Kessil

Cilyjr's 470 gallon display

Switches, Switches, Switches was the name of the game while doing the electrical, being able to turn stuff off quickly and easily is a huge advantage. I never found fumbling around in my pocket for my phone van. Trying to get the Apex app loaded. Worked well in an emergency.
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I guess I could talk a little bit about all of the electrical. Pre-tank. Which is kind of what prompted this upgrade.
 
I was getting a bit tired of $600 electric bills from PG&e. So I decided to do my own solar. I had upgraded the panel shortly after we moved in to a 200 amp service. So that part was done.
I did a little research into the solar systems that were available. Settled on EG4. Cuz the company I work for has a C-10. I went to a city in PG&e and pulled my own permit and then my wife and I got our asses on the roof every weekend for about a month. And even though we don't lose power here very often, I added two batteries for backup. Now as opposed to 500 to 600 bucks a month. I am at $200 for the year so far.
There is a critical load panel that keeps about 2/3 of the house running and all major aquarium life support going. In the summer. I could lose power indefinitely. In the winter. I have about 3 days worth before I would have to do something.

This part of the hobby is not sexy, but in my opinion imperative.
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Can you all tell I am sitting around on Thanksgiving with not much to do. I injured my neck the other day so I'm kind of just hanging out and putting a little bit more post up every time I've got the heating pad on
 
I have 2 dedicated circuits 1 15 amp on the CLP and 1 20 amp non critical.
Apex and the laminar flow pump are on critical also both return pumps.
Lights and the mp-40s are not though 2 of the mo-40s are on a modified ecotech battery back up. Basically I pulled out the lead acid battery and replaced it with a LiFePo4 battery. I have no pictures but if anybody's interested on how to do it hit me up. It's really easy.
 
Here's what I did with the gap between the aquarium and the wall. There's another 2-ft Gap on the exterior side of the house between the shed. The pipes there are just outside but I insulated them pretty heavily. Then I built a stand over them and put my top off water on top of it in a brute.
I can climb up on top of that and reach the back of the tank on that side very easily.

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Kensington Reefer said:
You have both my empathy and sympathy for the forecasted posts.
Yet...we keep on keeping on
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Ain't that the truth, no matter how bad the disaster I've had, and I've done them all, probably twice, I never said I'm gonna quit, just how am I gonna fix it.

In fact, when I told my wife I was going to spend an extra $12,000 and go from 6 ft to 10 ft, her response was ” cool, you really only have the one hobby"
 
Cilyjr said:
Ain't that the truth, no matter how bad the disaster I've had, and I've done them all, probably twice, I never said I'm gonna quit, just how am I gonna fix it.

In fact, when I told my wife I was going to spend an extra $12,000 and go from 6 ft to 10 ft, her response was ” cool, you really only have the one hobby"
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I had a store...
I had a fire...
I’ve had a 300 with 13 year old fish...dead
Keep on keeping on
I have 20+ year old fish and many many over 15
It’s the only thing I do by choice
The fish don’t choose to be confined to a box
 
So I added all the fish , coral and got the temporary set up out, yay we have our living room back!
Everything was going according to plan, then 1 fish started showing white spots, uh oh, despite nothing new being added in over a year, I know I had a golden opportunity to have gotten the coral out and medicated the fish before going into the aquarium but having not had problems in years I honestly never thought about it. Which makes me extra mad because of all the extra precautions I took coral wise. It's like I forgot about the fish. I'm not proud but it's what happened.
 
Cilyjr said:
So I added all the fish , coral and got the temporary set up out, yay we have our living room back!
Everything was going according to plan, then 1 fish started showing white spots, uh oh, despite nothing new being added in over a year, I know I had a golden opportunity to have gotten the coral out and medicated the fish before going into the aquarium but having not had problems in years I honestly never thought about it. Which makes me extra mad because of all the extra precautions I took coral wise. It's like I forgot about the fish. I'm not proud but it's what happened.
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Been there, done that...
I appreciate your frustrations
 
Fish started to die. And I said to my wife do we weather this or pull down everything we just built. In the end we opted for the latter. So we set up a couple of tables and took out every single rock. And put the fish back into the Rubbermaid where they are now. We did copper and I now clearly see uronema as well. I'm going to do metro as soon as it gets here. The survivors are looking better and have resumed eating.

I have added an H2O2 regiment to the display. Which is helpful with all the algae that I was counting on my 6 tangs to help with.

So now I'm doing all the new tank stuff without the help of fish, I added 10 more urchins which is helping, and many more snails. But it's me in there every night with this guy.
If you don't have one get one. Completely submergible.
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Kensington Reefer said:
What’s the surviving fish list?
Ya might want to consider using chloroquine phosphate
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I did and I may, but I had too many fish not eating for too long so as soon as copper was done I got it out of the water and everyone is eating.

I'm told it's easier on the fish though unlikely to eliminate uronema marinum internally.

So first will be metro soaked food
 
I'll take some shots of the display in a while, it's not too terrible. Algae, diatomes, and cyano including lyngbya. All are manageable if kept up on.
 
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