125G top to bottom rebuild

Griepp06

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So this is a long story. I have in the last few years had 2 separate saltwater tanks one that ran for nearly 2 years that I shut down in 2022 when my son was born and I got too busy and one I started in January of 2024 when things started to calm down or maybe I just got used to the chaos that is called being a parent. All the while I had bought a 125 gallon tank and stand that needed a lot of work the tank leaked and the stand had water damage and was also stained a horrible color. So while I was still working on my last tank in 2021 I was removing every scrap of silicone that could possibly be the source of the old leak on the tank and then replaced it with new silicone after watching I dont know how many tutorials and reading tons of forum threads on here from people who had also done it. Once it had cured I let it sit in my garage for 8 months from spring till fall making sure the water level never went down and that the colored paper I put under it never showed signs of leaking. right before winter hit MN I drained the tank and put it in my home office where I would have loved to put it but the total weight when finished would have been too much without reinforcing the flooring right below it so it just sat there. I would have finished the tank over the winter of 21/22 right before I shut down my first saltwater tank when my son was born. When the tank was just sitting in the garage to long term leak test it I started working on the stand. It was the original stand that who knows who built and I like the design because it had a large double door section where i could easily later on fit a sump. The doors were busted and the bottom and sides were rotten so I removed the sides and bottom and replaced them with new wood and just because it felt under engineered I added some more lumber anywhere I thought it was lacking. There was never anything on top so I added that and the left to right didn't seem very strong so I clamped all 6 feet of it together and added some 2x4 with 5 inch screws to hold both walls together at the bottom. I also strengthening the corners to increase the downward pressure ability since it was originally just 1" red oak and seemed a little minimal. All in all It is probably way over engineered and nearly double the original weight but I am no longer worried in the slightest is could handle 2000 lbs of water, fish, rock, and equipment. When everything was replaced and strengthened I sanded all the surfaces with a sander and stained it a darker color that I could agree with and put a poly clear over the top of that. Because I didn't have a place for the tank yet since it was going to weigh too much when finished I was not exactly in a hurry to restore and stain the stand so I didn't get to this point until very recently like October of 24. That was because I bought a business in April of 24 that came with an existing office that was pretty small but in October of 24 I was moving my business to a new office location closer to my house and on the ground level with water access which made it a perfect time to finish the stand because I could finally set up the 125 Gallon. I now have the tank and stand moved into my new office and am putting finishing touches on things and getting ready to plum it. I picked up some marco rocks, two 250W heaters, some RO tubing, a bunch of other odds and ends when BRS had their black Friday sale the other day and just doing white HD plumbing since I didn't wanto to spend the extra for red and grey for something nobody will really see. over the last few years I picked up some things used if I saw them hit the local club forum like a 4 bulb 48" T5 set up, a still new somatic 120S skimmer, and a never used but incredibly cracked sapphire 29 sump that I had the cracks acrylic welded and also water tested that in the garage the same time that I was letting the tank sit there. I picked up two off brand 800GPH DC return pumps to total 1600GPH if at 100% and I will be taking a lot of stuff off of my 40G that I am shutting down to put the fish and corals from that into this. I have the Hydros 4 with three power strips that control water changes, automatic feedings, current T5s turning on and off and a dosing pump that I use for dosing Tropic Marin. All that will get moved over and then I am going to reuse the rock structure that I made since it was a negative space that I put a lot of work into making I am going to put a bristle worm trap to see if I ever got any worms in the last year and if I did I will at the very least clean it with RO water and bleach to kill anything that might be hiding in the rockwork. If i don't catch anything in the trap I will just throw caution to the wind and put it straight in the new tank. Going from 40 gallons to 125 the current aquascape will not be enough so that why i bought more and I have learned more about how to build a negative space better and am going to give it another shot to make something even nicer I am going to attach all the pictures that I have that have brought me to now and keep things updated for how my office lobby tank is turning out and if you read all the way to here wow you have patience and I appreciate you sticking around.
 
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Griepp06

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Here are some pictures of the progress over the last few years with the last one being from yesterday.
 

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Griepp06

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With a larger tank I will need a larger mixing station and I found the 150 gallon water tank on marketplace for only $40 wow that was a deal. I also pulled the tank off of the stand to finish the trim and paint the back black.
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Griepp06

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Finished the last bit of trim on the stand and clear coating that trim. I also got some black paint and did the back of the tank in a few coats and started to plan how I am going to run my plumbing. I want to make sure I have access to the back of the tank but did not like big gap but I had these corner shelves just lying around I was given but did not know what to do with them. They finally have a use and look pretty good on each side while also hiding the gap I think.
 

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Griepp06

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So i picked up about 70 lbs or dry rock rock with the goal doing a negative space. I attempted a negative space a year ago with my 40 gallon and realized I could have done a lot better. I am going see if I can reuse the aquascape from the 40 or if it just doesn’t match I will break it apart and start from scratch. I got the tank up on the stand with the help of my neighbor and started making out and cutting pipe for the overflow and return. I went to Home Depot and got some 20 inch shelf angles and some shelf track which means I have a lot of adjustability for where the T5s end up above the tank and thinking of putting an actual shelf up there for a few tank related fun items but that will be later.
 

