a Wisconsin Reef... my raceway dream come true

[Alpha Aquaculture]

Hello R2R!

I have been in this hobby for nearly ten years now and have had a reef for nearly half of those years. A few years ago I was inspired by Anthony Calfo and began dreaming of building a raceway system. Nearly two years of concepts and hundreds of drawings later I have done it. I have finally worked out most of the kinks and it has been established for over 6 months now. My corals have grown quite a bit and its time to start showing it off. While I have had my share of setbacks, this is my baby, a seed of my imagination. Definitely not your average 'box' style tank!!!


Here is my system shortly after setup in October '09. Many changes have been made so I will have to update soon but you get the idea :wink:

Compartmentalized Waterfall Raceway System

Thank you so much for visiting. Feel free to ask any and all questions. Conctructive criticism will be warmly accepted. Enjoy!!!

:tongue:

Kris

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

I have Acans in my top coral tank and Chalices in the bottom one.

I feed for hours every other nite under LED light so thats what I see the corals under mostly.

Much much more to come...

 

[inactive]

Awesome, I will be watching this thread

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

Thanks Kraylen! I won't let you down!!!

 

[inTank]

go pack go

 

[grisha]

Kris,
im a complete noob in this kind of tanks but interested to learn about benefits of this type of set up. also you mentioned drawings..would you give us some insights on the skematics like pumps, sizes, lights...Also is that a "serge box" up on top?...BTW i really want to comment on those acans,, but colors just make me look the other way and say to myself "grisha your acans are not that bad" ...

 

[grisha]

picture On the wall..Priceless

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

Pink ******* Timeline

Here is the photo from the sales thread, it was in my quarantine for over a month and put into the system shortly after setup in mid October

Same frag on 1-14-2010

Photo taken 3-26-2010, its half way down the height of the plug

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

go pack go

Actually not a Packers fan, but don't hold that against me! Lol

I'm from NY!!!!!! Somehow ended up in WI?!?oh:

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

picture On the wall..Priceless

Haha, one of my fav movies, but I'd rather be Sosa!!!!

Kris,
im a complete noob in this kind of tanks but interested to learn about benefits of this type of set up. also you mentioned drawings..would you give us some insights on the skematics like pumps, sizes, lights...Also is that a "serge box" up on top?...BTW i really want to comment on those acans,, but colors just make me look the other way and say to myself "grisha your acans are not that bad" ...

Glad you joined in Greg

Well im sure I'll get into it more as we go here but I'll give it a quick explanation.

The main concept is functionality. I need to be able to deal with problems and pests should they arrise. So I decided to break the normal style of tank into its constituents, a compartmentalized tank.

I never liked the standard box style tank, sand, live rock, and then corals. If you have a problem with the sand you have to take out the corals and then live rock to get at the sand. If you have a problem with the live rock like aiptasias or algae, its a pita to remove the corals and then almost impossible to remove these pests from the rocks. The rocks are right there next to the corals. So I keep my live rock in another tank seperate from the corals. There is nothing but corals in the coral tanks, they are growing on acrylic, I have ceramic plugs in there but I don't like it!! If I have a problem with a pest, I can just wipe it off the acrylic with my thumb.

The top tank is an Algal Turf Scrubber. I used textured tempered glass plates that I ordered special for this tank. Two so I can clean one per week. I configured them in a V shape to double the amount of square inches for algal growth under the same amount of light. I have read of ats's that leached plasticizers into the water due to UV breakdown so I wouldn't use plastic mesh to grow the algae as most do. It was a gamble to use glass and for a few months nothing grew but I changed my lights and it started growing and now works well. I used textured glass so the algae would have crevices to get a foot hold. When I scrape it clean the algal foots remain and can grow out quickly. I like the idea of an ats because it supplies oxygen and removes nutrients. I need all the nutrient export I can get because I feed a lot. I also like the phytoplanton it delivers to the tanks. This phyto has to go through all the tanks before it gets to the skimmer on the bottom most tank.

So saltwater is pumped from the bottom tank to the top one (ats) where it flows over the plates passively to one coral tank (acans-higher light) to the next coral tank (chalices-lower light) then to the live rock tank and then back to the sump (I like to call it the controller) where I make all changes to the water chemistry and water changes/skimmer/pumps. I use two pumps for this waterfall for redundancy. Initally the idea was to have no pumps in any of the tanks (except the bottom-most controller) and this is how I ran it for months. Things grew well but I decided I wanted to experiment for more dynamic flow so I added two tunze 6055's in each coral tank on a controller. The live rock tank will never have a pump.

The bottom most skinny tank is for RO only, I like the clean look of it all incorporated into the system. Plus this RO tank is the same size as the coral tanks so if one breaks I have an immediate replacement.

The raceways are basically tanks with walls to force the flow in a certain path. This creates much more flow and because the tanks are gravity fed, its free flow!

I did so much research about raceways and found very little info, almost none. Most 'raceways' are just long straight tanks. I feel like the term raceway has a dual meaning as far as its usage. I'm already in the process of building another system much larger than this one which is roughly 120g. I'm learning as I go. I've never had a mentor in this hobby.

 

[Paul_N]

Nice setup! Can you get more detailed/closer pics of each tank?

 

[spotted jawfish]

Outstanding acans!!!!

 

[I-K@ndY]

Ill be following this thread .. nice work Kris

 

[foxyb]

sweet set up

 

[Blackhawk Fan]

awesome!
What part of Wisconsin are you in?

 

[blackbeard]

i like it lets see more shots

 

[El Camaron]

very nice Kris, and great growth on that pink boobs chalice.

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

Nice setup! Can you get more detailed/closer pics of each tank?

Thanks Paul! I will work on it but its kinda tough now, all I have is my 100mm Macro lense, lol. I've got a few right away for you tho.


Here is the ATS a few nights ago before a cleaning, got some nice red bubble macros in there

Got this one from far away :wink: I have had it for nearly two years but almost killed it and just added it to this tank less than a month ago, I guarantee it will blow up in another month!!!

This red bubble I have had with me since my first reef nearly five years ago, been through many tanks and have almost lost it many times, but now its kicking butt in this tank!!!!

The macro algae photos I took quick with pumps on so they're not that great but it shows how much turbulent flow and bubbles they get, I know they like it a lot

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

Outstanding acans!!!!

Thanks bro! Yours is going to be one of my best :xd: I should be able to recieve it next week. I'll let you know soon. Thanks for your patience.



Thinking of my red bubble algae got me thinking of my first tank...

How about a quick trip down memory lane...

Oh the memories :cry: lol

 

[Alpha Aquaculture]

Ill be following this thread .. nice work Kris

Thank you very much Steve! I have learned a lot from reading your posts... most importantly about balut :tongue: