Canopy and Lighting: I built the canopy with pine boards and designed it with two gull-wings. This gave me the maximum accessiblilty to maintaining the tank. The inside was painted with three coats of 2-part epoxy to prevent water damage. There were two 250W Iwasaki with spider-light reflectors and two VHO actinics to offset the coloration of the Iwasakis. Night lighting was created with two 25W blue colored party bulbs found at Home Depot. Outdoor sockets were used to prevent salt spray damage.

After one year, however, the heat from the lighting brought out the natural characteristic of wood....the lengthy doors were bowing and cupping. Using wood as soft as pine worsten the effect.

Water return: Water back to both the main tank and frag tank was supplied by two Mak 4 pumps. Four 1/2" ORBIT sprinkler heads supplied water back to the main tank. The sprinklers had adjustable flow pattern. Each swept back and forth at 110 degrees.

Only three sprinklers had to be replaced over the course of 2 years. This is due to the removal of the internal filter baskets of the sprinklers. Being clogged, the sprinkler will be stuck in one position and will not rotate. Without the filters, the sprinklers clogged within 3 weeks and had to be replaced. At $8 each, it is not a big problem. Two Maxijet 1200 on a DIY wavemaker were used to provide further water movement.

Sump and Skimmer: The sump is a typical store display 30g acrylic tank. I bought it as discounted price when my LFS wanted a change to their display. Skimmer is the Top Fathom TF110 venturi skimmer. It performs ok...not the greatest. The heart of a venturi skimmer is its venturi injector. Due to the troublesome procedures in removing, decalcifying the injector and draining the skimmer, for the last two years, I just neglected its maintainence. Most of the time it doesn't skim anything at all. Since all the inhabitants are healthy and growing well, that was the way I left it.

Calcium Reactor: DIY dual chambered reactor purchased from Bob Odenwell about 4 - 5 years ago. Works pretty well. I use regular CaribSea Seaflor Reef Sand for media. I have read many people empty the entire reactor every year to remove the fine dust left from undissolved media. Over the years, I have only emptied the reactor once. Originally a small minijet type powerhead was used as the feed pump. After a year, I feed the reactor by a line tapped off of the main return pump. However, this didn't work too well. Once every couple of weeks, the efflucent will stop. Some hobbyists told me this is due to "vapor lock". Basically, feeding any reactor with a separate pump is the best choice.

Feeding: A NutraMatic automatic feeder dispenses flakes to the fishes twice a day. Every other day, I feed the fishes with home-made frozen food in between the flake feedings.

Every night, after lights go out, I add about 50 drops of cryo-preserved phytoplankton for the corals. Every other night, along with phytoplankton, I add about 1 teaspoon of Golden Pearls. During this time, the skimmer is turned off for about one hour.

There are a total of two actinic VHOs and four 250W Iwasakis. Due to space constrain, all the spider lights reflectors had to be reinstalled (instead of parallel to tank, now all four are perpendicular to tank). All the power heads were removed and changed to four 3/4" sprinkler heads, and one 3g surge box. The new sprinklers are made by K-Rain, model K-1000 and are not the pop-up type as before. From what the manufacturer had told me, this model is ONLY sold in California (don't know why). Instead of two Mak 4 pumps, a new Dolphin Ampmaster 3000 is used. Also I build a new canopy to replace the old pine canopy that has been warping due to heat and natural tendency of the wood.

Skimmer Updates: (July 15,2002) I realize a simple solution to the cleaning of the injector and be achieved by installing two additional 1/2" PVC unions and gate valve. There is one union on the skimmer body, then injector, the second union, then a gate valve. To clean the venturi valve, I just loosen the unions and the entire injector can be removed. The gate valve permits a finer tuning of water entering skimmer as oppose to the original ball valve.

Feeding: Even though not much skimming is done (water change occurs about once every 2 months), I feed the tank constantly. The auto-food dispenser feeds twice at the highest setting daily. Flakes from different brands are mixed and fed. Every other day, I add the equivalent of about 4 cubes of frozen food for the fishes. Every night, 80 drops of cryo-preserved phytoplankton is added. And finally four times a week, two teaspoon of three different micron-size Golden Pearls are added.