Back in November I decided to make a new home for my sps. I have always liked the 40 breeder, and have wanted one for years. So that decision was easy. The decisions I had to make from there on were a little more difficult. I haven't had a tank with a sump before, but with this tank I was going to have one. At first I was thinking of using a 20 long for a sump because it would fit inside the stand. Then I got to thinking, if I was to use a stand for a 75 a 40 would fit and have extra room for equipment. This is the route I chose.
Sump
The sump was built with the first chamber for skimmer, second for refugium, third for return, fourth for autotopoff reservoir. I drilled the display with 2 holes for 1" bulkheads. The gentleman who is building the sump and installing overflow boxes cracked my display and I'm waiting for him to replace it. It took around 2 months to decide what exactly my setup would be. Whether deep sand bed, shallow sand bed, barebottom etc. Ultimately, I decided to go with a very high flow rate where having sand is not really an option. After looking at several different skimmers, and asking for fellow reefers advice I chose the bubble magus curve 5. Once I made this choice the remaining decisions were much easier. I thought about a multifaceted approach to nutrient export. Without a sandbed none export was a concern to me. I decided to use biopellets as a replacement for the sandbed for nutrient export. I will have a ball of cheato in the fuge which should help some also. The curve 5 skimmer should be a little overkill, but I plan to feed extremely heavily, and it should be a pretty good match for this system. I have also bought a phosban reactor if I need aid with removing phosphates. I hope this is one piece of equipment that never sees a drop of water. For a return with manifold I chose sicce syncra silent 5.0. My goal for turnover in the sump is from 4-6 times per hour. The sicce should be adequate to achieve this with the manifold included. Since this will be a sps tank I wanted to have the most stable CA/alk levels I can. I chose to do this with kalk in a two little fishes kalk stirrer hooked into the autotopoff. For autotopoff I chose the jbj ato. Later on I decided to purchase a Neptune systems apex lite which kind of makes the ato purchase unnecessary. But oh well, I have both now so I will use them. The apex was not something I was going to purchase initially. After thinking for a while about the controller it seemed to be kind of an "insurance" in case something went wrong. In my mind now its worth the investment to help protect the livestock I plan to have. For flow inside the display I will be using 2 jeabao wp25. I should be able to provide heavy to insane amounts of flow with these. Also, I'm sure I will have no problems keeping detritus from accumulating inside the display. I chose to use flex tube for all plumbing in this system. I like the thought of being able to move things later without having to replumb everything. I guess time will tell if this was a good choice or not. For lighting I am using a 6x39w t5 fixture with 6 LED moonlights. I replaced the stock bulbs with all ati bulbs. This is the.same model el cheapo fixture that I have had on my 29 for over a year with great results. The fuge light is a 2x18w t5 fixture that I'm sure will be plenty of light to grow macroalgae. I researched a bit on biopellets and reactors and chose a bluefin reactor with Dr. Tims np active pearls. There were lots of miscellaneous purchases for plumbing parts, extra powerheads etc.
When I had everything purchased, and the tank sent off to be built I took a trip to Little Rock and hit up the lfs there. While I was there I picked up 32lbs of Tukani rock. I have this rock in my 29 and have had great results with it. I didn't anticipate my tank being cracked, and having to wait over a month for it to be replaced. The rock has been curing in a tub for over a month now, and I'm sure its ready to go.
This about sums everything up for now. The display is supposed to be complete this week. Hopefully I will be able to start setting it up soon!
I want to give a special thanks to David Maki from Concordcorals.com for all the help, and his extraordinary customer service.
Sump
![vydujytu.jpg](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fimg.tapatalk.com%2Fd%2F14%2F02%2F24%2Fvydujytu.jpg&hash=0dd27d37a1efaa8a296b9ce36ac78421)
![gevevaze.jpg](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fimg.tapatalk.com%2Fd%2F14%2F02%2F24%2Fgevevaze.jpg&hash=b4a458b20ecb21d410ad1f479436f059)
The sump was built with the first chamber for skimmer, second for refugium, third for return, fourth for autotopoff reservoir. I drilled the display with 2 holes for 1" bulkheads. The gentleman who is building the sump and installing overflow boxes cracked my display and I'm waiting for him to replace it. It took around 2 months to decide what exactly my setup would be. Whether deep sand bed, shallow sand bed, barebottom etc. Ultimately, I decided to go with a very high flow rate where having sand is not really an option. After looking at several different skimmers, and asking for fellow reefers advice I chose the bubble magus curve 5. Once I made this choice the remaining decisions were much easier. I thought about a multifaceted approach to nutrient export. Without a sandbed none export was a concern to me. I decided to use biopellets as a replacement for the sandbed for nutrient export. I will have a ball of cheato in the fuge which should help some also. The curve 5 skimmer should be a little overkill, but I plan to feed extremely heavily, and it should be a pretty good match for this system. I have also bought a phosban reactor if I need aid with removing phosphates. I hope this is one piece of equipment that never sees a drop of water. For a return with manifold I chose sicce syncra silent 5.0. My goal for turnover in the sump is from 4-6 times per hour. The sicce should be adequate to achieve this with the manifold included. Since this will be a sps tank I wanted to have the most stable CA/alk levels I can. I chose to do this with kalk in a two little fishes kalk stirrer hooked into the autotopoff. For autotopoff I chose the jbj ato. Later on I decided to purchase a Neptune systems apex lite which kind of makes the ato purchase unnecessary. But oh well, I have both now so I will use them. The apex was not something I was going to purchase initially. After thinking for a while about the controller it seemed to be kind of an "insurance" in case something went wrong. In my mind now its worth the investment to help protect the livestock I plan to have. For flow inside the display I will be using 2 jeabao wp25. I should be able to provide heavy to insane amounts of flow with these. Also, I'm sure I will have no problems keeping detritus from accumulating inside the display. I chose to use flex tube for all plumbing in this system. I like the thought of being able to move things later without having to replumb everything. I guess time will tell if this was a good choice or not. For lighting I am using a 6x39w t5 fixture with 6 LED moonlights. I replaced the stock bulbs with all ati bulbs. This is the.same model el cheapo fixture that I have had on my 29 for over a year with great results. The fuge light is a 2x18w t5 fixture that I'm sure will be plenty of light to grow macroalgae. I researched a bit on biopellets and reactors and chose a bluefin reactor with Dr. Tims np active pearls. There were lots of miscellaneous purchases for plumbing parts, extra powerheads etc.
![nu3usybu.jpg](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fimg.tapatalk.com%2Fd%2F14%2F02%2F24%2Fnu3usybu.jpg&hash=f9fe0c4033982c020b9b6e7fe03f0c00)
When I had everything purchased, and the tank sent off to be built I took a trip to Little Rock and hit up the lfs there. While I was there I picked up 32lbs of Tukani rock. I have this rock in my 29 and have had great results with it. I didn't anticipate my tank being cracked, and having to wait over a month for it to be replaced. The rock has been curing in a tub for over a month now, and I'm sure its ready to go.
![pa4ehu7e.jpg](/proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fimg.tapatalk.com%2Fd%2F14%2F02%2F24%2Fpa4ehu7e.jpg&hash=4d2d2947e7334760c47498bb7ae6010c)
This about sums everything up for now. The display is supposed to be complete this week. Hopefully I will be able to start setting it up soon!
I want to give a special thanks to David Maki from Concordcorals.com for all the help, and his extraordinary customer service.