Mike's 260g Rimless Starphire Build

<u>Red Sea Colors Program Update:</u>

I was able to test my NSW and got some interesting results in terms of the Red Sea Coral Colors test parameters, especially considering this is their Coral Pro salt:

I = 0.09
K = 430
Fe = 0.00

So it looks like my weekly water changes are enough to replenish iodide and iodate as well as Potassium. What is troubling is iron was undetectable. I tried the test twice to confirm this. First time was after I had let the mix sit for overnight and had some precipitation. I thought that might have been the issue so I tested another batch after it mixed clear. Same results.

I was able to find some Reef Colors "C" at a LFS after calling around to quite a few so I have been able to continue iron dosing. Tonight, I am still at 0.05 so I have upped the daily dose to 150ml to try to raise it to the recommended 0.15 level. If 100ml is required for maintenance levels then I will need a TON of Colors "C" supplement.

Thus, my supplemental regimen and 30-day monthly cost looks like this along with about how many 500ml bottles I need (rounded up):
Reef Colors "C" 3,000 ml (6 bottles) $12/ea = $72
Reef Colors "D" 450 ml (1 bottle) $12/ea = $12
Reef Energy "A" 900 ml (2 bottles) $16/ea = $32
Reef Energy "B" 900 ml (2 bottles) $16/ea = $32
Total Cost = $148.00

Well, I guess at least I have LEDs instead of 1200w of MH eating at my electric bill [smilie=lol.gif] How's that for rationalization? [smilie=wink.gif]

Here are my full parameters from my testing this weekend pre-water change:

<u>Salinity:</u> 35ppt (Hanna Digital Refractometer & Apex Conductivity Probe)
<u>Temperature:</u> 78F (Apex Temp Probe, drain side)
<u>pH:</u> 8.20 (Apex pH probe)
<u>Ammonia:</u> Undetectable (API)
<u>Nitrite:</u> Undetectable (API)
<u>Nitrate:</u> Undetectable (API)
<u>Alkalinity:</u> 8.6 dKh (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Calcium:</u> 435 ppm (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Magnesium:</u> 1340 (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Phosphate:</u> 0.00 ppm (Hanna Checker)
<u>Iodide & Iodate:</u> 0.06 ppm (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Iron:</u> 0.05 ppm (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Potassium:</u> 410 ppm (Red Sea Pro)

<u>Quarantine Update:</u>

I've neglected updating this part as I've been writing a blog entry for Reef Addicts that details my QT process and progress so I can quickly reference it. It has gone well for the most part but I did unfortunately lose my initial naso to swim bladder disease. The other fish have done extremely well and the Powder Blue eats just about everything even though it initially wouldn't even touch Nori.

The big news is they have now all been in hypo for about two months so I started to raise salinity tonight. The end is in sight!!! A quick recap of the timeline is I started hypo around October 19, saw no more spots around November 3 and then waited the requisite 4 weeks plus another week to be safe at 1.008 S.G. (I tweaked it down from 1.009). It has been a long process but hopefully they are now all marine ich free. I will raise salinity by about 0.002 per day until I reach normal salinity levels and watch for another week after that before adding them to the main tank.
 
Quick update: I wrote to one of the Red Sea chemists regarding my iron levels, dosing, and test results to make sure I am on the right path. Adding that much iron supplement daily just doesn't "feel" right per se especially given the option to dose based on calcium uptake alone which would indicate much lower dosing than what I am doing. I'll update with what they say.

Good news is that Red Sea said they will be shipping 5 liter containers of some of these products and a LFS I spoke with gave me cost estimates which looks be cheaper than buying the 500ml bottles.

Also, my QT article made it onto Reef Addicts: http://www.reefaddicts.com/content.php/372-My-Reef-Friendly-Quarantine-System

Salinity in my QT is now at 1.012 today after my water changes. I am also feeding a full cube of mysis and leaving a 1/4 sheet of Nori for grazing daily for the QT inhabitants as I want to make sure they have all the food they need while they adjust to higher salinity levels.
 
Great write-up about the QT setup sir and I appreciate how through you have been documenting the Red Sea program as well. It has been both interesting and helpful to read. It has given me some things to think about concerning my own plans for my QT.
I am also interested to see what the Red Sea folks say about the iron levels....
 
Thank you! I am interested in what they say as well and have not heard back yet. I spoke to someone over the phone who then gave me the email address of one of their chemists. I'll follow-up in a couple of days if I haven't heard back by then.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy SIII
 
Mike, you've done a great job documenting it so far. After you've been using it for another couple of months, a product review article will be your next assignment. :)
 
Have you thought about changing to a ca rx. Your corals are frags now imagine when they are colonies and the amount of color program you will buying to maintain the levels


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
@Marc wrote:
Mike said:
You got it!

@kuyatwo wrote:
Have you thought about changing to a ca rx. Your corals are frags now imagine when they are colonies and the amount of color program you will buying to maintain the levels Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk said:
I have looked into a Ca reactor before, especially when I was initially planning the build. Honestly, I am hesitant to switch as I have no experience with the Ca reactors and they seem rather complicated with all the things that can go bad and the maintenance involved. The things that have scared me off from running one are things I've read about solenoid issues, valves, dialing them in every time you change media, changing media being a pain, pH probes going bad and messing things up, leaks, and clogged pumps and the need to still supplement and dose Ca to keep up with Ca demand. I'm sure there are better ones out there these days and some of these may be old issues that have been addressed by better reactors. If you have suggestions as to better ones to look at and some reviews, I'd be interested in reading up on them.

