The Upgrade! Aquaone Aquareef 400 series 2

[saltyseadog]

Been a while since I posted about the small tank but I've finally upgraded it so thought I would start a new thread

Picked the tank up about 3 weeks ago from my LFS and used cured live rock. After two weeks the tank had cycled and over the course of the three weeks I also tried to swap over as much water from the old tank as I could into the new tank. Once all the levels were safe I moved all of the contents of my 94l tank to this one.

I used ultra grade live rock from H2O Aquatics to make up for the 30kg extra required. I got rid of the bio balls in the sump and have a mixture of live rock rubble, cermedia ceramic balls (new product which is perfect for reef tanks according to an LFS owner I know) and there's a handful of grape algae in the sump also.

This is the new version of the aquaone tank and looks much sleeker than the original. It also makes use of LEDs as opposed to T5s and gives a much higher light output than the previous version. My corals love it!

Livestock so far:

2 x frostbite clowns
1 x regal tang
1 x red scooter blenny
1 x orange spotted goby
1 x cleaner shrimp
1 x peppermint shrimp
1 x fire shrimp
2 x halloween hermit crabs
1 x blue hairy legged hermit crab
3 x red legged hermit crabs
2 x mexican turbo snails
1 x trochus snail
1 x fighting conch
1 x nassarius snail

Corals:

sun coral
radioactive dragon eye zoas
fruit loops zoas
green star polyp
branching torch
branching hammer
cabbage
acan
prikly coral (adding a c makes it censored out )

maidens mane
bubble tip anemone

 

[saltyseadog]

Also you'll notice there are some lego divers and a submarine floating around also Which is a pretty cool addition!!

 

[saltyseadog]

So since posting last there have been some huge changes to the tank.

More live rock
8 Chromis
Purple Firefish
Royal Gramma
Pipefish
Orange spotted goby

Big toadstool coral
Various zoa frags - Rainbows, ice cream sundaes and another type I don't know what they are called
Blue tipped fan coral
A few other corals also.

Also got my hands on a lovely blue and gold clam!

Getting excellent growth from all of my corals now. The sun coral and cabbage died but this was due to a pesky crab nipping at them!

As you can see in the pic below the difference is substantial!

 

[CEECH]

Missed this thread before. The tank looks great so it does and corals look healthy. How big is the tank in total. Looks really nice Big Thumbs Up

 

[nodster]

Nice one mate slipped this thread in on the sly would have liked to see from the beginning , however I'm liking the tank looks very nice indeed and the selection of corals Big Thumbs Up keep us updated and please need pictures of sump and list of equipment

 

[jim_fitz]

Love the yellow bellied regal

 

[saltyseadog]

Thanks all for the comments!

To address the comment regarding equipment I'm using and a pic of the sump, please see below!



The Water Arrow was for a friend looking after my tank... I got worried about her topping up RO into the main tank so thought I would make things clear for her

Tank: Aqua One Aquareef 400 Series 2
Lighting: Standard LEDs that come with the tank
Wavemaker: Newa Wavemaker control with a pump at each end of the tank (can't remember what size but recommended for this size tank)
STC 1000 Temperature Controller which controls one heater when the tank gets too cool and a fan unit in the sump when it warms up too much
Media Bag with Activated Carbon in the weir

Sump:
Water flows down into a filter bag containing filter floss
2 x heaters which came with the tank
Aqua One skimmer which came with the tank and overflows to an 8l waste container
LED light over grape algae and chaeto mix in sump
cermedia marinepure ceramic balls and live rock rubble mixed underneath algae with 2 gorilla crabs crawling around that were caught in the main tank!
Bubble Magus media reactor containing biopellets to help keep phos and nitrate levels down
cooling fan unit
Reefloat RO top up hooked into sump

I try to keep things as easy as possible with my tank. Do a 57litre water change once a week using an AWC from Reefloat and add calcium and KH buffer to my RO to keep the levels in balance. Other than that I generally leave the tank to it and everything seems happy! Even to the point that my clownfish are spawning in the tank and have had one successful hatch so far. However, I was unprepared food wise so wasn't able to feed the little ones Hoping they will spawn again in the next day or two though.

 

[feeblebob]

Look and sounds as though it's going great

I see Aqua One still haven't made it any easier to get a filter sock under the downpipe though... The way the Red Sea tanks do it with a pull out tray at the front of the sump is a big improvement.

 

[saltyseadog]

The filter sock that came with the tank was a nightmare so I just run filter floss instead

Came home this evening to find some lovely little eggs waiting for me!!

 

[jim_fitz]

Look and sounds as though it's going great

I see Aqua One still haven't made it any easier to get a filter sock under the downpipe though...

i have one of these and cut the pipe and added a flexible connection from B&Q that cost less than £7

 

[nodster]

Hey there mate looks like all is going pretty good so far , looks like the clowns are liking nem too Big Thumbs Up are you hoping to bring the fry up to adulthood

 

[saltyseadog]

Hey there mate looks like all is going pretty good so far , looks like the clowns are liking nem too Big Thumbs Up are you hoping to bring the fry up to adulthood

Yes I'm hoping to try! I have a rotifer culture set up at home now so fingers crossed they will survive!