A Sketchy Build Thread (fatc)

[Reefer Reboot]

Aha, now I get it. Perhaps I can save you a little frustration by learning from my past mistakes. A few people have asked how I keep the loose chaeto from going over the overflow.
Simple answer is, "water in = water out". If all the water movement is created by pumping water in from another chamber, then all that moving water has to ultimately exit the chaeto chamber, taking the loose chaeto with it. In my diagram you can see that although my powerhead pump is within the previous chamber (which keeps the intake free of loose chaeto), the addition of using eductors picks up water from within the chaeto chamber and keeps a circular flow within that chamber. This keeps the ball rolling and tightly packed. Now does that mean that no little loose piece of chaeto ever breaks free? Of course not. Self admittedly, I do use a piece of large open pore cell foam across the outflow baffle. The loose pieces snag onto the foam and gradually grow out back across the top of the water with the current, which makes it real easy to grab and remove.
Your way will work also, and better, if you add an eductor or two onto the outlet of the bypass going into the chaeto chamber. (I was actually teeing off from my return line instead of a powerhead in the video but changed it since.)
Hope this helps you, (and I think I just used up my allotment of words today). ;Stop;Writing

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Okay, lets throw a little plumbing on the back of this for the next contest entry.

I even took an actual picture during build up.

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Plumbing in the DIY flow diverter device which gradually alternates the flow from one side of the tank to the other in one minute intervals.
An actual picture,

and as an added bonus, a video from the DIY thread!;Smuggrin

Now it's time to put in the last entry into the REEFTIDE'S DREAM TANK GIVEAWAY.

 

[Sebastiancrab]

Commercial break, this is for the Hanna Instruments' GREAT SUMMER GIVEAWAY!!

Love Excel! That is a first I have seen here. You have made my day reading your thread. Too funny! And the plumbing has blown me away!

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Hhmmmm, I seemed to have been kinda' slipping on this. (Maybe because it reminds me of homework!;Sour) But with all of the currently running contests I guess I'll just have to do this. So....
for the "October 2020 Reef2Reef Site Supporter Giveaway!", the "Noopsyche's Halloween Giveaway!! Join the spooky fun and WIN a light for your reef!!" and the "Reef Chasers 40 Days of Reefsgiving!! WIN a Red Sea XL 525 (valued at $3,000+)!!" contests, I give you.... ;Nailbiting.... an added manifold! (the white PVC part) Whoopi whoopie wee wee!;Yawn;Shamefullyembarrased

I know, I know. That was totally anticlimactic! Just be glad you weren't one of my teachers who gave me homework. Can you just imagine the "Stuff" I made them read?

 

[tbrown]

Hhmmmm, I seemed to have been kinda' slipping on this. (Maybe because it reminds me of homework!;Sour) But with all of the currently running contests I guess I'll just have to do this. So....
for the "October 2020 Reef2Reef Site Supporter Giveaway!", the "Noopsyche's Halloween Giveaway!! Join the spooky fun and WIN a light for your reef!!" and the "Reef Chasers 40 Days of Reefsgiving!! WIN a Red Sea XL 525 (valued at $3,000+)!!" contests, I give you.... ;Nailbiting.... an added manifold! (the white PVC part) Whoopi whoopie wee wee!;Yawn;Shamefullyembarrased

I know, I know. That was totally anticlimactic! Just be glad you weren't one of my teachers who gave me homework. Can you just imagine the "Stuff" I made them read?

"And for this week's essay on 'What is your favorite color...'" 13 pages later I'm pretty sure the answer was yellow.

 

[Reefer Reboot]

?! ?!;Facepalm

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Arrgh, long day, got a half hour left to get this in for the "Reef Chasers 40 Days of Reefsgiving!!" contest.
Added in a built in venturi vacuum system.

And an xray view to better understand.

Return flow is diverted through the venturi (coming in from the right side) by opening the bottom left ball valve. A vacuum hose is attached to the upper left ball valve. Water is filtered by the lawn sprinkler filter before being drawn through the venturi. 3...2...1....times up, gotta enter.

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Well, it's been a while but there are enough contest going right now for me to add another installment of this drivel. Lets add an ATO set up to this this build.

I had to figure worst case scenario,... return pump dies, DT drains to sump, ATO pump gets stuck on further filling sump,... it might just be enough to overflow the sump. As fate would have it, there was a hole drilled in the back of the sump tank when I bought it so I plumbed in a line for the water to go back to the ATO reservoir if it ever gets to near capacity. If the unthinkable were to happen, that should keep it from over flowing the sump. Granted it would reduce the salinity a bit but 13 gallons of RODI into a 250 gallon system shouldn't be a death sentence. Now... got to find those contest threads again.

 

[RobB'z Reef]

Well, it's been a while but there are enough contest going right now for me to add another installment of this drivel. Lets add an ATO set up to this this build.

