Kevan's Reef Adventures Cubed

[kevantheman35]

The time to start a new build thread has come! I am a dedicated cube fan and this tank will be no exception. Going with a 60g 24"x24"x24" with a custom 25g acrylic sump. I intend this build to be picture heavy and as detailed as possible since those are my favorite builds to follow (and if you have a build thread chances are I have read it through). Finally, I'm doing this to learn as well as share my ideas both dumb and good with others. If you think I am doing something stupid tell me! if you have an idea don't hesitate to share it. We all need all the help we can get in this hobby, so HERE WE GO.

Edit: Here is the photobucket album where you can find most of the images in this thread at once, Cheers. http://smg.photobucket.com/user/flipflipgameover/library/60g cube build

Background
Here are a few of my past tanks. Both nanos and both cubes. I learned a lot from my experience with these tanks and to sum it up smaller is not easier! in fact I would argue the opposite is true in most cases.
12g Nano-cube 2008-2010: This was my first reef tank. Having such a small volume of water, water chemistry was a real challenge with this tank. I actually had a ton of growth with many species and still have many of the colonies started from frags when the tank began. The green candy cane (top left) for example started with 2 heads and is now 2 colonies of 75+ heads after many traded and given away frags.

34g Solana 2010-2014: I had a lot of ups and downs with this tank. There were times I had it running about how I wanted it but the way this tank is designed made it so that I had to be constantlychanging things and dumping money into it to keep it looking good.

 

[kevantheman35]

Equipment list so far
Tank: Deep Blue 60g rimless 24x24x24
Sump: Custom acrylic sump 20x18x16.5 made by mojo here on the forum
Lighting: Deciding between my 250w icecap MH with diy royal blue crees or my reef radiance 132e. Leaning more towards the MH so far. Not that im opposed the the leds so much as I don't want to spend much time dialing in the reef radiance fixture. I would like to go with a 6 bulb t5 fixture and may in the future but I have these two fixtures laying around.
Return pump: Ehiem 1260? possibly jebao or waveline dc. Would love input if you know a good fit for this system.
Circulation: 2 Ecotech mp10's. I imagine these will be enough but I have a tunze 6045 incase.
Rock: 50lbs marco dry rock (been curing for about a month now)
Sand: Bare bottom? opinions please
Filtration: TLF150 reactors running carbon and GFO possibly a 3rd one running biopellets. Growing out 8 red mangroves right now to incorporate into the system. Kicking around the idea of adding a second smaller cube next to the tank to serve as a display refugium/ possible seahorse tank. This would look similar to Julian Sprungs current set up.If you havent had a chance to see that I recommend searching. The display fuge may come at a later time and until then I will be growing the mangroves alone the back wall of the display tank probably.
Skimmer: Leaning towards either Vertex Omega 130 or Aquamaxx cones co-1. I was set on vertex but after reading some reviews the 130 seems to need modification to perform well.
Stand: Custom built by me
ATO: Elos osmoregulator

 

[TheChef]

dig the sump! how much did it put you back, if you dont mind me asking

 

[Reeflogic]

Cool little build! Love those Deep Blue tanks. Also, I couldn't help but think of Randy Quaid "Cousin Eddie" when I read TheChef's post.... "that's a fine piece of furniture, mind if I ask ya how much it set ya back?" haha ...classic.

 

[TheChef]

Cool little build! Love those Deep Blue tanks. Also, I couldn't help but think of Randy Quaid "Cousin Eddy" when I read TheChef's post.... "that's a fine piece of furniture, mind if I ask ya how much it set ya back?" haha ...classic.

 

[Reeflogic]

lol

 

[skinz78]

Great looking start to your setup!

Cousin Eddie for president!

 

[revhtree]

Very cool! Following along!

 

[kevantheman35]

dig the sump! how much did it put you back, if you dont mind me asking

Don't mind at all. I got the tank and sump slightly used from a local for $250 together luckily. I believe mojo said the acrylic cost was about 100 precut

 

[kevantheman35]

Cool little build! Love those Deep Blue tanks. Also, I couldn't help but think of Randy Quaid "Cousin Eddie" when I read TheChef's post.... "that's a fine piece of furniture, mind if I ask ya how much it set ya back?" haha ...classic.

