Lighting woes

[SHOmuchFUN]

Well...
As some of you may know, I've been having some lighting issues. I bought a dual 250w retro kit that came with 2 12k coralvue bulbs. It ran fine for a few days, the color was AWESOME. Didn't think I needed T5 supplementation, but went with it anyway for added par.

On Saturday, my timer went off, then came back on a few minutes later and I noticed a funny smell. I guess it's ozone or something, but it smelled like rotting grass, or a putrid flower. I shut off the ballast and let it sit for a while before refiring. One of the bulbs came on, but didn't fire completely. So I figured the bulb may have gone... Which was stupid, because if the bulb had gone, there wouldn't have been ANY light coming from it. So... I figured I needed to start looking for a bulb ASAP. Well, later that evening I had a brainstorm and decided to switch the bulbs to see if it'd fire from the other socket... To my surprise, it did... And the other socket, still wouldn't fire the bulb. So, now it has to be the ballast. So... I ordered a new raw magnetic ballast (these things run SUPER HOT) and it should be here Thursday, but still unsure if this is the problem...

This morning, I'm screwing around with the tank and notice this black lava-looking substance that had spewed out of one of the white cylindrical components of the ballast. It busted right out of the casing!

So now, I've got a bunch of Tom and Brad's acros sitting under my CSL PC hood with only about 260 watts of light hitting them... On Thursday, :cool: hehehehe

So... This was just to get you all caught up. I'm thinking about hosting a reef club meeting. It's possible that it could be August, but maybe September. By then, things should be settled down, I should have some SPS growing, and maybe even a clam if I'm lucky :D You all have to admire Tom's work with the stand and hood.

[SHOmuchFUN]

Only problematic coral right now seems to be the Tom's pink/blue stylophora, and Brad's pink millepora. All others seem to be ok.

[Brad A.]

Is the pink mili doing better now?

[SHOmuchFUN]

The stylophora is doing great, and actually had a piece of encrusting (I'm not sure) which seems to be creating another stem.

Pink milli seems to be doing *better* Still doesn't have the polyp extension it did in your tank, but I still think flow is my culprit. I have two SEIO M620s that should be here Tuesday, along with my Mag5 return pump for my sump (will be somewhere between 300-400gph as well. With the added flow, I should definitely have an all encompassing system that should inhibit coral growth and health.

[Brad A.]

How's the pink mili doing now?

[SHOmuchFUN]

Pink Mili seems to be doing well :thumbsup: I can see small polyp extension, but doesn't have the waving hands that makes it look <b>hairy</b> like a typical millepora. I have it setup right in front of my SEIO and it seems to like it. I also expoxied all of my frags to the rock, so they aren't loose and/or falling over. Even though it doesn't seem to have 100% polyp extension (probably 80-90%), it does seem to be growing! I noticed this morning that it looks taller and may have an extra branch or two. I'm really not good at guaging growth of my corals. I really should take a picture of all my frags to refer back to (should've done this before now).

All-in-all, I think my tank is doing very well, with exception to some problems with heat. I'm only running a 55 and have over 600 watts of light directly over it. Even with these 20HP fans I have (exaggeration) it still heats up the water into the low-mid 80s.

I also noticed that my alk was fairly low, so I put in a full teaspoonful of reef builder along with about 1/2 gal of water two days ago, and put in a half teaspoonful yesterday and it has seemed to bring my alk from about 7 :eek1: to near 9 :) .

I bought a carpet anemone from the pet advantage the other day for my clown. Although my clowns haven't expressed much of an interest, it definitely is a cool anemone. Fed it a piece of canned tunafish and it gobbled it right up. I just have to make sure it doesn't walk over my SPS! It seems pretty settled on the ground and with all the excessive lighting I have, I wouldn't think it would need to venture too high in my tank (where most of my SPS is to begin with).

I built my sump with Tom on Thursday and now I'm waiting on a pump. Was going to run a mag 5 for a return (320gph @4' head and around 45 watts) but decided it wasn't enough to really stretch my U-tube siphon overflow, so I decided to go with a quiet-one 3000 as my return (will push around 550gph@4' and only 40 watts!). I have all my fittings ready to go and be plumbed. It'll be great to finally run a sump. It'll make my display look a LOT cleaner getting that mag3 that hangs from the back of my tank precariously. It will also help my flow. I wasn't originally impressed with the flow of the SEIO M620s, but once I slap another 500gph into the center of the tank, it should create some pretty hectic current.

-Sorry for the long post-
More later...

[Brad A.]

Kewl, give the mili time and it will adjust to your tank.