125 gallon rescue tank

Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Hi All,

I am picking up a 125 FOWLR from someone I know who has to get rid of it quickly and it has to be moved by tomorrow. I borrowed a 100g rubber maid container from Frankie and am making fresh sw. I should have enough sw by tonight. Is there any suggestions or recommendations you can give to make this a smoother transition? I already cleared it with my wife :).

The tank is a 125 rr with the 2 overflows away from the corners. There is about 100 lbs of live rock and about 80 lbs of live sand. The filtration consists of a wet/dry system with filter pads and bio balls. Not sure what the return pump is. There are dorsos and return loc lines in the overflow boxes. Some coraline but didn't see any algae. The fish are all thin from lack of food. The biggest fish is a maroon clown at about 4" and looks the healthiest. There are 2 medium size tangs, a yellow and a blue. Both have some pinching in the belly and the yellow has white along the dorsal fin and body. It looks like some one has been picking at his fins too. There are 3 convict damsels that look ok and there is a yellow tail damsel that is so thin, I don't think he'll make it. You can see his spine and ribs and his whole body is pinched in.

I think that is all the highlights. My plan is to get it home, set it up, fill it with fresh sw, put the LR in it and acclimate the fish and try to get them as healthy as I can. Don't know if I want to keep the sand or not.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,

Chris
 
Val

Val

Member
Congrats! on the new tank. I kept the sand from the used tank I bought and have had nothing but problems. Ditch the old sand and start fresh it'll save you headaches and money.
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Hi Val,

Thanks. I've heard that before. I'll ditch the sand when I pick it up. I'll probably go bare bottom for now, it will make it easier to clean when I do wc. I wonder if I can get GSP to grow along the bottom? Naw, FOWLR. :)

Think the bio balls will be ok to use or should I start fresh with them too?
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Just got it home. Time to clean it up, acclimate the fish and get it set up. Oh, and a pencil urchin came along for the ride too.
 
Val

Val

Member
Rhodes19 said:
Hi Val,

Thanks. I've heard that before. I'll ditch the sand when I pick it up. I'll probably go bare bottom for now, it will make it easier to clean when I do wc. I wonder if I can get GSP to grow along the bottom? Naw, FOWLR. :)

Think the bio balls will be ok to use or should I start fresh with them too?
Click to expand...

I'm not a good one to ask about bio balls... never have been a fan. I think if you have plenty of live rock you don't need them. Someone who knows that filtering system may have better advice. I'm looking forward to pictures. :)
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
catran said:
Wow, Cool tank and fish! Most important thing is that clearance! :)
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LOL!!! Yeah, I thought I was gong to be a dead man but she was fine with it. She knows me to well. :D

Oh, and guess who asked if we could get sailfin mollies (her favorite) on line (can never get healthy ones form lfs)? And guess who asked if we could get another tank (55g) like the one for her blood parrot cichlids for the sailfin mollies? I'm beginning to wonder if she had this planned all along. :D
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
tnwillia said:
Have fun!
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Thanks Tom. It was some work getting it moved in one day but it was fun. My friend Jerry helped me empty it out and move it to the house and Frankie helped me clean it up, move it into the house and got it going.
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Val said:
I'm not a good one to ask about bio balls... never have been a fan. I think if you have plenty of live rock you don't need them. Someone who knows that filtering system may have better advice. I'm looking forward to pictures. :)
Click to expand...

Thanks Val,

I ditched the sand but kept the wet/dry. The tank has been running on it so I thought I'd continue with that until I can learn more about FOWLR. If its not needed, I'll pull it and probably replace it with a sump/fuge combo. LOL, my first FO ran on an UGFS!! That was about 28 years ago.

Now on to the pictures. :D
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Ok, here we go. We broke down the tank and loaded it into the back of my truck within about an hour and a half. I forgot to bring my camera so I don't have any before pics (one day I'll learn). My friend Jerry and the lady's husband helped me break it down and then Jerry followed me home to help me get it off the truck. We set it up in the drive way so I could clean it up. It had about 100 lbs of sand in it but we dumped it when we emptied the tank.

