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Items by Gawiedj

Marine Aquariums of South Africa

• 

  1.2 m Tank, Sump & Stand - Free for sale: Table View Cape Town

  Posted: April 3rd, 2011, 10:57am CDT by Gawiedj

  Hardware for saleThread title:

  1.2 m Tank, Sump & Stand - Free

  Location:

  Table View Cape Town

  Shipping or Collection only:

  Collection only

  Photo's and description/list of items for sale:

  Tank: 1.2m x 65cm (deep) x 70cm (high) 10mm Glass
  Sump: 90cm x 50cm x 50cm
  Stand: Mild Steel tubing covered with wood
  
  The tank is free to anybody who is willing to collect it.
  The tank has some minor scratches along the bottom of tank.
  The cabinet needs some work.
  
  
  
  

  Notes:

  -

• 

  St Thomas Mushrooms

  Posted: February 1st, 2011, 7:09pm CST by Gawiedj

  Unfortunately I do not have a pic and do not want to hotlink an image illegally but google it and you will see what I am talking about.
  
  Are they available in SA?
  
  It's like a ric on steroids;)
• 

  Pearly Beach - Cold Water Anemones

  Posted: September 13th, 2010, 6:38pm CDT by Gawiedj

  I spent the weekend in Pearly Beach and had some time on Sunday to take some pics.
  
  
  
  
  
  a bit closer
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• 

  Blue Zoas - Trying to get the color to show

  Posted: August 2nd, 2010, 8:35pm CDT by Gawiedj

  Here's 2 pics I took of my blue zoas.
  I tried to get the color the same as what I see in the tank. (15 000K MH and 2 x 24w blue T5s)
  
  
  
  Best effort for the evening.
  
  
  
  Lucky Shot of my Sleeper Goby.
  Aperture set to F5.3 (was shooting the zoas and he popped out for his 15min of fame.;))
  A good example of what happens with depth of field when the aperture is wide open.
  
  
  
  Edit:
  
  Any suggestions on getting better results with the blue zoas will be appreciated
• 

  My new Coral Box

  Posted: July 22nd, 2010, 11:05am CDT by Gawiedj

  I've ordered a new tank.
  Big tanks are not for me... I learned that lesson with the 1.2 I bought end of last year. I just cannot get it the way I like and it's a mission to work on it because I cannot work inside it unless I use a ladder....and the list goes on.
  Anyway, you make mistakes, you learn from it and carry on.:thumbup:
  
  So I ordered a new tank from Phuture Labs, before we get to the specs let me tell you what I plan for this tank.
  
  As you know I love coral, so this tank will be dominated by coral, mostly recordea, zoas etc., with 4 fish.
  The fish
  1x Royal Gramma
  1x Sleeper Goby
  2x Clowns
  
  So as you can se the bioload on this setup will be minimal. (Keep that in mind)
  
  So the tank specs:
  
  800 L x 600 W x 600 H (288 Liters)
  12mm glass
  Rimless with black silicone and flame polished glass.
  
  There will be a 10cm gap at the back of the tank. Blocked off with a piece of black perspex. There will be 4 sections for Chemical filtration, DSB & LR, Macro Algea and the last chamber for heaters pumps etc.
  
  It will look something like this
  
  
  
  
  The tank, in this drawing you will see only 3 chambers at the back, however after some redesigning 4 chambers is the way I will go go.
  
  
  
  I will use the following equipment:
  
  Reef Octopus HOB Skimmer
  150w MH with 2 x 24w T5 Actinic tubes
  4300 lph CLS pump with 2 outlets on the back pane
  Depending on the flow in the tank I will add 1 or 2 3500lph sun sun pumps
  2 x 150w Jeager heaters
  
  I have a lot of LR (All the LR from my Nano, All the LR from my 1.2 and then some more and will add as much as I can
  
  I will run Carbon, Phosgaurd and Purigen for chemical filtration
  
  10cm Deep in tank DSB.
  
  I will do 50l weekly water changes with NSW.
• 

  Moving my very new tank

  Posted: December 23rd, 2009, 5:47pm CST by Gawiedj

  I will be moving at the end of January.
  Problem is
  I've just finished the upgrade from Nano to 1.2 and moved all my LS over.
  So the tank is pretty "green", but the parameters are stable.
  
  SG 1.025
  nitrate = 0
  nitrite = 0
  amonia = 0
  PH 8.3
  
  I will house my corals with a mate for a month or three until the tank is stable after the move.
  The fish I dont have temporary lodgings for and to make matters worse most of them are damsels so I do not want another reefer to house them in their current setup; however my current landlord is willing to let me leave the tank in the house for 2 or 3 weeks after we move out.
  
  The best plan I can come up with so far is:
  
  Setup a temporary facility now in my garage, make sure everything can be broken down and moved easily. (I have a frag tub running at the moment so it will be easy to use that with out the massive "in-tub" DSB)
  
  On the day I move (30 Jan) take the temp facility to the new place and setup, wait for a week or 2 and only if parameters are stable move the fish in two or three batches.
  
