Chelsey
Valuable Member
Tank
Standard 10 gallon tank with 10 gallon sump. The display tank has a centered 1" bulkhead on the back wall for a drain and there will be two returns coming up over the top of the tank, no more holes. The sump, also 10 gallons, is baffled into three compartments: equipment, fuge, drain (from L to R). I still need to take a picture of the sump. I picked up a Quiet One 2200 from Howard that I'm going to be using for the return pump and I'll buy a visi-therm heater if and when I need one. The goal is to have quite a bit of flow through this tank. The Quiet One pump starts out at 581 GPH but it will have probably around 4' of head plus a "T" for the returns so even before I use anything to restrict the flow it will be less than 581 GPH, probably somewhere around 350 GPH if not less than that.
Lighting
I was on the fence about what kind of lighting I wanted to use. For a while I thought I might want CF or T5 but then I decided just to copy a friend's idea and used 5 curly Q bulbs, three white and two blues. They're on separate cords so that I can set them to come on at different times. I'll also throw in a moonlight that will stay on all the time for the shimmer effect at night and for more focused blue lighting. There's not really anything interesting to take pictures of with this, there are just 5 bulbs and a bunch of wires right now. Once the canopy is build I will make a reflector out of some aluminum sheets that I have to make my lights more efficient (any ideas about how to make the reflector would be appreciated)
Stand and Canopy
A friend of mine here in Columbia is going to help me build the stand and canopy. The design itself is going to be relatively simple and clean and I will be using furniture grade plywood as well as some oak. The goal is to stain both after they're finished, stain color is undecided. I really liked the idea that ludnix on RC had regarding the use of intarsia for decorating the stand so I ran with that idea. Here's a pic of Ludnix's stand:
Here's the design I'm going to be using. The intarsia will be on the stand door:
Since I'm a bit accident prone I decided to pay someone to do the intarsia for me though I still have the plans if I decide to try my hand at cutting fingers off at a later date. The design will be done sometime in the next week or two :) I'll be sure to post pictures when it gets to me.
Livestock
I'm planning on mostly softies for this tank. The goal is to have it look pretty and grow/fill in fast so that it looks mature pretty quick since it will be in the living room. There will be various zoas/palys in this tank, some daisy polyps, two different leathers (neon green polyped toadstool and green nepthea), mushrooms, cloves, and a few varieties of favia.
I'm not completely sure on my fish list yet though I would like it to be various gobies and blennies. I bought a cave basslet (Liopropoma mowbrayi) a few weeks ago that I would really like to put in the tank but I'm not sure if it is considered big enough for him; I'm having trouble finding information on this species. Here is a list of the fish that I like and are possible candidates for this setup but I know I won't be able to put all of them in there:
I also thought it would be cool to have a few neat hermits in there like a staghorn or other colorful hermits but then I'd have to worry about providing them shells, whether they're going to eat my fish, and if they will decide to make each other/my corals snacks.
Rock Wall
After snooping around in the DIY forum on RC I found that I really like the look of a rock/foam wall so I decided to "steal" another great idea. Since I am using an overflow for the 1" drain in the back of the tank I decided to make the overflow out of eggcrate and rock/foam it as well. It took two tries before I managed to produce a result that I'm proud of. Here's try #1:
After full expansion:
I was also having quite a bit of trouble with the rocks staying in the wall after I removed the zip ties. I haven't removed the zip ties on the second wall yet but the rocks seem sturdier, especially now that the epoxy has dried. I didn't like wall #1 becuase there was too much foam, not enough rock, the rocks wiggled/fell out after the zip ties were cut, and the rocks were kind of plain, not much dimension. Since I didn't like it I salvaged the rocks and threw away the rest. Time for try #2:
Notice the cool rocks!
After foaming and trimming:
Today I completed the epoxy/sand part of the rock and foam wall and let me say that it was a MESS! The epoxy stinks far worse than silicon and sticks to EVERYTHING! I did a good job on the wall but it was super messy and trying to get the epoxy off of my hands is/was impossible. If you try this at home make absolutely sure that you have gloves to wear! I thought I did and didn't, then I didn't have any acetone to remove the epoxy and it was just terrible :lol: I ended up using two bottles of nail polish remover and 1/3 of a gallon of white vinegar to get the resin off of me and I still have some that I couldn't get off! It's now hardened and I'm really unsure of what to do.
The wall is no longer in "attack mode" and is safe to handle so I took some pictures. Unfortunately it still stinks terribly so it's going to have to hang out in my garage for a few days instead of being in my house where I can admire it. I'm contemplating soaking it in RODI water until I need to silicon it to the display tank (after stand and canopy are finished) to get any nasty chemicals out of it, though from what I've read it's inert now that the foam and epoxy are dry. I'm not convinced that this was worth all of the trouble, though if I had worn gloves and didn't have a ton of tiny cuts that were still stinging I'd imagine I'd be pretty happy with how the wall turned out. Here's the finished wall. Please note that the zip ties are coming off before I put it in the tank ;)
Despite the heaviness of the rock wall I imagine that the buoyancy of the foam would make the wall float once it's in the tank so to avoid this minor glitch I'm going to silicon the back wall into the tank.