Here is the tank and stand in the drive way. I scraped most of the coraline algae off the glass and cleaned up most of the vermatid snails out of the over flow. I cut myself up pretty good on them but I think I won. :D

125tankcleanup.jpg



Here is the wet/dry what came with the tank.

125wetdry.jpg



Frankie came over just at the right time to help with the clean up. :D

125Frankiecleaning1.jpg


125Frankiecleaning2.jpg



Live rock in a trash can.

125lr.jpg



The skimmer that came with the tank. It wouldn't work so I'll have to play with it later.

125skimmer.jpg



Here are the current T5s that came with the tank. I'll have to replace the bulbs and clean up the fixtures. No IDR unfortunately.

125T5lights1.jpg


125T5lights2.jpg



Here's Frankie behind the stand removing one of the back braces so we could get the wet/dry filter in. It came out through the top of the stand when we broke it down but we put the tank on the stand before I remembered the wet/dry.

125Frankiebehindtank1.jpg



Wet/dry in the stand.

125inhouse2.jpg


125inhouse1.jpg



Frankie in the stand doing the plumbing. I'm glad he's skinny. :)

125Frankieplumbing.jpg



Frankie picking on me while rockscaping. My wife is behind the camera taking Frankie's side. :D

125meandFrankie.jpg



Frankie let me borrow his 100g container to make up fresh water for the 125 and I have it in my garage with a pump and heater going. The fish are in the bags being acclimated while we clean and set up the tank.

125wc.jpg



Ops! One of the bulk heads was cracked and we didn't know it. When we tightened the hose clamp, the barb on the bulkhead broke and we flooded the stand and floor with about 8 gallons of water. I had to run to a lfs to get a new bulkhead. They didn't have what we needed so we had to modify what they had. Fortunately, my wife didn't skin me alive for getting water on her wooden floor (Thanks for saving my bacon Frank :)).

125flood.jpg



Here's the tank filled up with water, rock and fish. We're leaving the tank with only the ambient light so it will be less stressful on them. I'll clean up the lights tonight when I get home and test the water.

125filled.jpg



I fed the fish some of my home made mush and they went nuts over it. Because they are so thin, except for the maroon clown, I'll be feeding them more often until they recover. My biggest worry is for the little yellow tail damsel. He is so thin his spine and ribs stick out big time.

Depending on how things go, I may move the tangs into my 180 and sell the maroon and the convicts. The maroon is pretty big and looks to be the bully. This tank might turn out to be a nice angle tank. :)
 
Robzilla

Robzilla

Active Member
Looks great! I think that is a Coralife Super Skimmer. They work great if the pump is matched for the correct water volume.
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Robzilla said:
Looks great! I think that is a Coralife Super Skimmer. They work great if the pump is matched for the correct water volume.
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Thanks Rob,

I don't think the skimmer was working when I picked it up and Frankie said there was a problem with the air line but we didn't have time to work on it. I'm not familiar with the Coralife Super Skimmer, what type/volume pump should be on it?
 
Val

Val

Member
Looks great! It's a shame we can't clone Frankie he looks like he would be handy to have around.
 
S

seabass

Member
Yes that is a corallife super skimmer and when i chucked mine i kept the pump for it so if you need it let me know and i can ship it too you.If that is the 120 skimmer.Otherwise great job with the new tank and have fun.
 
Rhodes19

Rhodes19

Active Member
Val said:
Looks great! It's a shame we can't clone Frankie he looks like he would be handy to have around.
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Oh yeah. It's great having a friend and mentor like Frankie. He has taught me a lot about reefing and aquariums and has helped me with many of my projects. Many of which I could not have done on my own or as well. It's nice to have some one local I can turn to and say, "does this look right"?
 
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