Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)
Hi,
John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.
I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.
With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.
I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.
If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.
I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.
I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.
Thank you
Darragh Sherwin
Percula 90 Part 1
So as promised, below I hope you wll find some pics...
Above is the stand...
Now thats the tank ready to go. The day before I went to pic up liverock, water and aragonite I filled it with tap water and ran the system with all pumps, skimmer, gadgets and all... Just to see how it worked and make sure everything was ok. I would highly recommed this to anyone... Yes it is a bit of work to put 280 litres into tank then a few hours later empty the hole thing, but I think it was well worth it. This avoids any headaches the first day when you are trying to set up.
Just the Tunze products I added to the set up. You will see them in more detail later.
Thats the inside of the cabinet. I put an extension lead on the top left hand side and all the wires that I may need to unplug from time to time I will put them there to make it a bit easier. The white and blue yoke is actually the Tunze pump for the auto top up.
Another detail of inside the cabinet.
Tunze pump for auto top up.
I had to do a bit of work with the 25l water drum, the pump did not fit into the opening, so I had to cut it a little bit... (Obviously the dog was supervising my work the entire time!)
The biggest controller above is the Tunze temp. control, and the smaller one is for the water level.
This is at the back part of the tank. The black yoke is the sensor for water level, and the one next to it controls it if it goes above the level.
Ok, overall my first day setting up went really well, just one thing I could have done better... I could have a friend around to help me! What a work out it was will all the 25 l drums... Hehe, I did not think of the amount of drums and room I would need in the car. But everything worked out in the end.
If you have to carry drums around all the time, I would recommend a trip to IKEA to the get this blue trolley... Yes you would look a bit like granny, but at the same time would not have to kill yourself... hehe...
Box of liverock, 22 kilos...
My choice of aragonite... I used 3x 4kg bags. They had to be rinsed a bit (in salt water, dont forget that detail!) before putting them in the tank. I chose the medium size aragonite, as I think the water flows better around them...
And the aragonite is in!!!!
Liverock is rinsed (in salt water!) and placed inside tank...
Ok now I have started to aquascape... Just keeping it simple and leaving a lot of room for soft corals which will follow...
Auto top up is ready to be turned on, and fitted below the tank inside cabinet.
Alright folks, these are all the pics for now. Just realised I havent taken any pics of the tank with water in it, but you can imagine of that looks like for now, I will add the later... This is what else happened:
After aragonite and liverock were in, I placed a big plastic bag over the entire thing to them started putting in the water. This helped me because then the aragonite did not go everywhere and I did not have to arrange things again.
One of the most important things when filling the tank for the first time is to count the amount of water you are putting in as you do it. Write it down somewhere so you will not forget it! My tank is 280 litres, but after aragonite and liverock I could only fit 230 litres. This could be very valuable information in the future if you decide to add things to your tank (supplements, medicine, etc...)
As you can imagine, the heater as a busy bee getting the water to 25.2 degrees C. At first the reading was 22, and it took ALL NIGHT to get it up to 25.2... It takes quiet a long time, but once its there it will be kept constant much easier. If you are using cured liverock, I recommend you fill the tank with water first, bring it up to your desired temperature, and THEN add the cured liverock...
Well folks, this is it for now... Drop me a line if you have any questions... It is waiting time now for the next 2 weeks... In the meantime I need to get light units ready to go, so expect another posting sometime soon...
L
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really helpful step by step guide there.
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