  Move the tank to the new place setup and let the cycle happen before slowly moving stock from the temp facility to the tank.
  Obviously this will require weekly 20 to 30% waterchanges on the temp system, but NSW is free and the ocean is close to my new house.
  
  What do you think will it work? Any advice will be welcome:thumbup:
• 

  Some fish pictures

  Posted: December 19th, 2009, 1:52pm CST by Gawiedj

  Been quite busy over the last couple of weeks finally got the camera out today:)
  Some results.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• 

  Macro Lense for my D40

  Posted: November 27th, 2009, 2:33pm CST by Gawiedj

  I've been looking to upgrade to a proper Macro lense for my D40, yes I know it's old and entry level...it will be upgraded next.
  
  I really want the Nikon 105mm VR but I dont want to spend THAT much.
  I've looked at the Sigma 105mm f/2.8 EX DG Macro and from what I've read it seems to be a really good lense at almost half the price of the Nikon.
  Do you guys think it's worth spending the extra 4k on the Nikon Lense?
• 

  Removing a painted background

  Posted: November 10th, 2009, 8:57am CST by Gawiedj

  I recently got a 2nd hand tank, the back pane is painted blue. I want to remove the paint and paint it black.
  
  How do I go about removing the blue paint?
  
  Would paint stripper be OK?
• 

  Gawie's 1.2

  Posted: November 4th, 2009, 5:06pm CST by Gawiedj

  Yes, this not a joke.
  
  I bought a 2nd hand 1.2m w x 65cm d x 70cm h (546L) with sump 90cm w x 50 d x 50 h (237 L) total system volume is around 700L.
  
  The tank came with 3 x 54w T5 Daz units (3 tubes each) one of them has been modified with 2 more T5s.
  I am not going to use all of the t5's I want MH. With that height I am sure I'll get better results using MH. I have a 2 x 150w MH pendant) add 3 x 54w Actinic to that and I'll be good to go.
  
  The tank came with more or less 40kg of LR, I'll have to add more.
  
  I will run a TS2 skimmer to start and see if I need to upgrade it.
  
  The tank is on a metal stand clad with stained wood.
  
  All my LS from the Nano will be moved over in time. Finally I can have a Yellow Tang and a Mandarin the fish I've always wanted.
  
  Tomorrow the cleanup starts and I'll take lots of pics:P
• 

  Avain Protocol vs Telkom Business ADSL

  Posted: September 4th, 2009, 6:06pm CDT by Gawiedj

  Thought some of the tech-heads would like this
  
  Hi Guys/Gals
  
  We are having a bit of fun at the expense of our favourite telecoms provider Helkom. Let me explain. We have satellite call centres which are connected via business ADSL’s to our main data centre. As usual these connections where very unstable and extremely slow. This caused a huge amount of frustration for us as we need to move voice logs(100’s of megabytes) a day up to our main databases for QA and legal purposes. Our company runs on sales and without voice logs we have no binding contract between us and the customer. So they are pretty essential.
  
  Anyway I read a Aprils fools white paper about Avian carrier networks a couple of years ago. Basically it is a protocol that uses racing pigeons as a network layer. This got me thinking about how fast we can transfer the data by racing pigeon. I discussed this idea with my CIO one night having a couple of drinks. When we did the math we found out that we can transfer the data faster by pigeon for certain sites. So we made a project of it. Next week Wednesday is Pigeon VS ADSL day here at the unlimited world. We have the media involved so check the Sunday times for a article on this event.
  
  Basically we will be flying a pigeon with a 4GB micro SD card from Howick to our central site in Hillcrest. We did a dry run yesterday. Here is the stats: Pigeon took 48 minutes to deliver the data. ADSL is still downloading. Telkom got hold of this via the media and is currently in a flat spin. We got a call from Telkom asking us for our circuit numbers so they can make sure we have good service.
  
  Here is the best part. We spend +/- R 45000 a month just on rental for these lines. If we moved to the Avian Carrier Network we will be saving a whopping R 35 000 a month.
  
  Check out the facebook group, do a search for Winston the pigeon on facebook. Also watch the local press for some tongue in cheek articles about our great Helkom.
  
  Regards
  Neil
  
  PS: The Original White Paper is located here: RFC 2549 (rfc2549) - IP over Avian Carriers with Quality of Service
  
  Edit: Made a spelling mistake in the title would one of the MODs fix it please?
  
• 

  Changing from T5 to MH

  Posted: May 27th, 2009, 7:32pm CDT by Gawiedj

  Finally my light unit arrived. :thumbup:
  I got a 1 x 150w MH (10 000k) and 2 x 24w T5 (actinic) unit.
  
