55 Gallon Frag Tank

We all have something we like about our aquaria...

Lol true enough Washing out my RO containers and hooking up the RO unit today...Get the tank topped off and ready for the new arrivals...Il get some pics up once they get here and start getting a little cleaning done. Its nothing bad just a bit of diatoms in random places but still. It could look so much better.

Quick edit/update. Just talked to foster and smith and neither the auto feeder nor the skimmer are under their warranty. They did give me E-Shopps phone number and told me to contact them as well as the manufacturer of the feeder. Called E-Shopps they're on west coast time so their customer service lady is at lunch. Im about to go check the mail and see if the CUC was dropped today by chance. Also going to get a hold of Current USA and see about the feeder. That said right now it looks like im starting to get back under way. Doubt itll stay that way but hey lets enjoy it while it lasts

Well I need to take new pictures of the pump unless I still have the old ones up on photobucket but I am getting it replaced for the cost of shipping it back to e-shopps. Sandy at E-Shopps is an epic woman btw. Great person to deal with Current-USA has decided to take the umm...Arrogant big business approach. Granted I was a bit rude in my e-mail I said nothing out of the way enough to warrant this response. Again, I was rude il admit. That said my words were essentially design flaw in the mounting made it unstable, It hit the water during routine maintenance while mounted as well as possible, I hope this dosent become an issue of arguing whos responsible. This is what they had to say...I wont deal with current-usa again though.

Dear Mr.Taylor,

There is no design flaw with the AquaChef fish feeder. We have sold these fish feeders for over five years now and have never had any issues with them fitting on aquariums. We specifically state on the first page of the AquaChef instruction manual that the warranty is void if the feeder is ever submersed or dropped into the water.

What type of aquarium do you have which made the feeder did not accommodate?

Sincerely,
Current-USA, Inc.



Quick further update. Just checked the mail the CUC is at the post office (Indoors at least thankfully) Gotta go in the morning to pick them up which im kind of glad because the tank is still being ever so slowly topped off by the RO unit. Hopefully tomorrow after we count our losses to shipping the little guys will already be at work.

Welp just added the CUC. Gotta go flip snails over and all the good stuff again in a minute. I got at least 400 dwarf ceriths man its ridiculous.

I'd just let the company win (Current USA). It's not like they'll help you if that is their attitude towards the problem...

Anyways, 400? That's a lot. o:

Lol yea I really dont care that much about it. Yea I have quite the little nom snail army in there now.I honestly lost track of the guesses about what all I got lol. Ended up getting a hole bag of hermit shells.

Welp here we go again with the rollercoaster. Im going to skip all the diffirent little things and sum it up. We are officially -1 ballast and +1 auto feeder...Loose screw in the ballast caused the issue. Long story short I got distracted while trying to reach a balance on the return/overflow to keep the overflow on full siphon and i ogt about a gallon of water on the floor. Heres Current-USA's reply to me telling them I have a standard tank.

Dear Mr. Taylor,

Normally this would not be covered under our warranty, however as it turns out we do have a few refurbished Aquachef Fish Feeders and are willing to send you one. Please email us your mailing address and we will get one out for you.

Sincerely,
Current-USA, Inc


Funny if you ask me. Anyway im going to attempt to salvage the ballast since it isnt covered under warranty and see if its as far gone as I think it is

Scrounged up my old 4ft T12 light and stuck it on the tank. Only has one bulb atm but its still 40 extra watts. I want to get it put on better but thats going to be something for later today. I saw about 20 nassarius when I tossed some munchy food in for them and the hermits. Saw 2 of the virgin nerites also. I like those little guys

Waters starting to clear up now that I replaced the GFO in the reactor for floss to get some of the stuff out of the water column while the skimmers down. Sending out the skimmer pump monday so hopefully il have a new one by next week. Zoas are really happy now that the skimmers down lol. They're spread wide open and looking beautiful. If nothing else il get some pics of the dirty tank up shortly.

I think im going to go mess with the T12 fixture and take some pics in the process so by the time yall read this hopefully there will be pics.

I'm reading but there's no pics!

Lol batteries are dead on the camera. Had em charging since that post I got a few pics of the zoas took il try and get them up real quick as teasers

Here ya go

Sorry boys I done got wrapped up in something itll be tomorrow if I remember for pics. Lights are out anyway. Btw that last pic is a virgin nerite. for size idea thats a super macro shot with the lens against the glass. Its basically like a ball with the diameter of a No. 2 pencil eraser.

