Seafloor Cavern

[BlueOnBlue]

Finally after months of contemplating, I've decided to write about my reefer 350's journey. Made the move on this tank about four months ago and was kinda nervous because all along I've only been dealing with nano tanks and feel like I was not ready for a huge one. Nevertheless, I read, read & read countless of forums and watched tons of videos just to stock up my knowledge on reefing as I did not wan anything to go wrong. I bought the redsea reefer 350 from SAS while they had a promo so I think it can be considered as a pretty good buy.

 

The area that I was going to have my tank in had to have a reasonable amount of space for a chiller and a rack to house all my fish food and additives. I also took into account which part of the house that had less sunlight during the morning and less humid during the afternoon.

 

 

Guys arrived in 3 days after I've placed my order and moved the tank in. Damn speedy.

 

 

 

 

 

Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

[CalvinKlein]

Nice build coming along. Care to share your equipment list?

[BlueOnBlue]

Nice build coming along. Care to share your equipment list?

sure thing. Stay tune for more updates. Have alot of stuff to write about. 🤣

[Evolutionz]

Another RSR! Nice!!! 

[BlueOnBlue]

Alright so before the tank was ordered, I bought 2nd hand caribsea liferock from various reefers at good prices. Came in many shapes and sizes so I had to mix and match to get the scape I wanted. Used Aquaforest's stone fix to get the pieces to stick together. Took around 2 bags of it to get the job done as some rocks came apart even after cementing them for many hours.





After several hours of improvised creativity, finally came out with something acceptable.





Bought my bio media way earlier too from madpetz. Had to go with marinepure balls as their reputation for their bio media is quite good. Gave them a good soak in rodi water and off they go into the sump. Also transfered over some media from my previous nuvo 10 too.



Had a hard time moving my rockscape into the tank as it was quite heavy and I had to stand on a stool to slowly lower it into place. Almost dropped the whole rock piece on to the base at one point... scary. Finally after moving everything into place, I can see that my tank is finally getting somewhere.



Filled up the tank w 3 stage RODI at 0 tds over a span of 16 hours. Dear lord the anticipation was real and I could not wait for it to be filled up.




Started placing my wavemakers so that later when it's filled up won't have to put my hand in the water again. Using 2 AI Nero 5 as my trusty surface agitaters and wind for my corals.

[BlueOnBlue]

I wanted to sump to be simple and neat. I went with bubble magus curve 5 for my skimmer as I did not want to spend so much on a skimmer since it was a new tank and did not know what fishes I was about to have yet. So I went light and caved in on a more affordable skimmer. Left the filter sock and cup section to be default and probably will change it up in the future. Used my old Aquaforest reactor for running carbon and GFO to keep nutrients stable and at bay. For my return pump, I went with the Fluval SP2 as I needed a reputable pump and one that doesn't fail on me halfway when the tank is up and running.



Cable side compartment, wonder whether it will be enough for future equipment too haha



Went with my all time favourite salt from tropic marin as I've had success with it before and it is used by many reefers as well.

[Arai Jack]

Nice bro! How much u bought? Whr u buy?

Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

[BlueOnBlue]

Tank was cloudy the next day due to cycling. Tested my salinity and the big 3 but magnesium had fluctuations no matter how much I topped it off with brightwell aquatics Magnesion. Guess it's just new tank syndrome stuff.



Skimmer cup was overflowing like crazy too



Added my refugium lights consisting of blue and red led diodes as I read somewhere that having a mixed spectrum will give macro algae better growth. Base of the refugium consist of caribsea mineral mud for pods and macroalgae to flourish. Also added some loose rock for bacteria to grow on. I purchased some red bamboo, orange sponge and seagrapes to kick start my refugium, so far so good.

[BlueOnBlue]

Bought some new equipments to monitor my tank better. A ph monitor and external temp monitor for my chiller. Tank will be running 25c-26c tentatively, if any side effects kick up, I will increase it slowly.



Upgraded from a Hailea HS-28A to a HS-90A for more horsepower and lesser kick in time for the chiller to relax. Got it at a good deal from polyart clementi. Chiller will be outside the tank as I've had bad experiences in the past placing it in the cabinet. Connected it to a unknown china branded pump running at 2000L/H.



In the dry side of the cabinet will be the ATO reservoir. I'm using a 24L jerrycan to hold the RODI water. Usually lasting me a good 20 days before needing to top it up again. Covered the jerrycan with clingwrap so the water will not evaporate hence needing to top up the can less often. Luckily the AutoAqua Smart ATO Lite pump is small enough to fit through the mouth of the jerrycan.



For dosing, I decided to use the balling light method powered by Tropic Marin which covers Ca, Mag & Alk including all the trace elements that the corals will need. Was dosing pure cal, mag & alk before and didn't get very good results as most of the trace elements were missing even though I had stick to the dreaded once a week water change schedule. I also believe that to have a healthy reef, all three elements must be consumed equally. Bought two jebao 3.4 wifi dosers and two skimz dosing containers to house all my additives. Firstly from left to right in the picture.

1) Tropic Marin NP Bacto Balance
2) Tropic Marin Balling Light C
3) Tropic Marin Balling Light B
4) Tropic Marin Balling Light A
5) Fauna Marin Ultra Amin
6) Fauna Marin Color Elements Red
7) Fauna Marin Color Elements Blue
8) Fauna Marin Color Elements Green



Basically, what I'm aiming for is minimal to no water changes so that my parameters won't fluctuate everytime I take out a huge chunk of water for waterchanges. Firstly carbon dosing for keeping nutrients low so that water changes can be eliminated, also with the help of Fauna Marin's Phos 0.04. Carries a very rocky texture compared to normal GFO.




Fauna Marin Ultra Amin for supplying aminos for my corals so that I don't have to dose that manually everyday and lastly Fauna Marin color elements to help bring out the corals color as low nutrient tanks often make corals look pale and have washed out colors, also to increase calcification and have them to grow faster.

Purchased Fauna Marin BactoBalls for continuous dosing of bacteria slowly so that I don't get a bacteria bloom overnight if I overdose. All I have to do is drop them in the filter cup so that they are always floating around slowly dissolving over a period of two weeks. These balls also seem to clear algae and improve water clairty for some weird reason... strange hmmm.

[BlueOnBlue]

Fast forward one month, I added livestock and a bunch of corals from my previous tank to see how everything would fair. Used my nano tank's AI Prime 16HD too for one side of the tank as I was still thinking about whether to go T5, LED or hybrid, so here's the funny looking reef with only one side brightly lit.

[BlueOnBlue]

Borrowed a par meter from a friend and realised that I wasn't really getting a good enough evenly spreaded out par due to the AI Prime being a spotlight led. The edge of the tank was getting a mere 25-50 par but in order to increase the par I had to bump up the whites which gave the tank a very washed out look which I did not like. Read many reviews online about the brand Orphek and came across these bars called Orphek OR3 Led bars. Was contemplating whether to use the 90cm or 120cm bars as I did not want light spilling outside of the tank or the whole house would be blued out. I initially wanted to go with two Atlantik V4 compacts but the price was too steep compared to having 4 bars over my reef. Although they are meant to be supplementary lights, as I was thinking to go with the A360X kessil lights, I decided to use them as my main lights because the color was so beautifully and evenly spreaded out when I saw them at the lfs. Had a very good deal so I went ahead and bought 4 (deciding to add another blue plus soon) OR3 120 Bars consisting of 2 blue plus and 2 reef day along with the orphek universal mounting kit.



Bracket clamps were very sturdy and made of good metal which does not rust while touching water. The screws felt trustable enough to hold four bars or higher, also factoring in if I ever wanted to add more bars in the future. Unfortunetely they only came in silver and the black one was out of stock.



Did some cable mangement and used cable ties to hold the wires in place when mounting the bars on the arms so it will have a clean look.



Here's a picture of just the OR3 Blue pluses turned on. Turns out the light spill wasn't that bad when mounting them at a height of 10". Using the lights, I immediately saw corals open up more and having a more fluorescent highlight compared to the AI Prime


Some closeup pics of the gems

Green & Pink Goniopora


Tyree Rasta Zoas


Rain Infusion Zoa


Ironman Mushroom


Lumi Yellow Bali Tenuis


Blue Asian Acan

[Admiraltian]

Nice. Can share what is the carbon dosing method u r using?

[BlueOnBlue]

Nice. Can share what is the carbon dosing method u r using?

Hello, thanks for taking the time to read my thread. Am currently using Tropic Marin's NP Bacto Balance for carbon dosing. 0.5ml daily at the start of my light schedule.


Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

[Admiraltian]

I see. So this is ur carbon source? And bacteria u just depend on the bact balls?

[BlueOnBlue]

Started adding somemore corals as I decided to have Lps corals on the right side of the tank and Sps on the left. For the middle, it will consist of encrusting corals to cover up that nice flat surface of the rock structure. Of course I had to dip the new corals in one of my favourite dips Coral RX dip. Always having some bristleworm or weird stuff falling off frags that I buy so I'll always make it a habit to dip new frags no matter how small or clean they look as I'll never know what nasties are hiding in them.

Some loots from various reefers and Lfs

Green Branching Hammer


Bubblegum Digitata


Tri color Valida


Sunkist Zoas


Tequila Sunrise Zoas


War Coral (Helping a friend to take care)


Not sure what ID but looks nice (Anyone can help ID)


For food I use Redsea's Reef Energy AB+ as it doesn't elevate my nutrients by alot. Got the 1L bottle but finish quite fast



Also two times a week I dose live phyotoplankton Nannochloropsis Oculata. Keeps diatoms down and my soft corals seem to love it, also beneficial for my pods down at the refugium wonderland. After dosing this, scraping of my glass seems to be less needed too. Very nice product for all reefers to try, recommended.


