150 Gallon build

[Shameless_Dood]

Well pulled the trigger on a new tank this weekend. I had been in discussions with a tank builder the last couple of weeks and had everything all planned out for a 120. Before I called them and paid for it, I went to a LFS that normally has a large selection of tanks just for one last look. Sure enough, they had a 150 Marineland 48X24X30 corner overflow for 100 less than I was going to pay for the 120 and I got 10 percent discount. I'm not crazy about the corner overflow, it's going along the wall in the picture, I really wanted to minimize any equipment I see with this build. But I guess there's benefits to being able to see the overflow if the pump performance is starting to suffer etc. I'm sure I'll find a way to hide it.

So let the madness begin! Next weekend is building a stand and painting the back.

 

[143MPCo]

Good luck with the build out, following.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Cool! Following!

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Got the back painted this weekend took me several coats before it was nice and even with no little specs of light shining through. I doubt anyone would ever see them, but I knew they were there and it would bug me. Besides I had more than enough paint so whatever. The stand will have to wait, I didn't realize how much other crud I had going on this weekend.

I am thinking about doubling up the drain in the overflow and running the return elsewhere. There's 2 holes drilled for 1 inch bulkheads currently. Wouldn't mind having the extra capacity on the drain, just not sure I can fit two sets of plumbing in there. We'll see how that plays out later.

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Framed out the stand this week, then found out I made it too short for the sump I wanted and still be able to work on it comfortably. So I rebuilt that, it's taller than I wanted now, especially when we're seated in the living room...but it should make up for it since it'll be easier to work on...and then....the 40g breeder I bought less than 2 hours prior on the $1 a gallon sale broke....I was moving things around to make room and stack things nice and neat....and it broke. Have no idea how, but it broke. At least it's only $40 bucks.

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Finally had a bunch of days off and could get some work done! I took advantage of BRS's double reward points last week, bought 110 pounds of pukani, vectra m1, and a couple random plumbing parts. BTW, BRS did a great job packing the rock, doesn't look like I have a single casualty..but OMG I am still finding packing peanuts at random places in the house!! Bought a stock tank from Tractor Supply and started the cure the other day in the garage. Going to need to add another cheap heater or two, with the cooler temp in the garage it's just not getting that water above 72.



Got the stand wrapped with Birch plywood as well. The cabinet doors still need some adjustment to fit right, I fought with getting the hinges right (well close to right) for a couple days. Going to buy some other trim pieces to hide the imperfections and ugly edges of the plywood and wood filler to hide the screws. I started to use the paint I used to paint the back of the aquarium but I'm going to go back and get gloss instead of flat. Next up is bribing a couple guys from work help get the tank on the stand.



Hope everyone had a good thanks giving!

 

[Reefermatt3]

I love the build and how you are taking your time... I was a little impatient! Any update?

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Not really, we're travelling for the holidays so I'm not going to really set anything up before we go. I trust my current tank to be on autopilot while we're gone, but not a new one. After the first of the year it's going to be fast and furious! The rock will have been curing for 6 weeks by then (probably closer to 2 months by the time I get everything else shipped here and built).

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Well it is finally running and I have not been doing a good job of keeping up with this thread up to date so here goes.

February 20th, I started filling the tank with water. My plan was to fill it as much as I could then aquascape it. By this point, my rock had been curing for a little over 12 weeks and I had been ghost feeding it here and there. I didn't want to loose what beneficial bacteria had built up on the rock.



While my RO unit was working overtime, I built out my sump. I am going the Triton method on this tank so the refugium is before the skimmer (Skimz SM201 - I wanted the DC version but ordered the wrong one. By the time I realized my mistake, I decided it wasn't worth loosing the 10x points I got on the brs r2r group by and paying shipping back so I kept it.) Plumbed in my vectra m1, herbie drain, and made some stands / screens out of a light diffuser. The idea with those screens is to keep the macro algae out of the places I don't want it.







Next I built out the canopy for the lighting. I went old school with metal halides / t5, I know people are having success with led's, but after all the struggles I had with the other tank, I wanted to go with something that has a long track record of success and my wallet hurt just looking at the radions. I'm running 250w radiums with 2 ATI Aquablue Special right now. Eventually it will be Aquablue special and Blue Plus, but I broke the Blue Plus (funny thing, t5's don't react well if you drop a cordless drill on them) and then I bought the wrong one at the store.



As the tank got full (lots of mixing 10 gallons of salt at a time, should a picked up at least a 20 a the $1 a gallon sale for mixing) I started aquascaping. I used the Aquascape Fix from Fauna Marine. This stuff is pretty awesome, took me a little bit to figure out how to use it. Works better if you fashion it around your rocks like hooks, stays more stable while it hardens. I also figured out while it's hardening, take some of the rubble you have an embed it in the joint, it will hide the joint really well.

