B1N4RY's 8 Gallon Reef Aquarium.

Nighttime on the Reef

So here is a little sneak peak regarding my new surprise from my wife.

 

A Surprise from My Wife.

So my wife frequents an online garage sale to find little deals and steals in the neighborhood. So a person was moving and didn't want to break down and sell their Oceanic Biocube 12 gallon along with some live rock for free. She didn't know the condition of the aquarium but it was free so why not check it out. As expected with most free items that aquarium was in really bad shape. The top rim looks like it may have come apart at some point during a move and was patched back together with large amounts of aquarium safe silicon but covering most of the upper part of the glass. Also the lights were completely rusted away from the saltwater and it looked as if the aquarium was never cleaned when water from common aquarium tasks had spilled over. But with a little time and patience I think I whipped this aquarium back into shape.

They had included some live rock, around 7 lbs. and I had another 7 lbs. of Premium Fiji Live rock on the way that I ordered from Premium Aquatics. Combined I managed to make a pretty nice aquascaping with plenty of caves and hiding spots. I also added an additional 5 lbs. of Caribsea Arag-Alive Live Sand. As for additional filtration I purchased an Innovative Marine Aqua Gadget Desktop Protein Skimmer which just managed to fit (width wise) into the first compartment of the rear chamber. I'm allowing it to break in further before I do some fine tuning to get the darker skimmate that we all know and love.

And with the doctors orders for me not to drive or lift anything my sweet wife played Mr. Daisy's driver for the past few days and lifting everything out of the car and wherever I needed it. So this tank was pretty much made possible by her. I can't say I love her enough.

 

Setting Up My New Kessil a150w Ocean Blue LED Pendant.

So after waiting the entire weekend I received my Kessil a150w Ocean Blue LED Pendant for my aquarium and being extremely excited I decided to go against the doctors orders and take a little trip to Home Depot for some supplies (my wife drove me as I am still not allowed to drive from the surgery). The aquarium is located in my dinning room and I just thought to myself for a while now that the wall located directly behind it was quite ugly and missing something. So after a few a few minutes of chatting with my wife we managed to come up with something that I am quite happy of and were able to setup the Kessil while not look like an eyesore.

 

First Thoughts On My New Kessil a150w Ocean Blue LED Pendant.

First off I have to say that I am definitely impressed with the small form factor of this light and the silent operation. It is quite honestly one of the most beautiful pieces of equipment I have seen. The shimmering affect is amazing! But this is just my personal opinion that the 15,000K Ocean Blue is just too blue for my taste. I would have definitely preferred something along the 10,00K Sky Blue unit. Another issue I am having with it is that I'm having some light bleed off the aquarium being mostly that it is a wide angle version. I can remedy this is one of two ways. I can lower the light which would bring it close to the water as well as increase the intensity which gives me concerns in both aspects or I can purchase the standard angle or place a sleeve over the unit to keep the light from bleeding. However, the color temperature is definitely wigging me out and I am exchanging it for either the a150w Sky Blue or the a360w Tuna Blue unit.

 

Looks like a great pico setup you have going. I personally agree with changing the light from the 15000K. I also dont like the real deep blue look.

 

That is a whole lot of light over 12 gallons! I have 60W LED over my JBJ 28 and I thought that was a lot LOL.

I also am not a big fan of anything over say 14K. Nice job getting it mounted and getting it to look good though.

 

Tunze Osmolator Nano Automatic Freshwater Topoff.

One of the major factors that has been affecting this aquariums stability is that it evaporates more water than I expected. For the past few weeks it seems that my daily practices included topping of freshwater during the morning hours before work and topping of more freshwater during the evening hours after work. So one of my primary goals in keeping this aquarium is water parameter stability. So I just received my Tunze Osmolator Nano that I ordered from Premium Aquatics. I went back and fourth between my decision of ordering this unit or the regular Tunze Osmolator Universal since the latter has the primary optical sensor and a secondary float sensor. But from reading this unit only doses water for a maximum of 1.8 minutes, so combined with only filling the reservoir with a limited amount of water I figured everything would be fine.




Since this aquarium is located in my dinning room my primary concern is to keep the misses happy by not making it an eye soar of tubing and cables. But I'm still aiming to have the equipment as accessible as possible. So I'm using 3M Command Strips rated for 16 lbs. to mount equipment and cable housing guide to hide cables and tubes when possible.












For the Freshwater Reservoir I am utilizing one of the 2.2 gallon Nutri-Seawater containers. I am searching for a nice wicker basket as to place the container in but for now it remains a little eye soar. The water cable and power cable for the pump are housed within a 3M Cable Guide.








The float switch which activates the unit is located in the far right chamber as recommended by Tunze. It was installed with the magnets that were included with the unit. Also the output of the water house is being aimed at the center baffles were there is a good amount of flow to mix the freshwater into the saltwater and then it passes by the heater to bring the temperature to the right level.

 

Looking pretty slick!

 

Reply to Dboshibby.

Thank you!

 

Aptasia Solutions #2 The Peppermint Shrimp.

Well my Berghia Nudibrach plan hasn't seem to have any effect on the Aptasia in the aquarium. So I decided that may it needed a little help since I have seen a few more Apstasia sprout up in other location. So I purchase two peppermint shrimp to assist in the battle and within 2 days one of the Aptasia is gone and they are living in peaceful existence with my two Cleaner Shrimp.