Ok heres the plan

[kass03]

I'm trying to make my 150 better. It always had high nitrates cuz of the wet/dry and I don't change water in it like I should.
Not to mention the light bulbs keep burning out lol.
I only want it mainly for fish anyway.
I have live rock not sure how much but it goes up about 3/4 to the top.
It's been running for 11 yrs now. I got it used.

Anyway I changed 40 gals of water yesterday and cleaned the pumps etc.

It's old so the sump has DLS material in it which is like a big roll of felt surrounded by black plastic spirals for bacteria to grow. Which I used to take out and wash in the washing machine to clean but not both at the same time.

It has 2 large chambers for the DLS which are a little bigger than a foot square. It has other chambers as well which my skimmer pump sits in and some small ones for things like carbon.

Today I removed 1 large roll of DLS material and there was some bioballs underneath that. I removed those to (I thought I removed those a long time ago lol).
I left the other chamber with the DLS alone for now.
The water runs into those 2 larger chambers from the tank and has a plastic drip plate which I removed so it was like raining on the DLS.

I want to put chaeto in the chamber that I removed the DLS from.
It normally has a plastic cover but I removed that so I can put a light on it. It's kind of splashing now without the cover so not sure how I can do a light.
What kind of light works best for chaeto?

I was always afraid to remove the media but we'll see how this goes.
I want to wait a bit and then remove the other side media eventually.

Do you guys think this will work?
I could put chaeto in the smaller chambers that are for things like carbon but theyre only like 4 inches wide. It has 4 of those.

kass

[kiowascout]

Kass,

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=775729

Also, if you look in this picture, you can see the lights above my fuge on the rack.

http://home.new.rr.com/dafox/HPIM0566.JPG
<br><br><br>

Hope this helps!

Dan

[jandlms]

Kass,
home Depot have some compact fluorescent spotlight bulbs (inexpensive) that do a great job of growing chaeto (or caulerpa for that matter). I run mine with one of those outdoor christmas spotlight fixtures (you know the cheap green Christmas ones). I think the bulb and the fixture cost maybe $10 total. I couldn't be happier with the set up. Low cost. Good growth. Little extra heat because the bulb is fluorescent.
Maybe worth a shot for you to try.
Jon
jandlms

[kass03]

Thanks.

I have one of those clamp on lights somewhere cuz I used to grow mangroves in both my tanks. I don't remember what I did with it though lol. I used it on my 55.

I would rather just get one of those flourescent growlight strips and put it on the top of my cabinet but I think it would be to far away then and not work. I used one of those for the mangroves on that tank but they were much closer.

I'm concerned about the splashing. The pipe only goes a cpl inches in there as the water was suppose to run into the tray and then on the DLS so it drops almost a foot and runs into it like a bathtub spout. Sounds like Niagra falls to lol.
I only have the sump filled to about 8 inches of water cuz the sump fills up some if I turn the pump off.

I'll figure something out. I saw this thread to from melev.
http://www.melevsreef.com/fuge_bulb.html

I dunno if thats the bulb you guys were talking about.

kass

[kass03]

Jon I looked at those green fixtures tonight at Menards and think thats what I'll do. They have one you can mount with screws.

Do you know what bulb you got exactly? Id rather go with a fluorescent.
Is it for outdoors or indoors?
Usually fluorescents run cooler than incandescent.

kass

[jandlms]

Kass,
I will show you mine when you pick up your livestock. Basically the bulb looks like a spotlight with a pc twist bulb inside instead of the usual filament.
Jon