Welp yet another day getting caught up in something. However my girls coming over in a few days so im just going to wait until after she leaves to take pics. Hopefully have the tank looking a lot better by then.

Nice shots.

Thanks man. Im starting to think I want a DSLR for my bday now just because of how sweet they are. I hate how you cant really do anything yourself with point and shoots. CUC is starting to get there little butts in gear. At the rate theyre going theyll have it spotless inside of 2 weeks. The ceriths are still spreading out from where I put em in at...Probably should have spread them out a bit more...

It's disappointing when you can't capture the real colors of the tank. I can understand why you would want a DSLR. You should look at some Nikons.

Man even the cheap ones are waaay out of my price range. Had a very long but VERY VERY good day today We've got a monster storm rollin around on the east coast though and we lost power for awhile so I have no idea what shape the tanks going to be in tomorrow. Also have at least 2 pumps with chaeto wrapped around the impeller shafts clogging them up that I gotta get out and clean up tomorrow but for now...I been up almost 22 hours and spent most of it with my girl...Im going to sleep

man, I haven't been on here for quite a while and wow, there's good ol' bluntokian stealing the spotlight with his awesome reef tank

Don't worry Blunt, I'll be back with cowfish soon

Dont worry, as my typical style I retired from the light back to the shadows very quickly. Due to the circumstances of the move and a deteriorating center brace on the tank im going to be downgrading it to the 20L that currently is the fuge.

The fuge will be replaced with a 10 gallon sump. Also had some issues with plumbing that I have since gotten "worked out" but im still short a hand full of parts for plumbing. I have a koralia 750 that had the magnet on the...I guess output that controls which way the propeller spins break off so its sort of just hanging around atm. I have one I just noticed this morning (not sure of size because I didnt even look) that simply isnt spinning.

Obviously im going to be going over all the equipment during the take down and set up when we move to make sure everything is in shape. I did get the skimmer pump replaced however the nozzle that plugs into the skimmer was too small so its siliconed in but working fine. All in all right now it is quite literally $50 holding this tank back from completely taking off regardless of the move.

Also still dont have corals because of funds (5 of us living on $1200/month) however my 18th was 16th of last month and right now im trying to find some odd jobs to get up the money for my permit, GED, and the last odd and end bits of hardware I need for getting the tank back on auto pilot.

I honestly dont even know what all you all know about happening so if I loose you on something just ask. Current USA after quite a bit of arguing did replace the auto feeder which I had to rebuild the replacement they sent because the company they contract the production/repair out to is apparently terrible. Iv lost I think 2 nerites both due to ending up flipped over for an unkown reason however they fed the nassarius and the hermits so I didnt worry about it.

Had a Candonema Jellyfish bloom thats actually survived for I believe about 2 months now. I was told that was usually short lived but I like it, its a bit interesting. During the move I really want to try to save as many of them as possible because they seem a bit rare in aquaria for extended periods of time.

The biggest issues im facing right now is the ~$50 in odds and ends i need (including a container for ATO water) and how im going to move the sand. The killer about the sand is the obvious nutrient and gas pockets it may or may not in it. I dont think itll have much if any simply because I very (very very) rarely feed since theres nothing in there that needs to be fed but the nass. and the hermits.

Any ideas about the sand move would be greatly appreciated. As for the plumbing I decided to redo it and went with 1" pipe and in the end im basically going to end up with exactly what I had to begin with accept its going to be slightly cleaner.

In hindsight, I should have slapped myself as soon as I thought about redoing the plumbing.

A 20L will certainly be more manageable in the beginning. As you get more experienced with fragging, and if you even want to, you'll be able to upgrade to a larger tank.

Yea, especially with everything going on right now. If I have to move again shortly after this move (50/50 chance atm) or, if I get a job and get my own place itll be a lot easier to move. Honestly though its rather annoying to me. I've been doing this for what? 4 years or so? and absolutely nothing to show for it but knowledge. As nice as knowledge is itd be nice if I could throw a pic up and say "Now tell me that aint sexy!"

Rather, think of it as four years of forethought and preparation.

I like that actually, definitely puts a new spin on it. Now, just to fund the product of 4 years of insane ideas

Do you mind sharing pics of those jellyfish? And that setup sounds like it's coming along well

~ocean wrote:Do you mind sharing pics of those jellyfish? And that setup sounds like it's coming along well

+1. I had forgotten about the jellyfish.

Not at all I believe I have some from the ID thread. Cant take any news ones atm though