400 Gallon Starfire Build - Mixed Reef

[reefgeek96]

yha the pvc bill is usually a shocker cant even believe what it was looks well planned out cant wait to see it running

 

[Fin]

Boy, lots of great toys there. This will be a beatiful tank when you are done. I ask only because this happened to me with my old 200 - have you thought what you will do with a lrage mature reef like that down the road when you need to replace the carpet? I put tile just under the tank on my 140 and changing out the carpet will be no problem now. Just a thought....

 

[AJsTank]

Boy, lots of great toys there. This will be a beatiful tank when you are done. I ask only because this happened to me with my old 200 - have you thought what you will do with a lrage mature reef like that down the road when you need to replace the carpet? I put tile just under the tank on my 140 and changing out the carpet will be no problem now. Just a thought....

Cut the carpet around the tank and replace. I was going to put it on tile, but I was just nervous with all that weight on it. I spoke to several tile manufacturers and they all advised against it. I realize it's possible, I just didn't feel comfortable about it is all. If a tile cracked in the long run, it would drive me nuts. We figured roughly 6,000 lbs of weight with water, stand, tank, rock and sand.

 

[flyingfish]

Inspiring! Watching build...

 

[AJsTank]

check out flexpvc.com. they have just about everything single plumbing fitting known to man, including all your 1.25" pipe, fittings, valves, etc. although if using a valve on the 1.25" i'd go bigger, 1.5" and then bush down to the 1.25" for non-restrictive flow. it's not common, you're right which is why most places don't have it.

just based on the experience of folks that have had the dc10500 6+ months and experienced issues because of running it external, i'm inclined (and what i ended up doing) is installing both mine internal. that coupled with the heat issues associated with the original gen 1 rlss/h20 pumps (that RO largely copied) makes me think it would only be a matter of time. and i dont feel like dealing with that and trying my luck with lower speeds instead because what if one day i add a frag tank or sump or something off the manifold and need all 2600gph flow? i reduced my output to 1" for ease of plumbing and just used the provided screen and put in my sump. easy peezy. up to you of course and perhaps you have heard much different about their performance as an external pump? i don't know, sir.

I just got the pump back out and was looking at the fittings they give you. 1 fitting reduces from 1-1/4 to 1 inch flex and the other fitting reduces from 1-1/4 to 3/4. So they must have it engineered for the reduced coupling or else they wouldn't provide them. What are your thoughts on this? I didn't even realize it was reducing it until a few minutes ago when I screwed it on. I just knew I didn't want to use flex, so I didn't bother putting that fitting on.

 

[AJsTank]

Last night I decided to get my returns and drains down in the overflow boxes. The wife was out of town, so I figured it was a good time so she wouldn't see the mess



The nice thing about this tank is that when you are inside, you have plenty of room. ha



Bulkheads under the cabinet were easier than I thought to deal with. I had the perfect amount of room and I felt like I was able to get the nut on the bulkheads nice and snug.



I wish I would have had some shorter bulkheads for my overflow boxes, but I was able to get it done. I did not glue anything down in these boxes. This schedule 80 is so tight and hard to work with anyway. I ended up doing an emergency drain about 1.5 inches from the top and my Durso's were about 3 inches below the emergency. I decided to not do herbie, because I wanted the ambient noise of the water flowing through the tank.



I'm going to shorten up these Loc-Lines up a bit tonight. They ended up being a little too long.




I don't know how many of you have worked with schedule 80, but it's a PAIN in the rear to pipe. Just dry fitting everything and then trying to get it apart was very difficult. I'm NOT a plumber, but growing up I installed commercial refrigeration equipment my entire life, so I get the basic concepts because I've worked in construction. My previous PVC experience has only been schedule 40, this 80 stuff was not very fun to work with. And yes, I screwed up on my length, so that's why I have a coupler there

 

[monkiboy]

I just got the pump back out and was looking at the fittings they give you. 1 fitting reduces from 1-1/4 to 1 inch flex and the other fitting reduces from 1-1/4 to 3/4. So they must have it engineered for the reduced coupling or else they wouldn't provide them. What are your thoughts on this? I didn't even realize it was reducing it until a few minutes ago when I screwed it on. I just knew I didn't want to use flex, so I didn't bother putting that fitting on.

with the RO DC10500, you are provided with barbed adapters for 1" and 1.25" fittings (one of each for output and one 1.25" for input). the fittings are not for use with flex but nylon hose. they offer only one reducer barb adapter in the box like mentioned above to 1" ID nylon hose (not 3/4") and that is for use on the output side. you can reduce the output of a pump but you never want to reduce the input.

 

[monkiboy]

good job on the plumbing too and yeah sch80 isn't as friendly as sch40 for dry-fit and mock up but the final product will look great when you're done - keep it up!

 

[AJsTank]

I had a few small pieces of rock that has been dried and sitting in a bin. I rinsed it off earlier this morning and just placed a few pieces in the tank. I will do my aquascape hopefully Friday.

 

[AJsTank]

So check this out. Elite Aquatics built this custom box for me. Ca, Alk, Mag - 2.5 gallons each - I had him build this shelf for my Vertex Dosser to sit on. He text me these pics. I will pick them up next week and post a couple more pics with the sump.






I didn't want to mount all my Apex and Ecotech controllers on the sides of my cabinet, so I had them build me a custom plate to mount them to. I will be able to slide it around and in and out of the way if needs be. The controllers will be mounted down each side with the cords going through the middle holes.







It's pretty cool when I can just give him an idea of what I want and he builds it.

 

[joshporksandwich]

So check this out. Elite Aquatics built this custom box for me. Ca, Alk, Mag - 2.5 gallons each - I had him build this shelf for my Vertex Dosser to sit on. He text me these pics. I will pick them up next week and post a couple more pics with the sump.






I didn't want to mount all my Apex and Ecotech controllers on the sides of my cabinet, so I had them build me a custom plate to mount them to. I will be able to slide it around and in and out of the way if needs be. The controllers will be mounted down each side with the cords going through the middle holes.







It's pretty cool when I can just give him an idea of what I want and he builds it.

Looks very cool

 

[TallShow]

Very awesome build so far!

 

[thenissantech]

This tank is gonna be EPIC!! Can't wait to see

 

[AJsTank]

Last night I started aquascaping... This is a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. Stacking, Acrylic Rods and Epo Putty... I did an island on the end with a couple of arches on the other side, a tall point at the top for some height and a bay for some depth. This doesn't look big in the pictures, but the tower on the right probably weighs close to 70lbs. I left plenty of swimming room in the back and lots of negative space as well.

 

[AJsTank]

Some more. This one shows a little more depth.



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[joshporksandwich]

Darn it man. You're making me want to upgrade!

 

[AJsTank]

Darn it man. You're making me want to upgrade!

You know you're going to do it... You might as well get started :bigsmile: BTW, how did you come up with your name?

 

[revhtree]

What a tank! Loving this!

 

[ShippD]

Oh yeah loving this one for sure.

 

[psidriven]

As far as the RODI feed, isn't there a way to monitor when the sump level goes up or down and have it linked to your controller to text or email you?

Couple reasons for running ro to a large container and not directly to your sump.

first is safety, those float on/off switches have a pretty high failure rate. also, murphy's law says it will eventually fail when you least expect it and you don't want it failing to an infinite source of water. its a cheap safety check to have it fed by a pump that you can shut off in case salinty drops, etc.

second is the ro is most efficient running for long periods instead of on/off. the ro water that comes out when your first run the ro is usually higer tds than later on. you can check this with a tds meter.

hope that helps and great tank build.