34 Gallon Solana Mixed Reef

[jrobbins]

I picked up a solana from a fellow MR member, and what was supposed to be a holding tank for my corals while i moved my 50 cube has become a permanent addition to my kitchen.

Since I have two tanks I am turning my 50 into a sps/lps tank (maybe a Caribbean biotope?) and the solana is housing all the softies and zoas that i had in the cube.

I switched out the stock skimmer for a tunze 9002 with the collection cup from SteveT on Nano-Reef.com, and added a koralia nano and a #1 to get some flow. The Tunze powerhead (6025 i think) that came with it was way too much flow for this tank of mostly softies, and is now making the sps in the 50 very happy :splitspin

Also using the glass lid since its in the kitchen and there's all sorts of crap that can get in there, and a chiller to keep the temp down.

So here are some pics.

And thanks for the tank Phil!

From an angle, you can sort of see how it is situated inthe kitchen

And from the front

Closeup of the center of the tank

The left side

A closeup of the mushrooms, if you look close you can see some mushrooms that attached to a snail. he trucks all around the tank with those things stuck to him :tongue1:

I managed to catch all three fish in this one shot, so i just had to include it.

ok, thats about it. i will post up some more pics and update my other tank thread in a few days...

 

[m'akoyPINOY]

nice set up,john!sweet yumas!!!trade?:thrash:

 

[jrobbins]

Hey M'akoy! those are the yumas i got from you about a year ago, they are growing like crazy, if you want one i have a few attached to a frag plug right now. just lmk.

nice set up,john!sweet yumas!!!trade?:thrash:

 

[NYreefNoob]

nice looking tank

 

[jrobbins]

thanks noob

 

[rookie07]

Looks good...why didnt you put the cover on(without the wood top)?

 

[MO~IDOL]

Nice cube John.

 

[jrobbins]

Hey phil,

The wood frame is really nice but it made the tank look too big. given it's location it works better as a rimless cube.

 

[Chiefmcfuz]

Great job!

 

[nanoreefer22]

Looks good J!

 

[jrobbins]

thanks kris and brendan

 

[JonnyIce]

i'm curious about the collection cup, as I have the same skimmer in my biocube. What's different about it? Everything looks awesome!

 

[jrobbins]

i'm curious about the collection cup, as I have the same skimmer in my biocube. What's different about it? Everything looks awesome!

the cup is modified to fit in the back chamber of the solana...

 

[Chiefmcfuz]

i'm curious about the collection cup, as I have the same skimmer in my biocube. What's different about it? Everything looks awesome!

Steve T makes a great mod for the tunze. It has increased my skimmer performance 300 % what it was.

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=161619&pid=1689249&st=0&#entry1689249

Here is his thread

 

[JonnyIce]

Wow thanks Brendan...I won't get into it as I don't want to threadjack, but that thing can be temperamental.

 

[buddy7664]

looks great, do you use the micro balls in the back.

 

[jrobbins]

if you mean the bio-balls, no i dont use them. most people tend to think that they just become a nitrate trap if you dont clean them frequently, and i am too lazy to do that

looks great, do you use the micro balls in the back.

 

[rookie07]

Wow thanks Brendan...I won't get into it as I don't want to threadjack, but that thing can be temperamental.

I had that tank for about 1 year(that exact tank) and never had any problems

 

[jrobbins]

yeah, the stock skimmer was fine. i just chucked it because it was loud.

I had that tank for about 1 year(that exact tank) and never had any problems

 

[dhel]

Hey,
I was wondering if you had a purpose for the macro algae growing on the right side of the tank? I believe I had the same algae and it very quickly overtook my RSM. I already see it has made its way to the Koralia nano. I would suggest you get that rock out of the tank and try and manually cultivate the algae so that any hermits/snails you have can take care of the problem immediately.

I appologize if you actually have use for the stuff and it is there on purpose...just trying to save you a bunch of headaches.