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Griepp06

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Took me a good chunk of the day so thankfully I didn’t have a lot of client requests but after fitting and double and triple checking everything fit I cemented the PVC in place with some unions when there were angles. I did have one mistake but was able to salvage it and should be leak testing starting tomorrow. After getting the T5s hung yesterday I tested them out while I was plumbing everything.
 

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Griepp06

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I filled the tank to leak test my plumbing job and had a small leak in my PVC and was able to get that fixed pretty easily. I turned the pumps on and added some citric acid powder and let that run through the system for a few days to clean everything and then drained it and used the lefter citric acid to scrub everything down for anything the pumps missed. I want this tank to be a bit more organized than my current 40 gallon with controllers just laying around so using a 1/4” white plastic sheet I had lying around I made a board to mount the technology like my hydros 4X, the return pump controllers, the MP10 controllers, and the hydros power strips. I have been playing around with the new aquascape and wanting something that is functional for fish habitat but also leaning in the NSA direction and this is what I have come up with so far. It is still a work in progress but I like the direction it is going. I cleaned out the water tank just need to leak test it and make sure that the tank was fully cleaned with some sort of water test. I noticed there was a hole behind the tank where the thermostat used to be and realized it would be a perfect place to run the AWC 1/4” hoses through since the water tanks are in the HVAC room wall. I really want everything set up before the end of the year as far as saltwater in the tank and pumps running. Fish won’t be in it but the heavy lifting hopefully done and I feel like I am getting very close.
 

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Griepp06

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Well I think I succeeded in my goal for finishing this before the end of 2024. It is not 100% done, but everything else is just minor things like finishing the doors, placing in the in there, and moving the corals and fish from the old tank. But the big stuff is done and tons of the minor things I didn’t think would be an issue. I moved my water filtration system from my house over to my office and found out the water pressure in my office is not that great so I had to pick up a smart buddy booster pump, but it was on sale at the time And I really like that it flushes out the membrane on its own, so I don’t have to remember to do that. I scrubbed down the inside of the 150 gallon tub that I’m going to use for salt water and then found a used 100 gallon tank that I’m going to use for filtered water. I wanted to do something fancy where the pumps were on the outside, able to move water from one tank to the other, but since they are in a very confined space in the HVAC closet, there was not really any room for anything on the outside, so I just went with a in tank pump for each of them that I think turned out pretty good. I used JB weld waterweld, and BRS superglue and Insta-set for attaching the new Aquascape with egg crate for the feet so it doesn’t scratch the glass on the bottom. I don’t have a picture of it yet since it is still in the works, but I’m going to have a taller than everything arch just for a few corals that like higher par. Water is in the tank with no leaks lights are mounted at the correct height water is currently filtering into the storage tanks. I just need to get my corals and fish out of the current 40 gallon so that I am in the clear for removing the Hydros controller that monitors and controls a good portion of the tank. I am using my 3D printer and the body of a old skimmer to make a kalk reactor but who knows if that will work just an idea since I had it lying around and I have a 3D printer. I also used my 3D printer to make this catch cup for putting in and taking out the wet sides of my MP10s so that I don’t have to put my hands in the tank meaning it is more likely I will actually take them out and clean them. My big goal was to get water in everything and ready to be placed in before the end of the year and I think I accomplished that. Let me know what you think and happy new year!
 
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Got back from vacation on Monday pretty late and just been too exhausted to do much of anything this week. I did borrow a par meter from someone in the local club and found out my T5's were not putting out as much PAR as what I needed. I am putting out 150 par at the top of my tallest aquascape and that isn't going to be enough for the few SPS that I wanted there. I am mostly doing LPS and softies but want a few of the simpler SPS like a green slimer and a anacropora. So I am looking at either a Kessil or one of these strips that look like T5's to up the PAR by at least a further 100 in just select areas where I am planning on SPS. I quit the plan to turn the old skimmer body into a Kalk reactor since I found on marketplace a 8" acrylic tube that will work much better and still using my 3D printer to make some of the pieces. I also don't like the placement of the tech board down under the tank since it makes it difficult to get down there and turn things off while at the same time I don't like being able to see behind the tank with the 11" gap to the wall. Two birds one stone I am going to take a board leftover from the stand top and stain it the same color and cover up the gap behind the tank and mount all my tech to those boards as I need one on each side. I have also decided to go with a fuge instead of the skimmer so I am going to be selling that and getting a fuge light since most of the skimmers on the market are too tall to fit in my sump with the 7" gap I have from the top of the sump and the bottom of the top lip of the stand and I hate the smell of a dirty skimmer bowl. I drained everything of water one last time and am filling them all up with RODI water right now. So that's 125G tank, 32G sump, 100G ATO, and 150G salt premixed all with a 75G per day filter. So I should have all of them filled after little over 5 days. I have placed my first order of corals and a fish which will get delivered on the 27th. I would normally buy things local but there was a website that was doing a huge new years sale and there were a few corals that I knew I wanted so I took the jump. That officially put me on the clock to get all my cycled live rock and sand from my old system into the new one. T minus 17 days and counting.
 