Every two days also dose Fauna Marin's Min S for my corals to take in. They love this stuff and I swear by it.


I also target feed my Lps calanus liquid feed once a week. So far torch and hammers are already producing new heads. Very satisfied.

[BlueOnBlue]

I see. So this is ur carbon source? And bacteria u just depend on the bact balls?

Yup. Seems to be working well for the past few months. Nutrients are always at a stable 0.04 phos and 1 Nitrate.


Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

[BlueOnBlue]

For my clean up crew, I bought some hermit crabs and trochus snails but they don't seem to be doing the job very well. Got three strawberry conches from a fellow reefer and they are super hard workers especially at night


My long time algae blenny who is always pecking at algae. He always looks fat... don't ask what I feed it, he grew fat just by eating algae of the rocks 🤣


My watchman goby who turns over sand like nobody business at night while no one is watching 🤫

[BlueOnBlue]

Here's a FTS of the tank after multiple coral and wavemaker placement changes, all being made just to get the correct light and flow pattern. Placing the wavemaker at the tank's back glass just wasn't cutting out for me as the flow was weird and I figured placing gyre pumps there for surface agitation would be much better than my nero 5 which now belong at each side of the tank running in opposite pulse mode towards each other. Placing one wavemaker nearer to the front glass and the other further back gives a very nice wave effect for Euphyllia corals.

Day


Night

[Evolutionz]

Did you managed to test your PAR with these Orphek bars?

[BlueOnBlue]

Did you managed to test your PAR with these Orphek bars?

Yes I did and the par was around 300-340 for the upper tank level, 180-220 mid tank and 80-130 bottom. Very good set of led lights

[BlueOnBlue]

After a two weeks, corals started coloring up and growth was speedy too. Didn't really pay attention to the tank as I'm usually quite busy with work so things just started taking off without me noticing it. Just did my normal regimen of topping up the ATO and filling additives that were used up for the following months.

The war coral that I'm currently taking care of for my friend


New pp growing for the pink panther zoas


Blue hornets, was previously 1pp


Acropora Tenuis became more vibrant


Yellow Spongodes sprouting like weed


Cali Tort previously was dull also had blossomed

[noobhobbyist]

Here's a FTS of the tank after multiple coral and wavemaker placement changes, all being made just to get the correct light and flow pattern. Placing the wavemaker at the tank's back glass just wasn't cutting out for me as the flow was weird and I figured placing gyre pumps there for surface agitation would be much better than my nero 5 which now belong at each side of the tank running in opposite pulse mode towards each other. Placing one wavemaker nearer to the front glass and the other further back gives a very nice wave effect for Euphyllia corals.

Day


Night

Super nice FTS bro


Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

[BlueOnBlue]

Super nice FTS bro


Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

Thanks for the kind words bro. Appreciate

[BlueOnBlue]

Got some upgrades, sold away my Aquaforest media reactor as it was such a hassle to operate it. Bought a skimz reactor off a fellow reefer whom installed a tuneable skimz pump to it. Very good reactor to run GFO in it as the flow for GFO must be just enough to make it tumble lightly. Don't want a very rough tumble else the GFO will disintegrate quickly and pollute the tank's water.




Came across a youtube video on a guy running his activated carbon in a bag just by hanging it from his tank's cabinet and the area of the bag filled with carbon is submerged slightly below the water column followed by a wavemaker blowing against it. Very innovative idea if you don't want filter cups or putting your carbon in a reactor. Placed my old jebao ow10 in the sump and set it to the maximum speed for getting all that detritus off the bottom and also to create flow for the carbon in the bag.


During the night when the lights are off, I dose Fauna Marin's coral balance every 4 days just to supply a good amount of marine biopolymers for the corals to have and to keep my nitrate and phosphate at a good ratio so one does not fall below the other creating a broken nutrient ratio.


Other than that, I do dose coral vitality as well for that extra color boostage I want my corals to have. Been using these two products for the past three months and the results are very noticeable.


Bought more corals as well... hope this addiction is being kept in check else my pockets will have big holes in it.

Dragon Soul Favia


Radioactive Bounce Mushroom


Yellow Hammer


Orange Passion Frag


Meteor Shower Cyphastrea


Neon Green Toadstool

[Admiraltian]

23 hours ago, BlueOnBlue said:

Yup. Seems to be working well for the past few months. Nutrients are always at a stable 0.04 phos and 1 Nitrate.


Sent from Singapore Reef Club mobile app

I see, thanks.