Wayne Scott
New member
Hello DanSreef & EricTheRed,
I am in the same boat when it comes to telling my wife what I spend on corals. The problem with telling her anything about cost is that she will always ask for a receipt. So I stopped telling her. I decided that I will not take from our account, but I will sell stuff and reinvest what I make back into the hobby.
She is OK with that. That was why I was happy that I purchased many systems, because I still have about $15,000 retail in equipment that I am sure over time that I can get at least $3000-$5000 for.
I will post more photos of my setup when I get all of my SPS mounted in my New tank. I just transferred everything from 2 other systems into this one a few weeks ago.
I had huge concerns about acclimation. I had someone coming over to buy one of the tanks that had a lot of livestock in it, he was only going to buying the tank/stand/canopy. I already had a 125 & a 140 tied into one filtration system. So I did something that I was not at all comfortable with. See, below
This is what I did:
1) I filled the 180 Gallon aquarium
2) At this moment, I did not have the 300 gallon tub connected to any system but I did have is set up as an LPS Live Rock saltwater Pond for about 6 months. I had drained the 300 gallon tub 2 weeks prior to setting up the 180 gallon.
3) I mixed another 200 gallons of fresh saltwater mix and added it to the 300 gallon tub.
4) I monitored the parameters of the 380 gallons of saltwater that was recirculating for the 180 gallon recirculation system.
5) 5 days later, I got the parameters close to what was other recirculation system.
6) Once I felt comfortable, I shut down the recirculation 2 recirculation systems.
7) I rearranged the sump tanks to combine the 2 systems into 1 recirculation system. I modified the PVC overflow & return routing for the 2 tanks so that I could tie the new & old recirculation system together.
8) Before I opened the valves and turned on the external return pump:
"I GOT ON MY HANDS AND KNEES, PRAYING TO ALL THE GODS IN THE WORLD SAYING PLEASE DON'T LET THIS WIPE OUT EVERYTHING THAT I HAVE ACCOMPLISHED WHEN I TURN THIS RETURN PUMP ON"
I waited about 45 minutes to build up the nerve, and I finally said the heck with it "I am gonna do it":
9) I turned on the return pump
10) I had to adjust some valves to tune the flows to each tank
11) I cried
12) My wife was yelling for me to come quick
13) My heart fell through the concrete floor of my basement
14) I went upstairs to see what was going on
15) Just by coincidence, she witnessed an accident at the intersection near where I live. I never felt so much relief in my life & who would have thought that someone else getting hurt could do that. I did rush to see if I could help, I immediately called 911. Sorry to say, someone died that day.
16) She said it happened the moment she heard the water flowing again in the aquariums
17) I waited three days to see how the corals were taking to the new water, and believe or not “I never saw my corals look so good.”
18) I did not even acclimate anything; I just started moving stuff from one tank to another with the exception of the SPS corals
19) I unmounted all the SPS corals and put them in a frag tank half-way house that I set up a couple days before the transfer.
Now I still Have to mount about 25 mini colonies of SPS before I would say that the aquarium is complete.
Oh, I still have to complete my custom stand and canopy as well. This will be a winter project and I am planning on building it around the running tank.
Regards,
Wayne
I am in the same boat when it comes to telling my wife what I spend on corals. The problem with telling her anything about cost is that she will always ask for a receipt. So I stopped telling her. I decided that I will not take from our account, but I will sell stuff and reinvest what I make back into the hobby.
She is OK with that. That was why I was happy that I purchased many systems, because I still have about $15,000 retail in equipment that I am sure over time that I can get at least $3000-$5000 for.
I will post more photos of my setup when I get all of my SPS mounted in my New tank. I just transferred everything from 2 other systems into this one a few weeks ago.
I had huge concerns about acclimation. I had someone coming over to buy one of the tanks that had a lot of livestock in it, he was only going to buying the tank/stand/canopy. I already had a 125 & a 140 tied into one filtration system. So I did something that I was not at all comfortable with. See, below
This is what I did:
1) I filled the 180 Gallon aquarium
2) At this moment, I did not have the 300 gallon tub connected to any system but I did have is set up as an LPS Live Rock saltwater Pond for about 6 months. I had drained the 300 gallon tub 2 weeks prior to setting up the 180 gallon.
3) I mixed another 200 gallons of fresh saltwater mix and added it to the 300 gallon tub.
4) I monitored the parameters of the 380 gallons of saltwater that was recirculating for the 180 gallon recirculation system.
5) 5 days later, I got the parameters close to what was other recirculation system.
6) Once I felt comfortable, I shut down the recirculation 2 recirculation systems.
7) I rearranged the sump tanks to combine the 2 systems into 1 recirculation system. I modified the PVC overflow & return routing for the 2 tanks so that I could tie the new & old recirculation system together.
8) Before I opened the valves and turned on the external return pump:
"I GOT ON MY HANDS AND KNEES, PRAYING TO ALL THE GODS IN THE WORLD SAYING PLEASE DON'T LET THIS WIPE OUT EVERYTHING THAT I HAVE ACCOMPLISHED WHEN I TURN THIS RETURN PUMP ON"
I waited about 45 minutes to build up the nerve, and I finally said the heck with it "I am gonna do it":
9) I turned on the return pump
10) I had to adjust some valves to tune the flows to each tank
11) I cried
12) My wife was yelling for me to come quick
13) My heart fell through the concrete floor of my basement
14) I went upstairs to see what was going on
15) Just by coincidence, she witnessed an accident at the intersection near where I live. I never felt so much relief in my life & who would have thought that someone else getting hurt could do that. I did rush to see if I could help, I immediately called 911. Sorry to say, someone died that day.
16) She said it happened the moment she heard the water flowing again in the aquariums
17) I waited three days to see how the corals were taking to the new water, and believe or not “I never saw my corals look so good.”
18) I did not even acclimate anything; I just started moving stuff from one tank to another with the exception of the SPS corals
19) I unmounted all the SPS corals and put them in a frag tank half-way house that I set up a couple days before the transfer.
Now I still Have to mount about 25 mini colonies of SPS before I would say that the aquarium is complete.
Oh, I still have to complete my custom stand and canopy as well. This will be a winter project and I am planning on building it around the running tank.
Regards,
Wayne