Any thoughts, suggestions, ideas, or comments are appreciated ;)
Standard 10 gallon tank with 10 gallon sump. The display tank has a centered 1" bulkhead on the back wall for a drain and there will be two returns coming up over the top of the tank, no more holes. The sump, also 10 gallons, is baffled into three compartments: equipment, fuge, drain (from L to R). I still need to take a picture of the sump. I picked up a Quiet One 2200 from Howard that I'm going to be using for the return pump and I'll buy a visi-therm heater if and when I need one. The goal is to have quite a bit of flow through this tank. The Quiet One pump starts out at 581 GPH but it will have probably around 4' of head plus a "T" for the returns so even before I use anything to restrict the flow it will be less than 581 GPH, probably somewhere around 350 GPH if not less than that.
Lighting
I was on the fence about what kind of lighting I wanted to use. For a while I thought I might want CF or T5 but then I decided just to copy a friend's idea and used 5 curly Q bulbs, three white and two blues. They're on separate cords so that I can set them to come on at different times. I'll also throw in a moonlight that will stay on all the time for the shimmer effect at night and for more focused blue lighting. There's not really anything interesting to take pictures of with this, there are just 5 bulbs and a bunch of wires right now. Once the canopy is build I will make a reflector out of some aluminum sheets that I have to make my lights more efficient (any ideas about how to make the reflector would be appreciated)
Stand and Canopy
A friend of mine here in Columbia is going to help me build the stand and canopy. The design itself is going to be relatively simple and clean and I will be using furniture grade plywood as well as some oak. The goal is to stain both after they're finished, stain color is undecided. I really liked the idea that ludnix on RC had regarding the use of intarsia for decorating the stand so I ran with that idea. Here's a pic of Ludnix's stand:
Here's the design I'm going to be using. The intarsia will be on the stand door:
Since I'm a bit accident prone I decided to pay someone to do the intarsia for me though I still have the plans if I decide to try my hand at cutting fingers off at a later date. The design will be done sometime in the next week or two :) I'll be sure to post pictures when it gets to me.
Livestock
I'm planning on mostly softies for this tank. The goal is to have it look pretty and grow/fill in fast so that it looks mature pretty quick since it will be in the living room. There will be various zoas/palys in this tank, some daisy polyps, two different leathers (neon green polyped toadstool and green nepthea), mushrooms, cloves, and a few varieties of favia.
I'm not completely sure on my fish list yet though I would like it to be various gobies and blennies. I bought a cave basslet (Liopropoma mowbrayi) a few weeks ago that I would really like to put in the tank but I'm not sure if it is considered big enough for him; I'm having trouble finding information on this species. Here is a list of the fish that I like and are possible candidates for this setup but I know I won't be able to put all of them in there:
- L. mowbrayi - cave basslet
- red headed goby
- clown gobies (preferably one yellow and one green)
- tailspot blenny pair
- trimma gobies (I already have one in the snowflake tank, there are two other species at a LFS)
- neon goby
- tiger goby (little clear fish with black stripes)
I also thought it would be cool to have a few neat hermits in there like a staghorn or other colorful hermits but then I'd have to worry about providing them shells, whether they're going to eat my fish, and if they will decide to make each other/my corals snacks.
Rock Wall
After snooping around in the DIY forum on RC I found that I really like the look of a rock/foam wall so I decided to "steal" another great idea. Since I am using an overflow for the 1" drain in the back of the tank I decided to make the overflow out of eggcrate and rock/foam it as well. It took two tries before I managed to produce a result that I'm proud of. Here's try #1:
After full expansion:
I was also having quite a bit of trouble with the rocks staying in the wall after I removed the zip ties. I haven't removed the zip ties on the second wall yet but the rocks seem sturdier, especially now that the epoxy has dried. I didn't like wall #1 becuase there was too much foam, not enough rock, the rocks wiggled/fell out after the zip ties were cut, and the rocks were kind of plain, not much dimension. Since I didn't like it I salvaged the rocks and threw away the rest. Time for try #2:
Notice the cool rocks!
After foaming and trimming:
Today I completed the epoxy/sand part of the rock and foam wall and let me say that it was a MESS! The epoxy stinks far worse than silicon and sticks to EVERYTHING! I did a good job on the wall but it was super messy and trying to get the epoxy off of my hands is/was impossible. If you try this at home make absolutely sure that you have gloves to wear! I thought I did and didn't, then I didn't have any acetone to remove the epoxy and it was just terrible :lol: I ended up using two bottles of nail polish remover and 1/3 of a gallon of white vinegar to get the resin off of me and I still have some that I couldn't get off! It's now hardened and I'm really unsure of what to do.
The wall is no longer in "attack mode" and is safe to handle so I took some pictures. Unfortunately it still stinks terribly so it's going to have to hang out in my garage for a few days instead of being in my house where I can admire it. I'm contemplating soaking it in RODI water until I need to silicon it to the display tank (after stand and canopy are finished) to get any nasty chemicals out of it, though from what I've read it's inert now that the foam and epoxy are dry. I'm not convinced that this was worth all of the trouble, though if I had worn gloves and didn't have a ton of tiny cuts that were still stinging I'd imagine I'd be pretty happy with how the wall turned out. Here's the finished wall. Please note that the zip ties are coming off before I put it in the tank ;)
Despite the heaviness of the rock wall I imagine that the buoyancy of the foam would make the wall float once it's in the tank so to avoid this minor glitch I'm going to silicon the back wall into the tank.
Any thoughts, suggestions, ideas, or comments are appreciated ;)
