A garbage can full of milk...

[AlexKintner]

...as described by my 17 year old son. These are the humble beginnings of my first saltwater aquarium in 20+ years.

More to come

 

[T-J]

Is it a garbage can full of dry rock that you didn't rinse?

 

[F i s h y]

From the depths of darkness (and cloudiness) come beautiful things...

 

[Peace River]

Good luck and welcome back to the adventure (whatever is lurking in there!).

 

[AlexKintner]

Is it a garbage can full of dry rock that you didn't rinse?

Close... it's a garbage can full of thoroughly rinsed Marco Rock (more on that later), and some not-so-thoroughly rinsed Marco sand. Man, that stuff is silty!

 

[AlexKintner]

From the depths of darkness (and cloudiness) come beautiful things...

Thanks... that's the plan!

The 'milk' picture is from back in October. I'll follow up in a bit with a current FTS.

 

[AlexKintner]

Good luck and welcome back to the adventure (whatever is lurking in there!).

Thank you!

Here's what I found lurking after the milk cleared up...

 

[AlexKintner]

Current FTS...

This was taken about 10 weeks after the rock/sand entered the Brute trash can.

Tank: Fiji Cube 32
Stand: IM APS
Sump: Eshopps RS-75
Lights: ReefBreeder Photon 16-V2
Return: IM Might Jet Midsize
Powerhead: IM AquaGadget
ATO: Tunze 3155
RODI: BRS 5-Stage Premium Plus 75
Aquascape: MarcoRock (Reef Saver, shelf, foundation, rubble, E-Marco 400 and sand) + a couple pieces of liverock rubble from the local LFS

I was inspired by about 85 different builds on here. The wealth of knowledge and creativity to be found on R2R is unmatched. Thank you to everyone who contributes their hard work.

This build is fairly modest and low tech, but hopefully it can be helpful to folks that are just starting out. I'll fill in the progression details below.

 

[AlexKintner]

Rewinding a bit...

This project got off to a bit of a rocky start. I originally ordered an IM Nuvo Ext 40 from @MarineDepot. Unfortunately the tank arrived (via UPS) looking like this:

Marine Depot customer support was very responsive and shipped out a new tank the following day... this time with a private shipping company. The second tank arrived a couple weeks later, and things looked promising as I saw the box securely wrapped on a pallet. My hopes were soon dashed however when I opened the box to reveal:

There was discussion of a third attempt, but ultimately it was decided that this simply wasn't meant to be... and a refund was offered. As a much appreciated gesture, @MarineDepot said go ahead and keep the stand.

Here's our free (yet lonely) IM APS stand:

As you could imagine, this was all a big bummer and ate up the better part of a month. On the positive side, I was really happy with the service I received from @MarineDepot and very much appreciate the complimentary stand. It also allowed the Marco Rock some extra time to stew out back.

Onward...

 

[eggplantparrot]

ouch, really wasn't meant to be...

 

[MNFish]

As you could imagine, this was all a big bummer and ate up the better part of a month. On the positive side, I was really happy with the service I received from @MarineDepot and very much appreciate the complimentary stand. It also allowed the Marco Rock some extra time to stew out back.

Onward...

Way to stick with it, this can be a very frustrating hobby sometimes. The new tank looks great!

 

[MrBubble47]

What corals do you plan on growing? Soft, sps, lps or a mix?

 

[AlexKintner]

Are you too busy if you don't have time to update your reef tank build thread? Ok... where was I?

Oh yeah, the first two tanks were DOA. Now I need to find a 24x20 external overflow tank to sit on the IM APS stand. @BRS to the rescue with a FIJI 32.

Perfect fit... and all in one piece!

 

[AlexKintner]

Way to stick with it, this can be a very frustrating hobby sometimes. The new tank looks great!

Thanks!

What corals do you plan on growing? Soft, sps, lps or a mix?

This will be softy/lps for the foreseeable future. I'm really trying to keep it simple with minimal equipment and forgiving livestock.

 

[AlexKintner]

I'm messing up the timeline a bit... but here's a shot of the aquascape in progress...

It's Marco Rock across the board... regular reef saver, shelf, base, rubble and E-Marco 400 to hold it all together. As you can see in the background, we even tried to hide some of the patchwork with Marco Bahama Aragonite sand. This worked reasonable well, but some of it washed away once submerged.

I did this with my son, and we really didn't have much of a plan. We just wanted to make something cool with lots of hiding places for fish. I'm not sure it's the best scape for mounting corals, but it is without a doubt Royal Gramma paradise. More on that later...

 

[CMMorgan]

...as described by my 17 year old son. These are the humble beginnings of my first saltwater aquarium in 20+ years.

More to come

Based on that description... how could I not click? I do find it ironic that you from "Clear"water though.

 

[AlexKintner]

Based on that description... how could I not click? I do find it ironic that you from "Clear"water though.

Ha! How did I miss the irony?

Love the pie chart... very accurate indeed.

 

[AlexKintner]

A little bit of plumbing work next...

As you can see I went with hard plumbing on the drains and hard/soft combo on the split return. First time I've done this, so I was really happy with the way it turned out. Nice flow, very quiet and no leaks. Since this picture was taken I have:

• Added a union to the e-drain
• Added some strapping to support the hard plumbing
• Replaced the sock with Red Sea cup and poly fill
• Replaced the Eheim 2100 (too powerful/noisy) with the MightyJet

 

[RobB'z Reef]

Close... it's a garbage can full of thoroughly rinsed Marco Rock (more on that later), and some not-so-thoroughly rinsed Marco sand. Man, that stuff is silty!

up here in wisconsin we buy our sand in the summer cuz it's too butt *** cold to stand around outside and flush it out in 5 gallon pails haha