Tank Journal Archive

[jart]

Hello Everyone,

Confession time - today was my first water change in almost 6 months. Couole of factors:

* used up the last of my NSW just before heading away for a month at the end of last year
* when I returned from my time away in Jan I couldn't get in contact with my previous NSW supplier
* lost my remaining 3 corals while away (frag plug got knocked off rock and apparently zoas don't do that well when submerged in substrate, hammer decided to leave his foot and ended up stuck under a rock, cushion coral had some sort of flesh recession thing)
* so no more corals, but salinity good, low nitrates and phos, fish happy --> decided not to worry too much about it until i had more time. Pretty sure my other params were depleted ad iffy at best.
* life got busy, lack of time due to other commitments
* fast-forward to this week. Got inspired looking at other people's posts about their tank. Want to get the tank back in track and start a slow stocking of new corals.
* asks forum for recommendations of a new water guy/gal and one guys name came up numerous times. Texted Adam from Aquarium Excellence last night, he delivered this morning on his way home from a new fill. From the ocean to my tank in under an hour. * So armed with approx 600L of new NSW I cleaned out my sump, vacuumed my sand a bit, cleaned my return pump with vinegar solution, replaced my return hose (previous clear one had algae inside) - covered with black electrical tape this time, 1/3 water change.
* Could see a distinct change in behaviour of my fishy friends so I think they appreciated the new salty H2O.

Future:
* will let things settle over the weekend then will test water over a few days to see where we have ended up.
* my settlement tank experiment appears to be successful. Quite a lot of detritus building up in the bottom and on the sides. Really easy now to siphon it out from the bottom! Now that I have given the sump its first decent clean in a year it will be interesting to see how much detritus skips the settlement tank in the next few weeks.

 

[Trentwalsh]

Pics of settlement tank?

 

[Buddy]

It always feels good to finish a nice big clean out! I did one too not long ago and it makes you feel a lot better about your tank.

 

[jart]

Pics of settlement tank?

Hey Trent,

Not a great pic, but hopefully enough to give you some idea.

* the experimental mini-settlement chamber consists of an upside down "Aqua To Go 12L Springwater bottle" that I found discarded at work. Same as this one here from OfficeWorks - http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b...Adventure/2016-06-06 19.19.53_zpsf1qxgms8.jpg
* it had been used, so I removed the sticker, cut off the bottom to make it roughly level with the height of my 30 x 30cm sump chamber, and used part of the offcuts to cut a disc to plug the hole in the "lid" caused by use for its intended purpose in a watercooler; then cut another section out of the side at a height just higher than the existing water level
* My overflow is a Herbie type with two pipes coming from my weir. The main pipe on the right has a 45 degree angle on the end, the idea being that the water comes down and is pushed around the edge of the settlement chamber
* it is definitely collecting a fair bit of crud in the bottom each day - jury still out on what sort of percentage of the overall crud coming into the sump, but I hope to have a better answer for that in a few weeks (cleaned the sump as per my previous post and will now have a baseline to check how much crud makes it past the settlement tank in the next few weeks).

 

[jart]

It always feels good to finish a nice big clean out! I did one too not long ago and it makes you feel a lot better about your tank.

Definitely. Felt the same way. Fish seem happier, but that could just be me projecting onto them. :)

 

[Trentwalsh]

So basicaly hoping water flows over, shit settles in that container, then you can hust remove container???

Ever thourght about usuing filter socks on the bottom of it? So you can pick up n drain them? Or posssibly stockings? Isunno?

 

[jart]

So basicaly hoping water flows over, shit settles in that container, then you can hust remove container???

Ever thourght about usuing filter socks on the bottom of it? So you can pick up n drain them? Or posssibly stockings? Isunno?

Yep, that is the basic idea, though I just get my little siphon and suck the gunk out of the bottom of the bottle every week or so rather than pulling the whole thing out.

Never wanted to use filter socks in this build as they kept clogging on the previous tank and were a pain to clean. Settlement tank experiment is a further attempt to avoid filter socks.

Your idea could possibly work if you could get the right sized one and make some sort of holder to lower/raise it. One thing I have noticed though is an almost equal amount of gunk settles on the sloped sides of the bottom of the bottle, the rest in the neck. Pretty easy to siphon out as long as I am careful not to move the siphon tube too fast and stir up the gunk.