  At the moment I have 2 x units with 4 x 14w T5 per unit = total 8 x 24w T5 (6 x 10 000k tubes and 2 x "Blue" tubes)
  
  Now I need some help on how to the change over from one to the other.
  
  How far above the waterline should I hang the light?
  Is it best to start quite far away from the water and lower the light over time?
  What photoperiod do I start with for the MH and for the T5 actinic?
  How much do I increment the photoperiod per day/week/month?
  
  Please advise:)
• 

  Mushrooms?

  Posted: May 20th, 2009, 7:18pm CDT by Gawiedj

  A while back I was given one of these as a brown hairy mushroom...
  I placed it in the tank and within a day it had moved to one of the highest light / flow areas in the tank. (It happened to be between zoas. The zoas and the shrooms live happily together.)
  
  I have quite a lot of different shrooms and I have never seen shrooms move as far or as quickly as these guys. Over the following months it split and now there's four of them. Over the weekend I removed one and put it in the frag tub. I noticed a couple of differences to the average shrroom. Have a look.
  
  Top view
  
  
  
  Foot 1
  
  
  
  Foot 2
  
  
  
  They are not agressive and have not harmed any other corals so far. I would like to have a bit more info on these. Anybody that can help?
• 

  New Lights for my Nano

  Posted: April 15th, 2009, 11:44am CDT by Gawiedj

  I have to upgrade / change the lighting on my tank. (Cant get 14w 10 000k T5 tubes anymore.)
  The Dimensions are 76L x 46H x 40w.
  I keep soft corals only at this point, but who kows what the future holds.
  The tank is open top, no canopy and I have no plan to add one in the future.
  Suspending the light from the ceiling will be a huge challenge so I would prefer something that rests on the sides of the tank.
  
  I would like to buy a unit because for me D.I.Y. means Destroy It Yourself.
  
  Should I just change to a multiple 24w T5 unit or two?
  Or do you reckon a 70 or 150w MH supplemented with T5 or CFL atinics?
  
  Any recomended light units, tubes and bulbs please advise.
  Thanks
• 

  Tank moving for Dummies

  Posted: September 9th, 2008, 6:32pm CDT by Gawiedj

  My wife wants to move the lounge around and unfortunately my tank would need to move too.
  Lucky thing it's a Nano, so its not that much work. (I hope)
  
  It's a 133l AquaH2O tank, DSB, HOB skimmer, no sump.
  I have one fire fish and loads of mushrooms, rics and zoas.
  
  I want to do it as follows:
  
  Drain 50% to 60 % of the water from the tank into a plastic container with heater to keep the temp up.
  Drain the rest into another container.
  Remove coral as the tank drains and place in the container with heater.
  Remove LR
  Catch fire fish when and where possible, or just pick him up off the floor when he jumps.
  Remove DSB, put in different container.
  Move the tank to it's new spot.
  Put DSB back
  Scape LR
  Add water (old Water not fresh mix)
  then corals and fish?
  
  Is this correct?
  What am I missing and what should I be on the lookout for during or after such a move?
  
  Any comments or suggestions are welcome.
• 

  Suicidal Firefish

  Posted: August 10th, 2008, 2:26pm CDT by Gawiedj

  I think my firefish has suicidal tendencies.
  This oke just keeps on jumping out the tank!!!!
  Last night while feeding he did a Evil Knieval out the tank aiming perfectly for the little gap I made in the cover to feed through. (Oh yes I was busy feeding him at the time.)
  It seems like he does not want to be in the tank???
  I know of other people who keep firefish without this problem.
  Question I have is: Do I get rid of him or should I just live with it?
• 

  Gawie's "Nano"

  Posted: May 26th, 2008, 9:37pm CDT by Gawiedj

  Here's my first attempt at a marine aquarium.
  
  The tank is a AquaH20 (76cm L X 40cm W x 46cm H)
  
  
  
  The Hardware
  
  2 x Hopar T5 light units (54 w per unit)
  1 x Seio M1100
  1 x Boyu WM-2 wavemaker
  1 x Octopus HOB Skimmer
  
  40kg Kiddies Playsand
  
  10kg Live Rock
  
  It needs rock, anybody know where I can find some good quality LR in CPT?
  
  I have no idea what fish I'll put in there so suggestion are welcome.
  Any other comments or suggestions will be appreciated.
  
• 

  Answering the call to the darkside...

  Posted: May 7th, 2008, 5:28pm CDT by Gawiedj

  Hi Everybody
  
  I am Gawie and have been keeping freshwater tropical tanks for quite some time, alwasy had an interest in Marine tanks.
  
  For years I safely kept away from Marine tanks but unfortunately my business partner and (not sure if he is a good mate at the moment) friend Henk Hugo finally convinced me to join the darkside.
  I have a 90cm tank, holds about 150l that's been earmarked as my first marine tank.
  If my questions are iritating, stupid or offensive blame Henk;)