I've got my 2-part dosing down pretty well too and can easily mix up 5 gallons at a time. Even if my Alk & Ca uptake triples to say 600ml a day, my dosing containers support 31 days of supply without having to refill and the Red Sea Colors would just require about 30 ml or so a day. I guess that's probably my threshold, if my Ca consumption goes over around 600ml a day then I would probably switch to something else.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
<u>Red Sea Program Update:</u>

So I got a little behind this week and the test parameters are from tonight, after I did a water change on Saturday. I'm just going to list the important ones and ones related to the program as everything else is the same as last week:

<u>Alkalinity:</u> 8.4 dKh (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Calcium:</u> 425 ppm (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Magnesium:</u> 1300 (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Phosphate:</u> 0.00 ppm (Hanna Checker)
<u>Iodide & Iodate:</u> 0.03 ppm (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Iron:</u> 0.00 ppm (Red Sea Pro)
<u>Potassium: </u> 400 ppm (Red Sea Pro)

I added a 1/2 gallon or BRS magnesium solution to raise Mg to about 1400 and upped my daily Mg dosing from 50ml to 60ml to compensate a little for the loss. Although my my tank reads 0.00 on Phosphate, I have a small cyano bloom due to me messing around with the fuge when I removed a bunch of macro and stirring up detritus to remove it from there. I took a water sample from the fuge section and phosphates there are reading 0.10 so I'm guessing that's what's feeding the cyano. I'll just siphon some out when I do water changes and wait for it use up the excess phosphate that is being released as it is just staying on my sand bed.

I still haven't head back from Red Sea's chemist but will try to follow-up this week. For this past week, I've just done Iron (Coral Colors "C") dosing based on on Calcium use and gone to 10ml a day. Colors "D" dosing remains at 10ml a day. I am adding 50ml of Colors "C" to my 25g water changes though as the NSW still does not read any Fe. Given the lower readings on Iodide/Iodate and Potassium, I am starting Colors "A" and Colors "B" today also at 10ml a day. I did add the recommended amounts of Colors "A" and Colors "B" to get my Iodide/Iodate and Potassium levels back to Red Sea's recommendations.

So, total daily dosing is now 10ml each of Colors "A" - "D" and 15ml each of Reef Energy "A" and "B"

<u>Treatment Update:</u>

I am happy to note that there have been no signs of Marine Ich after getting the system back to normal salinity. It took a little over a week to raise the salinity in the system from a S.G. of 1.008 to 1.026. I used the Salty Zoo salinity calculator to ballpark my water changes (45 gallon system volume) and had to use a total of 114 gallons of new salt water at a S.G. of 1.026 to reach my target salinity. Here's a breakdown of approximately how much water was used for each change along with the salinity before and after:

1.008 - 1.010 = 5g
1.010 - 1.012 = 5.5g
1.012 - 1.014 = 6.5g
1.014 - 1.016 = 7.5g
1.016 - 1.018 = 8.5g
1.018 - 1.020 = 11g
1.020 - 1.022 = 14g
1.022 - 1.024 = 21g
1.024 - 1.026 = 35g

I administered Prazipro yesterday, which is the final step in my process, and did not notice a depressed appetite at all. I heard that can be an issue with Prazipro treatment but have not experienced it in this case. When I raised the salinity, I also boosted the amount of food everyone gets in order to help them adjust to the higher salinity and their greater energy needs. The tank gets a full cube of PE Mysis a day and a 1/4 sheet of Nori as well. The tangs really love the Mysis shrimp and sit in front of the powerhead catching shrimp as the shrimp get blown toward them.

I will be able to release my fish into my tank come next Tuesday, Christmas day! The Caribbean Blue tang will be adopted out to a friend as I have my heart set on a Achilles Tang and do not want to try to mix 3 Acanthurus tangs in my main tank. I currently have a LFS holding the Achilles and they will have had him for 2 weeks when I pick him up. Assuming he hasn't displayed any signs of Ich when I pick him up, I plan on putting him in preventative hypo for four weeks while I make sure he's eating what I feed my other fish. That will also give me time to put together my game plan as to how to introduce him to the main tank. I'm thinking about trapping the PBT and Purple Tang, which I anticipate would be the most aggressive toward him, and placing them in the QT tank for just a few days while I move the Achilles to the main tank, move around and add some rock, and then put the PBT and Purple back in the main tank. The Blonde Naso and Blue Hippo have been completely passive and are basically swimming chickens so I'm not worried about them.

I did also upgrade the skimmer last week to a Vertex IN-100 but am keeping the Remora Pro around as it has been so handy to have. I'll be replacing or supplementing the Koralia with a MP40W-ES or MP10W-ES to give the Achilles a lot of flow.
 
Mike, I have been following your build log closely. I only wish I could be as dedicated and detailed, but to the real point...

Let's se some more pictures!
 
Sorry for the lack of updates guys. Wife and I both got sick over Christmas and New Years, then had a death in the family, just got back from an almost week long business trip, and just finished getting the wife a new car. It has been a crazy 30 days! Let me get caught-up and I'll get some worthwhile updates together.
 
@MBSL55 wrote:
Thanks! One of these days I hope to finally get enough spare time to update this log. said:
That and you can add the skimmer cleaner I forgot to give you from my truck.... Lol. I will get it to you either at the bod meeting or at the next meeting

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top