What happened to Omegatron and Tendar?

[topQuark]

I'm just curious, what ever happened to Omegatron and Tendar? They used to be some of the top forum posters but I haven't seen anything posted by them for more than a year.

Is there another forum that everyone has moved on to?

Just an update... I've been living in Geneva for just over one year now. The 75 Gallon that we moved here (tank by ocean freight, live rock by Lufthansa air cargo and fish/corals by carry-on) is doing great. We do seem to be having a battle with cyano and some apitista anenomies. I cleaned a lot of debris out the sump today, and I'll do more frequent water changes, so hopefully that will help. We've had some really hot days here in Geneva, but I didn't have to break down and buy a chiller... the tank never got above 80. Thankfully our apartment manages to stay quite cool.

We recently broke down the nano and moved the residents into the 75 gallon tank... one yellow-tail damsel moved into the 'big tank' with the other fish and remarkably seems to behave herself. We're happy that she doesn't beat up on the other fish, as that was a real concern.

The Kenya Tree coral and the polyps we brought here from Chicago have multipled like crazy. Over the past year we have been searching for a "mate" for our Black Oscillaris clown-fish. I've been in contact with a LFS in Sion that orders fish from a hatchery in the UK... but so far we have not had any luck getting a baby. :(

[brody98]

It's good to hear your tank survived the move and things are going well, things are pretty slow in here. I see Chuck in here from time to time, he hasn’t posted for a long time but there is a lot of work behind a board like this. Everyone else is kind of MIA. I think a lot of them are at reef central.

[Matthewdmueller]

I think its really just brody and I in here. Most of the other posts seem to come from one timers looking to get a quick answer. I'm glad to help them of course, but it does seem pretty empty here when I check it everyday. Nice to hear that your tank is doing well. Hows living in Geneva?

[topQuark]

Geneva is a cool city... and very international. Before we moved my wife and I sold both of our cars. Here we can just ride the bus and walk where we want, it is quite liberating. No gas or insurance payments to worry about.

Of course, there are some times that we have to pay for a Taxi... like the time that we bought a huge bucket of Reef Crystals that I refused to carry home!

We do miss the great marine aquarium shops in the USA, like "Beyond the Reef" and "The Living Sea" (both shops are in the greater Chicago area). We have two marine shops in the area here. One is always sad to visit as much of the livestock appears dying or dead (we haven't been back there for many months) and the other shop just never gets very much livestock but when they do it tends to do quite well (we bought two black-spine urchins and one goniopora coral that have all done very well in our tank).

I still order quite a number of supplies from Marine Depot, Premium Aquatics and AH Supply (plumbing parts, RODI filters, lights). Most of the items I have shipped to my parents house first and then forwarded here by a cheaper and slower shipping means. The power compacts that I ordered from AH Supply were shipped directly to our home in Geneva, they arrived quickly and shipping them didn't cost an unreasonable amount. I'm always impressed with those guys at AH Supply and I have been quite happy with their lights/kits.

I have found one online reef supply shop here in Switzerland that I recently purchased some Salifert test kits from (www.riffhaus.ch). These guys even carry Arctica chillers, so I was impressed when I first browsed their website.

When we moved here we had to buy a 3000 Watt 220-120 step-down transformer to supply the power to most of the equipment in the system (lights and two pumps). We don't actually use 3000 Watts, but it's better not to put too much stress on a transformer that is intended to be used for extended periods. Needless to say, it is quite large.

One technical problem that I have not gotten around to resolving yet is an issue concerning the timer for our lights. See, the lights are 120 Volts but the current here is 50 Hz instead of 60 Hz in the USA. This means that the household timer we brought from the USA runs slower (the AC frequency is used by the timer circuitry to keep the 'tempo'). We can't just buy a local timer, because it runs on 220 Volts... So, I turn the lights on and reset the timer every morning. The lights will then shut off at the designated hour. Otherwise the timer runs on something like a 29 hour day, and the aquarium 'daylight' hours get all out of phase from the true outdoor sunrise and sunset.

I thought about buying one of those Neptune system controllers, but somehow it seems like such an expensive solution to such a stupid problem. Perhaps we will just upgrade to a T5 lighting system when these bulbs are due to expire and use 220 V.

[brody98]

You can do it with a digital appliance timer that has a weekly schedule with multiple on off times by staggering the on and off times as the week goes by, but you will still have to reprogram it once a week. Still a pain but not as bad as every day.

[Chuck S]

I am around just busy with work and other stuff to find time to post as far as anyone else can not say. Most likely at reefcentral.