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Well I had a set back that I was not counting on. The egg crate top that I have won’t let enough light in for the few SPS I am getting. I was at 215 par with them on and 405 with them off but I still wanted a cover so fish don’t jump out. When I bought the tank used it had a canopy that was in really rough shape that has been sitting in my garage for the last 3 years. It was too short to fit lights at the 9” above the water I needed so if it was going to be used it had to be modified so back into woodworking mode I went except this time I am on a time crunch wish corals less than 2 weeks away. So I brought it in from the garage and broke it down to the individual boards and sanded them down to bare wood. I went and got a sheet of pine plywood so I could replace the height portion with something taller and then put it back together and then figured out a way to mount the T5s to this new system. Originally I had 4- 60” bulbs but I added 2 more to total 6 but the tank is 72” meaning there was areas with no light so I staggered them with 2 bulbs in each section overlapping each other. Now the entire 72” have bulbs over it. I also found a local cabinet maker that retired and had some doors still in his workshop and bought them so I didn’t have even more on my plate. The doors don’t match the stand fully but they still look good and once stained you won’t notice the style difference. I am going to try and get everything stained this weekend. Just to be on the safe side since I bought most of the Marco rock used I am curing it in a storage container in my closet and will pull that out next week. Everything is coming together and can’t wait for this to be done.
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So yesterday I pulled all of the rock from the 40 gallon and half of the water as well. My first attempt at doing a NSA didn't go so well for being structural because as soon as i started trying to take it out it fell apart. I knew that I didn't do a great job back then but I honestly figured it would hold a little better than that. So since the aquascape fell apart I did not put it in the main tank but I still need all of the live bacteria colonies inside it so i just stuffed it in the sump for now and when my dry rock starts looking a little more live I will take it out of the sump and put it back together a little better this time. I also took the Hydro's and all the sensors off the tank and brought that over to the office but it did it not like being moved and did not want to connect to WIFI at first. Today I woke up early and took the fish and the few corals I have out and drained the rest of the water and got as much sand as I could from the 40 gallon. I brought everything over to my office in the 125 gallon and drip acclimated the fish to the temperature of the new tank. I added the sand to the tank but will need to get some more since 3 feet of 1.5" deep sand does not help as much now that the tank is 6 feet long. Once the fish had been acclimated for a while I added them to the tank and started hooking up the Hydro's that was being very stubborn at the start. I want to keep as much of the tech outside of the tank and on display this time that way I can see right away if a pump starts leaking or if something else fails. I have these corner shelves that I am going to put everything on but there is not enough cord for some of the sensors to go from one side to the other so I needed to order some extensions that wont get here till next week. In the mean time I hooked up the 1/4 tubing to all the pumps and tried put them behind the tank hoping that would work for now and of course what i didn't want to have happen happened. The ATO pump line was not seated fully and sprung a leak soaking up the carpet. I don't have a way to easily get under the tank so thankfully it was RODI and didn't have any salt in it. I unplugged all the pumps and am just going to have to manually do top offs for the next week. The fact that pretty much everything is put together and there at the very least is a giant load off my shoulders. I have a few sensors getting delivered later this weeks so i know when the water in the bins is getting low so that is not a guessing game of do I have water for the ATO and AWC pumps. I also just got delivered the Weld on 4 and started building my DIY kalk reactor. I bought 2 flat 10" round 1/4 acrylic and found on facebook marketplace a 8" acrylic tube that is 26" tall. Way overkill compared to any kalk reactor I have seen on the market but it should be pretty cool and very rarely need to be filled up. I stopped by Petco while they are having the 50% tank sale and picked up a 10 gallon tank for my QT system for anything i get from now on. I have a few corals and a fish that are getting delivered Monday and for what I have in there already it is what it is but I want to make sure that I don't introduce anything new that may be out there. That is all that i have done in the last few days to finally get me to a point that I can look at the tank with a few corals and my fish and everyone looks happy and not stressed. With moving everything around I come to realize I have a really bad vermetidae snail problem that was clogging up my pumps and didn't even notice. Removing everything and moving it to a new tank I cleaned everything but I think I am going to get some bumblebee snails to eat the ones on the live rock. My only casualties were I lost a few of my Cowries so I will have to get some more but the bumblebees may get eaten also so maybe I will go with something else for my CUC. Well that is it for now I will post the pictures in a moment.
 
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Griepp06

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Nice looking tank and cabinet.
Thanks as you can see it was a lot of work to restore the tank so it would hold water and the cabinet was a woodworking project that took forever. Since I am a bit of a perfectionist I notice the minor flaws in the cabinet but just the fact it is all there makes me really not care if the trim isn’t 100% or you can see the brad nail holes up close.
 

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