting a good refractometer & proper calibration to ensure the right salinity/specific gravity is reached. And some best practices to obtain consistent water parameters every time new salt is mixed. Cheers

DIY a breakout box for the Apex because i needed a very long cable. In my opinion, not really worth the cost/effort. Quite troublesome to make. Other pics : 'Harvesting' pods & rotifers to feed the tank after lights off. Add together with about 1 cup of assorted phyto culture.