I had to figure worst case scenario,... return pump dies, DT drains to sump, ATO pump gets stuck on further filling sump,... it might just be enough to overflow the sump. As fate would have it, there was a hole drilled in the back of the sump tank when I bought it so I plumbed in a line for the water to go back to the ATO reservoir if it ever gets to near capacity. If the unthinkable were to happen, that should keep it from over flowing the sump. Granted it would reduce the salinity a bit but 13 gallons of RODI into a 250 gallon system shouldn't be a death sentence. Now... got to find those contest threads again.

About time I was about to send an inquiry to your local coroner

 

[Reefer Reboot]

The coroner just knocked on my coffin lid and woke me up so I guess I might as well make another installment here. (Plus there's room for more entries into the contests.) By now I have no idea of where I'm at chronologically but I did find an old UV filter, changed some stuff around and installed it.

 

[Reefer Reboot]

More contests to enter, more drivel to write, but at this point I've even bored myself by just adding one component at a time to this model. So, in the name of breaking from chronological order, (again) I have an actual picture today. I just bought one of those Noopsyche K7 v3 using a gift certificate I won here. Mounted it under my current light setup so I could play around with it while I wait for the controller to arrive. Cranked it up to 100%. Not bad. That little light puts out some pretty good light.
Now, can I win one more?

 

[tbrown]

More contests to enter, more drivel to write, but at this point I've even bored myself by just adding one component at a time to this model. So, in the name of breaking from chronological order, (again) I have an actual picture today. I just bought one of those Noopsyche K7 v3 using a gift certificate I won here. Mounted it under my current light setup so I could play around with it while I wait for the controller to arrive. Cranked it up to 100%. Not bad. That little light puts out some pretty good light.
Now, can I win one more?

Good luck! I love mine!

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Okay, time for one more update for the contests. In keeping with the break from the banal component adding updates, I'm skipping over to a stand modification that was much needed and helpful. (Plus there's actual pictures. (Wait....What happened to the "Snap Happy" emoji?)
Anyhow, with my tank being 36" deep and the stand 35" tall, the top of the tank is just short of being 6 feet up from the floor. So doing much maintenance work (especially on the bottom) would usually mean dragging a ladder over and pogo jumping the ladder around. Well, that got old real quick. So I made this "Work Platform" and implemented some storage cabinet space into it as well. With the cabinet doors closed and the hide away handles stowed, it swings up to a nice platform to stand on.

 

[Sean Clark]

You have some impressive SketchUp skills.

 

[boacvh]

You have some impressive SketchUp skills.

No kidding. He is the Master Sensei!

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Sticking with my "for all the contests" gimmick, this one is for the "Noopsyche's It's Summer Time Giveaway". I had forgotten that I already included this light in my build thread but I'm going to do it again. I had been playing around with the PAR levels with my current lights vs. the Noopsyche light vs. a combination of the two. I pulled out the old trusty Seneye meter and adjusted everything to get the proper PAR. What I had it previously set at was quite high and must have been frying my corals to a nice crispy well done. But why were the ones up top doing great but the ones on the bottom were not. Somethings a little fishy here. So I pulled out the Neptune PAR meter for a comparison. DOH!! The Seneye is reading over 100 PAR higher than it actually was. I'm not frying the corals. I've been putting them through an extended June Gloom (So. Cal. people will get the reference). I guess now, after reading a few other threads about this issue, I'll have to play the "contact Seneye game" to get them to work their magic and reset this meter.
Cranked the PAR back up and would you look at that..... polyps everywhere.
Now, if only I could win another Noopsyche K7......

 

[Reefer Reboot]

Gotta get this one in for one more shot at the NPK7v3 give away.
I won this Tunze 9410 Skimmer in April. Just got around to installing it.

Wow, what a workhorse!

 

[tbrown]

I'm just sitting here anxiously awaiting the required "contest entry" submission.

 

[Reefer Reboot]

I'm just sitting here anxiously awaiting the required "contest entry" submission.

Hmmm,. Well with three contests currently running that have build thread bonuses, I guess I should update this,. But to be honest, nothing much has changed lately. So, will this entry count?
Oh wait, I did make myself a switch box for my break out box.

It's just another doohickey I made to make it easier for someone else (I.E. tank sitter, wife, etc...) to be able to shut down equipment if need be in an emergency. Switches 1 through 6 are programed through the Apex to shut down different groups of equipment. The switches are momentary ON when pushed down and latching ON when pulled up. The momentary comes in handy when doing maintenance. The Master Arming Switch (which completes the common/ground circuit for all 6) is there as a safety precaution in case Switch 1-6 gets accidentally bumped.
Hopefully in three months when my wife retires and we sell the last business I can have some time to do what I want. (I've been retired for almost three years now and have not had a day off yet.) Then I can quit messing around with this claptrap "experimental tank" and get serious again. Or at least I can dream about it.
Now, time to go enter some contests. Three contests for the price of one build entry, not bad.