My aquascaping did not turn out how I wanted it. I had one piece of rock that was really long (almost 24 inches) and was kind of mushroom shaped. I wanted to turn that into a tower for one side of the tank with some smaller rocks in the sand around it, then do a standard mountain on the other side. When I tried to cut that mushroom shaped piece to make a flat bottom it fell apart. There was no way it was going to be stable even after gluing it to the glass. I cut it down some more to be stable, then when I put it in the tank it wasn't tall enough to look right. After a full panic of what plan B was....I ended up with this.



It turned out ok, just not what I wanted. I made a second arch in the middle, but it shifted after I put it in and didn't catch it so you can't quite tell it's there.

It sat like that for about 3 weeks, ghost fed most of that time. After I put the sand in and I took out a rock and put in the rock from my older tank that was almost 4 years old. Also moved over my Gyre XF 130 and cranked it up to full speed. Also attached the MP40. Then moved the survivors from my other tank over. This is what it looks like as of today, ignore the diatom bloom I'm currently having. HA!




My sump needs some work, it's a lot more of a cable mess than I wanted. Same with the halide ballasts on top of the canopy. As time started running short, things started getting connected and put together anyway they would fit. I can't stand a half finished project when I have everything I need to finish it. I'm back to work tomorrow, but next set of days off is going to be some serious cable management, then you'll get some pictures of that!

Will be purchasing first batch of a bunch of fish Sunday (most likely), went "pre-shopping" today. That store is a little farther away, but they do have a good selection of fish and good prices.

So tell me what you think, any suggestions, ideas, comments, tell me I'm an idiot, whatever!

 

[Shameless_Dood]

I've decided, I'm going to use this more as a diary for myself so I can see the progress, I think we all don't notice our changes from day to day.

So was able to get some cable management done, it's still a little sloppy for my taste. Part of the problem is I didn't plan out that refugium light very well. I just thought "oh I'll use the 24 inch t5's from the old tank, no sense in buying a new fixture." Well that created a little bit of a mess. The only benefit is there's a little bit of a shelf to keep wires up high. When I get the controller (which needs to happen fairly soon I've decided), I'm aiming to clean it all up even more.



One design flaw in my stand is I didn't give it any ports to breath. I should have left the entire back panel off of it, but it's way too late to do anything about it now. I've had to keep the door cracked and a clip on fan inside running, otherwise you open the cabinet and it's hot humid air hits you right in the face. I also put a couple fans in the canopy, they have helped, but I don't think they are pulling as much fresh air in as I would like. I will need to make a plan and get a hole saw to cut some holes for some fans, maybe some Icecaps. The highest the temp gets is 81 in the evening and I keep the house fairly warm anyway. I don't mind 81, but I'd prefer 80 as a max.

Meanwhile, life seems to have taken off in my refugium. I never noticed too much in the other tank, this is the same clump of cheato, but it has lots of pods in it now.





Have a Triton test coming this week so we'll get an initial idea of where I'm at. I am having some trouble dialing in the correct dosage of Triton Elements to maintain 8dkh, all that's in there right now is the coraline from the old tank (and a cheap $10 monti frag I couldn't resist when I bought some clean up crew the other day), and it keeps dropping. I keep adding more but can't seem to get it to stabilize. My goal is to get that locked in this week.

Tank is in that "I'm still new so I'm going to look like crap" stage. Had some dino's show up, initially it looked like a second round of diatoms, but then I saw the air bubbles caught in it. Dosing some vibrant, already seems to be helping, it worked on my other tank. If it doesn't work this time, I will do the black out thing.

 

[AntarcticIkeelu]

Good progress, got the exact same tank myself and I'm glad I bought it. Good amount of space for both low and high placement corals

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Good progress, got the exact same tank myself and I'm glad I bought it. Good amount of space for both low and high placement corals

Thanks, I am definitely looking forward to coral stocking that is for sure.

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Got my Triton results back this week. I was pleasantly surprised, after hearing all the complaints about the Aquaforest salts, I was half expecting just about everything to be completely out of whack, but it wasn't. I'm not really seeing anything I'm going to completely stress over right now. There's a couple things that are a smidge high or a smidge low, but for right now I'm not going to chase the "magic" numbers.

Had cyano take off big time over the last couple weeks. Dosed 4 days of MB7 and it's about 80 percent gone. As a side note it's always funny to me the responses you can read about battling cyano. More Flow! Feed Less! Reduce your photoperiod! No one ever suggests, take a breath figure out what it's feeding on and attack that. On new tanks, my theory is many times it's a bacterial imbalance. Since cyano can use nitrogen, it's simply out-competing the other bacteria we want and becoming the dominant form. I wrongly thought Vibrant could have taken care of this one until I got reminded there's a carbon source in it. (well duh, you're just feeding that bacteria now). Not saying I won't use that stuff again, it was just the wrong tool for my situation.