Thanks I appreciate it!

 

[kevantheman35]

Great looking start to your setup!

Cousin Eddie for president!

cousin eddie YES!

 

[kevantheman35]

Very cool! Following along!

Thanks Rev! I've probably read hundreds of your threads over the years

 

[kevantheman35]

Salt water mixing station
I finished my new mixing station today. Completely done except for the second barrel that should be on the left, right now its curing my rock. The pump on this unit is atleast 10 years old and is still the best pump I've seen. Build like a tank and you have to touch it to see if its running. The brutes are only 20 gal each but even at that ill probably only need to mix water once every 2 weeks or more and I don't like using water much older than that.

Instead of a float switch I added an emergency overflow bulkhead that runs to a drain incase I forget to turn off my rodi unit.

 

[rboutin111]

I love the tank, sump and mixing station. I'm a cube fan as well. Why not add a float switch to the mixing station so if you forget that could possible stop it. Then if the float switch fails you will have the overflow as back up. This would possible save you from wasting water.

Will the tank be in the same room as the pool table?

I'm looking forward to watching your build.

 

[kevantheman35]

I love the tank, sump and mixing station. I'm a cube fan as well. Why not add a float switch to the mixing station so if you forget that could possible stop it. Then if the float switch fails you will have the overflow as back up. This would possible save you from wasting water.

Will the tank be in the same room as the pool table?

I'm looking forward to watching your build.

I probably will, I just had the bulkhead laying around and no float switch haha. I have overflowed my previous cans 2 or 3 times and I just wanted to set some kind of a safety up as soon as possible. No the tank wont be in the same room as the pool table. Thanks for the input!

 

[kevantheman35]

So most of my livestock for this tank is currently residing in a tubberware container. The funny thing is that everyone is doing much better than when it was in my aquarium, and I am actually enjoying it more. Having stuff in this shallow container allows me to give individual attention to each coral/invert. My rose bubble especially has at least doubled in size since I have been feeding it almost every other day. The only thing that is not doing great now is a maxima clam ive had for several years. I have a feeling the new cleaner shrimp is picking at it. For filtration I'm running gfo and carbon in a single reactor, have a big ball of tea cup culerpa as well as a few other macros and 5 red mangrove propagules that are just now rooting. I also threw a bag of chemipure elite in an aquaclear50 for good measure. Also have a simgle mp10 for circulation. Anyways, its a simple system and seems to be working well for me so far.

One of my Darwin clowns thinks its a dolphin always sticking its head out of the water

 

[kevantheman35]

Lighting decisions

​Which light do you guys think I should go with on this build? I have both sitting around ready to go. Leaning more towards the halide unless someone talks me out of it haha.
Reef radiance dm-132 full spectrum light. 44 3w leds with 90 degree optics

Ice cap double ended 250w metal halide pendant with icecap ballest. Currently running a 14k pheonix bulb.
7 DIY royal blue 3w crees attached to fixture.

 

[kevantheman35]

We've got roots!

Im currently growing 5 Red Mangroves in my holding tank and another 3 in a freshwater sandbed. I have heard they grow much faster in freshwater so I thought I would do a comparison. Noticed today that I have some pretty good roots started. These will most likely be planted along the back wall of the new tank but eventually in a remote refugium.

The candy cane coral in the back started as a 2 head frag in 2008 and grows like crazy. The other colonies are pieces that have broken off cleaning over the years and grow up themselves. Ive also given away a ton of frags. Wish I could say I had that kind of success with the rest of my coral species. Also shown is a RBTA I have been feeding like crazy getting it ready for the new setup as well.

 

[skinz78]

Looking good, for some reason I've never had much growth out of any of the Candy Cane's that I've had over the years.

 

[kevantheman35]

Looking good, for some reason I've never had much growth out of any of the Candy Cane's that I've had over the years.

Thanks! Yea it's definitely one of the species I seem to do very well with for whatever reason. I do spot feed them from time to time and that definitely excels the growth when I do it regularly