First a little history. Converted one of my Ocean Free 1.5 gallon freshwater planted tanks over to a pico reef in February 2007. Rocks and sand were contributed by Hyacinth (Alan) out of his huge tank (now sitting over at Perry's) and some yellow zoas and orange bam bams were added the same day (also courtesy of Alan). Originally lighted by 2x9W mini coralife fixture and filtered with both a red sea nano HOB filter and a Tom's micro dive pump.
Corals were doing fine for awhile, but really wanted the MH shimmer. So, I started reading on NR and saw the 70W DIY fixture using a Brink's reflector. Sourced out the parts starting on the 22nd of Feb. and put together my own and placed it over the tank on the 24nd of Feb. The changes were pretty dramatic.
With 70W of lighting over such a small volume I implemented a gravity fed ATO system. That didn't work so well and I finally took it off after running it for the first week and just started topping off the tank manually. At the same time, I was starting to deal with heat issues and began taking a look at cooling options. Threw the idea out of using fans out since evaporation was already an issue and I would have to look at another ATO solution. Instead I settled on either the iceprobe or a smaller chiller. Eventually, I ended up with both. I upgraded to a larger HOB filter (AC 150) w/a hole drilled for the iceprobe and placed it over the tank to see how it would do. Since the room was usually closed during the day, the temps in the room would hit 85F+ during the summers and the iceprobe did squat to bring it down. Pulled that down and up went the chiller. For intake and return, I customized and had a buddy drill some holes for me. Here's the last shot of the tank w/the PVC in the tank before it came down.
As you can see, it was packed to the gills and I was in need of an upgrade. Next thread will go into the details of how the starfire came about.
Corals were doing fine for awhile, but really wanted the MH shimmer. So, I started reading on NR and saw the 70W DIY fixture using a Brink's reflector. Sourced out the parts starting on the 22nd of Feb. and put together my own and placed it over the tank on the 24nd of Feb. The changes were pretty dramatic.
With 70W of lighting over such a small volume I implemented a gravity fed ATO system. That didn't work so well and I finally took it off after running it for the first week and just started topping off the tank manually. At the same time, I was starting to deal with heat issues and began taking a look at cooling options. Threw the idea out of using fans out since evaporation was already an issue and I would have to look at another ATO solution. Instead I settled on either the iceprobe or a smaller chiller. Eventually, I ended up with both. I upgraded to a larger HOB filter (AC 150) w/a hole drilled for the iceprobe and placed it over the tank to see how it would do. Since the room was usually closed during the day, the temps in the room would hit 85F+ during the summers and the iceprobe did squat to bring it down. Pulled that down and up went the chiller. For intake and return, I customized and had a buddy drill some holes for me. Here's the last shot of the tank w/the PVC in the tank before it came down.
As you can see, it was packed to the gills and I was in need of an upgrade. Next thread will go into the details of how the starfire came about.