The Tucker's Red Sea 650 build

Thank you. We love all of the fish. The powder brown has really disrupting the peace in the tank. He's an ich magnet and bullies everyone. But he is so beautiful.


Matt
 
Just fragged some armor of god palys. 10 polyps. First time fragging so I am still trying to get the hang of it. I will probably try to split the 10 into 5s at some point. Also fragged some zoanthids with green eyes and reddish brown edges. It's also a large frag. Id really like to split it in 2 as well. I think I'm just too afraid I'm going to hurt them.
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Matt
 
Honestly it didnt work out the way I planned. I used bone cutters to try to chip off a small piece. Ended up breaking it in half. Then I used a scalpel to cut the rest. Both mother colony and frag look fine today. It was dumb. You know how it is. You have a drink or two and then you think you can do anything. I should have waited. But it's done and they are healthy. I will try again on the frag to split into maybe 3-5 polyps per frag.

I'm not good at this stuff. Still learning. I will tell you that you probably won't hurt them. They are damn near impossible to kill.


Matt
 
We purchased a 5 gallon nano that we plan to pipe into our red sea tank. Im beginning the build on this tank. Today i purchased a scwd wave maker. I'm planning on drilling for a 1" drain and running the return on the outside with 3/4" lines. The drain will flow into the filter sock of the Red Sea 650.

I am considering two options for the return.

#1 put another valve on the mag 18 that feeds the chiller and biopellet reactor.

#2 do the return off the skimmer supply from the main return of the dt. Then I would send the effluent from the biopellets into the protein skimmer directly.

Any advice is appreciated. This is the first tank I've set up that requires me to plumb anything other than a chiller or pellet reactor.

The main reason we purchased this tank is so that we can house my wife's porcelain crab. If we decide to go nem free, we may try a seahorse or two. Sounds cool to me. Thanks for any opinions or advice. If my idea is stupid please feel free to tell me I'm an idiot. I won't be offended. I'm still learning about plumbing.
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Matt
 
Here's a picture of our palythoa grandis moon polyps. I may be somewhat jaded, but these are the best looking moon polyps I've ever seen. The eyelashes around the polyp are a half inch long on some polyps. I just wanted to brag on these guys. I bought a single polyp at Fish2morow about a year ago. I do have a single frag ill be selling soon if anyone is interested.
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Matt
 
I also need to mention that the polps that look connected are actually three polyps connected together right at the head. It's really cool looking.


Matt
 
Working on the return plumbing for the nano today. I got the SCWD and all of the return plumbing at the tank finished. I haven't figured out where I'm gonna put the valve yet. I will probably wait until I get it set up at home so I can figure out the easiest place to put it. I painted the drain pipe purple with the purple pipe cleaner. We don't want I see the white pipe in the tank. Figured it might give it a coralline look until it covers. I plan on painting the back glass black today as well. The AI Nano light I ordered will be here Tuesday.

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Matt
 
Thank you. I have a few frags of eagle eyes that I will probably be selling soon. I have a few that I'm giving away and then I will sell the rest in the next few weeks. Then I have the bright green center with reddish brown edges that ill be fragging soon as well. Darth maul palys soon too.

Here's the eagle eyes

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Armor of God paly and green eyed zoa(name unknown)

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Ill post pictures of the rest Darth mauls when I get home tomorrow.


Matt
 
Ran two separate 20 amp circuits. I plugged the apex with the chiller, heater, lights, and vortex into one and the Red Sea with all of the other pumps plus mag 18 into the other.

I was really pushing the limit with the 15 amp circuit. We put a meter on it and when the chiller kicked on with everything running it was pushing 20 amps. Then would settle out at about 17+. Now I'm pulling about 11.25 on the apex circuit and about 5.5 on the Red Sea circuit. Next project is to get the nano set up.

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We had to bust a hole in the wall of the garage above the breaker panel. We weren't able to get the wire to run up to the attic because they sealed it with spray foam insulation. I couldn't get to it from the attic because of the slope of the roof.

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Matt
 
Lol It's not a big deal. I can fix it. I actually may just clean it up and put a panel over it so that I have access to it in the future. It's in the garage. Not the living room. There was no other way around it. She actually said she is very proud of me. It had to be done. She knows we are lucky that we didn't have any major issues. This hobby was hers. I just got sucked in and fell in love. She's all about the aquarium so its all good. :)


Matt
 
Really? Seriously?? Every female reefer in the group just put her ipad down and hit her spouse with a pillow!

I have the S650 as well. Would love to put in a new circuit. Frag tank on hold until I do. Sadly I have to run a new line through the attic and across the whole house to the panel. When I run the new line I'm going to replace the whole panel - 30 years old and time.
 
It's nice to have a hobby together with your wife. We also hunt together.

Running the new circuit was not that difficult. I had to run it through the attic about halfway across the house. The hardest part was getting the wire up into the attic from the breaker panel as you can see. Lol

When you do it, I would recommend two 20 amps as well. That will also give you some room for expansion for the frag tank. The chiller is the biggest hog. The lights use about 5.5 amps when at full power. We are hoping the LEDs really help out on power consumption and heat. I wish I had them when I did the electricity yesterday so I could get all of my attic work out of the way. I think I may need to add support for the fixture instead of hanging it from the ceiling Sheetrock. The fixture weighs about 18-20 pounds. I would prefer to just use a good toggle bolt but most I have talked to recommend that I reinforce it with a 2x4 in the attic.


Matt
 
@Fish Outta Water wrote:
It's nice to have a hobby together with your wife. We also hunt together. Running the new circuit was not that difficult. I had to run it through the attic about halfway across the house. The hardest part was getting the wire up into the attic from the breaker panel as you can see. Lol When you do it said:
Awesome that yall have that!
Click to expand...
 
A picture of our clowns in one of the rbta. They rarely go to this nem. This is the mother. They seem to like the smaller one better. This is our first pic of them together in that nem. This picture is not doctored at all. Taken on my iPhone.

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Matt
 
@Fish Outta Water wrote:
A picture of our clowns in one of the rbta. They rarely go to this nem. This is the mother. They seem to like the smaller one better. This is our first pic of them together in that nem. This picture is not doctored at all. Taken on my iPhone. [img]http://img.tapatalk.com/d/13/07/18/2e9a5ypu.jpg[/img] alt=""> Matt said:
Awesome photo!
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Quick picture of the nano set up and running. I still have a small leak that I'm trying to take care. I also have a very tiny leak at the bulkhead. So slow it dries before it drips. Kinda sucks since I did so many leak tests and everything was fine. If the leak at the bulk head is so slow it doesn't drip will that cause any problems down the road? It won't get bigger will it? I hate to have to drain pull the tank off to fix something that might not be an issue.

We will be adding the sand and rock later. We just wanted to get it up and running. I still need to do some wire management.

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Matt
 
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