Have a couple fish in QT, using TTM. Just a couple firefish because they are the wife's favorite and I needed to get something in the tank shes interested in. Luckily I caught it, but the heater failed in the tank those guys are in right now. I was about to head off to bed and noticed the temp was about 88. ouch. Took the heater out, put an airstone in and hoped for the best. Woke up this morning and they seem to be doing ok. I have one more heater laying around but I am not sure of it's condition as it's super old. Hoping it still works, they are all set to be transferred again tomorrow afternoon.

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Having some weirdness going on the last week or so. Started with a slight haze. Was noticing some bubbles getting sucked into the return so I modified that with an elbow on the intake. Still had a haze, started some GAC (it was about time anyway). Haze some lessened somewhat, but now the skimmer is going craaaaazy. Almost like I put chemiclean in it or something. Alk was raising too and has gotten a little high for my liking. I stopped dosing my Triton Elements and it's still a little high. The one cheap monitpora frag I bought is not happy, but probably due to the alk swing. So I'm trying to not to overreact and cause more issues.

Meanwhile fish finished QT this morning and into the display they went. They adapted nicely and are swimming in the current feeding on things in the water column.



and the clowns wanted their picture taken too.

 

[Shameless_Dood]

I have been seriously lacking in taking care of this....but if I update I get me a banner so here goes!

Picked up 14 frags from Unique Corals over the 4th of July sale. They are all doing pretty good and was impressed with the corals I received. I wish I could give the names, but I bought packs and I'm not all that good and remembering what I bought....I've noticed an ALK drop the last few days so that's a good sign.

So here's the eye candy....



I also had (keyword) 3 different QT systems for fish going with 9 different fish from an online vendor. They all got a pre-emptive strike of Safety Stop bath but I'm still loosing them one by one. I'm suspecting flukes, caught one of the tangs scratching the gills 2 days ago. Treated with prazi. I suspected one of the tangs with a bacteria infection when I got him, but since he's been in QT, if anyone comes close to the tank he's takes off hiding. Confirmed that suspicion today so everyone is getting treated....I'm on a scorched earth plan to get these fish healthy! At this point though, I am not positive I can get them to pull through. Time will tell!

 

[Pickleowl]

Hey Dood! Could you give me the dimensions of your sump,, more specifically size of each section and baffle height?

I'm making my own from a 40 breeder Triton method and am getting ideas so I would like to hear your thoughts on yours.. thanks

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Hey Dood! Could you give me the dimensions of your sump,, more specifically size of each section and baffle height?

I'm making my own from a 40 breeder Triton method and am getting ideas so I would like to hear your thoughts on yours.. thanks

Sure thing, I don't remember off the top of my head exactly what it is, but I'll measure it for you when I get home this evening. I will tell you this, I worked from right to left (looking at my pictures) when determining the size of the sections. So I figured out what the size of the return pump was, rounded up to the nearest inch. Measured a reasonable baffle width to catch any bubbles from the skimmer. Got the skimmer footprint then measured that and rounded up to the nearest inch. Whatever was left was the fuge section. I was killing myself trying to determine the fuge size first then making room for the other stuff, couldn't get the math to work right for me. If I remember correctly, the fuge section ended up being on the low end of the recommendation. I probably could have made the fuge section an inch taller without risking a flood when all the pumps are turned off, but better safe than sorry.

 

[Pickleowl]

Thanks for the info.. I'm going thru the same thing, trying to get my fuge right then fitting everything else in like you did..
Was there much consideration for your return side and volume of water it held? Or was it simply make it just a little bit bigger than the pump?

 

[Shameless_Dood]

Thanks for the info.. I'm going thru the same thing, trying to get my fuge right then fitting everything else in like you did..
Was there much consideration for your return side and volume of water it held? Or was it simply make it just a little bit bigger than the pump?

The return section is 4 1/2 wide. The water level sits at 7 1/2. 2.67 gallons of water.

Skimmer section is a little over 12 inches (usable space is about 10 1/2 because of that baffle), water level is at 10 inches, 9.48 gallons

Fug is 18 1/2 with a water level of 12 inches for 17.5 gallons

If I plugged the numbers in all correctly (big if, I was doing it quick) the fuge is right at 12.5 percent of my water volume of 140.

There wasn't much consideration of that, obviously the smaller it is the more stable the salinity when the top off unit runs, but IMO that's not a huge deal at this water volume, takes a lot of water to make a noticeable difference.

The main thing when I laid this is out was to 1. Fit everything that needed to go in there. and 2. I wanted the whole system as silent as it could be (We all got tired of the water running sound of the last tank). So I kept the overflows the width of that 40 breeder, I could have laid out an L shaped fuge, sacrificed some room in the other two sections and still fit everything. But I wanted the long overflows, less chance of water sloshing. The only water we hear now is a trickle when the top off unit runs. and my vectra M1 is running full blast

 

[Pickleowl]

Awesome, thank you for all that info, much appreciated! What did you mean by "kept the overflows the width of the breeder"?

I need a return pump and am just starting to look at them,, how do you like the M1?