russell13
Active Member
not a build but a rebuild
A good friend of mine has a 300 gallon fish only tank, after the course of a year all the fish he had purchased died on him. He made some pretty bad decisions on livestock . The tank had no circulation, just the return pump moving water. He didn’t have an RODi and was just topping off with tap water every few days. The sump was just bio balls and the return pump.
He came to me and told me he really wanted to turn his tank into a reef tank but didn’t want to break the bank. This is right up my alley cause I’m pretty low budget when I build a tank. We started combing the forums and picking up things here and there to begin the conversion. Slowly but Shirley we started making process
First thing we picked up was an RODI system, looking back I wished we would have drained the tank and completely started it new. But instead we started doing massive water changes and testing. We picked up about 350lbs of live rock cured it and started placing it in the tank. We removed the bio balls and picked up a Skimz kone 204 skimmer. The skimmer wasn’t rated for a tank this size but I got a really good deal on it. He purchased 4 Chinese LED boxes, again not what I would have done but we decided he is only going to have soft coral and a few LPS.
Next I build a refugium out of and old ten gallon glass tank I found on Craigslist for $5. Fitted it with some LED grow light from amazon and set it up to run next to the sump. Also picked up a reactor for running GFO and carbon. Last we installed two 7” filter socks.
Next job was to work on the flow of the tank.
Again didn’t want to break the bank so we picked up so korrillia pumps and I found a Waveline Wavepuck. Now we’ve got the water moving and it’s starting to look like a reef tank.
Then I struck gold......
I found a guy who was moving and needed to get rid of his stuff quick. I went over to check it out and his tank was amazing. I ask about his Apex system and almost fell over when told me the price, $350!!!!!
This was the new version, $799.99 apex with all the probes, an ATK auto top off and the apex feeder. Unfortunately the feeder wouldn’t work on his tank so we ended up selling it but everything else has gone on with ease. We also started running kalk in the ATO to keep the levels up, not a ton of LPS and only two SPS frags so I don’t think we will need to go to two part or a calcium reactor Amy time in the near future.
Also purchased a simplicity 240dc skimmer from him, our sump has three chamber so now we are running two skimmer to take up the bioload. After we had the tank running and stable we started adding livestock. The tank is coming to life, fish are doing great and coral is looking healthy. He is doing a great job with daily maintenance and weekly testing. He got his whole family involved with the tank, I think that a big part of keeping a successful reef tank when you’re a married man with kids.
Not sure what other additions will be coming in the future. Want to get a kalk stirrer and maybe upgrade to something like a 30 gallon refugium. But for now this system should be pretty Rock solid.
Any tips comments or advice is always welcome. More pictures to come in the near future
A good friend of mine has a 300 gallon fish only tank, after the course of a year all the fish he had purchased died on him. He made some pretty bad decisions on livestock . The tank had no circulation, just the return pump moving water. He didn’t have an RODi and was just topping off with tap water every few days. The sump was just bio balls and the return pump.
He came to me and told me he really wanted to turn his tank into a reef tank but didn’t want to break the bank. This is right up my alley cause I’m pretty low budget when I build a tank. We started combing the forums and picking up things here and there to begin the conversion. Slowly but Shirley we started making process
First thing we picked up was an RODI system, looking back I wished we would have drained the tank and completely started it new. But instead we started doing massive water changes and testing. We picked up about 350lbs of live rock cured it and started placing it in the tank. We removed the bio balls and picked up a Skimz kone 204 skimmer. The skimmer wasn’t rated for a tank this size but I got a really good deal on it. He purchased 4 Chinese LED boxes, again not what I would have done but we decided he is only going to have soft coral and a few LPS.
Next I build a refugium out of and old ten gallon glass tank I found on Craigslist for $5. Fitted it with some LED grow light from amazon and set it up to run next to the sump. Also picked up a reactor for running GFO and carbon. Last we installed two 7” filter socks.
Next job was to work on the flow of the tank.
Again didn’t want to break the bank so we picked up so korrillia pumps and I found a Waveline Wavepuck. Now we’ve got the water moving and it’s starting to look like a reef tank.
Then I struck gold......
I found a guy who was moving and needed to get rid of his stuff quick. I went over to check it out and his tank was amazing. I ask about his Apex system and almost fell over when told me the price, $350!!!!!
This was the new version, $799.99 apex with all the probes, an ATK auto top off and the apex feeder. Unfortunately the feeder wouldn’t work on his tank so we ended up selling it but everything else has gone on with ease. We also started running kalk in the ATO to keep the levels up, not a ton of LPS and only two SPS frags so I don’t think we will need to go to two part or a calcium reactor Amy time in the near future.
Also purchased a simplicity 240dc skimmer from him, our sump has three chamber so now we are running two skimmer to take up the bioload. After we had the tank running and stable we started adding livestock. The tank is coming to life, fish are doing great and coral is looking healthy. He is doing a great job with daily maintenance and weekly testing. He got his whole family involved with the tank, I think that a big part of keeping a successful reef tank when you’re a married man with kids.
Not sure what other additions will be coming in the future. Want to get a kalk stirrer and maybe upgrade to something like a 30 gallon refugium. But for now this system should be pretty Rock solid.
Any tips comments or advice is always welcome. More pictures to come in the near future
