Acorral 250g cube(ish) reef

[Acorral]

I worked today on the canopy doors and structure as well as placing sump in place

Not sure about the baseboard... ro use white glossy finish or a brushed steel insert... would love to hear your choice...

 

[Acorral]

Plumbing is done !!!

Here you can see the shadow overflow... and a little bit of the water movement with just the two return pumps


Here is the sump


On the rightmost baffle the water comes in from the primary and secondary drain, also you can see the external skimmer intake with an elbow to prevent it from sucking air bubbles... an inlet strainer is on it's way for it...

Then three 4 inch filter socks, which will have a level sensor to alarm when they are dirty and water is overflowing them

Then a general purpose baffle, for some powerheads to keep detritus from settling, heaters, aqualifter for calcium reactor, sensor probes, doser outlets, maybe some media reactor, etc...

And finally after a bubble trap the return intakes (also waiting for strainers) and the ATO will be there too... with a mechanical float valve and some sensors for redundancy

On this video I removed the last 2 pvc pipe sections to give an idea of the real flow going through the sump...

 

[Acorral]

The other parts of the system, left to the skimmer is the place for the calcium reactor... the geo624 i have didnt fit so i am waiting now for a new geo618

 

[Acorral]

Here is the update...

Almost finished... only the top part is missing... it will have n air extractor there...

Bermuda pink aragonite bags... 18kg each

Foundational rocks:

Aragonite in place:

Filling with salt water and filtering aragonite dust with a pump and a 10 micron sock

No more aragonite dust:

The new geo 618 reactor in place

Another updates without photo:
- Tank is full and sump circulating
- two maxspect gyre installed, i think i wont need the two additional vortech mp60
- installed magnetic sensors on doors nd led lights inside cabinet.
- hve been seeding with mb7
- installed optical IR level sensors for low level, high level and socks full
- installed fail safe float valve for ato

I expect to have some time tomorrow for taking more photos...

 

[Acorral]

Magnetic sensors on sump doors to turn on/off utility lights under cabinet....

Optical IR sensor for detecting when filter socks are overflowing:

Float valve for ATO and a pair of optical IR level sensors for low and high level in sump:

Preliminary rockscape, will change for sure when I migrate the rock and coral form the existing tank.

Front view, on photo looks like just a bunch of rocks but they are in a kind of horseshoe arrangement ro give depth...

Left view:

Right view:

Its hard to arrange rocks and have 3 great views so I gave priority to left and front views...

A pair of maxspect gyre wavemakers, one in each side, only if you look fully 90 degres you can see them, otherwise they blend with the black background:

 

[revhtree]

Looks very nice!! Congrats!

 

[Acorral]

Some time cycling, already showing some diatoms...

Also, just finished the canopy !

Already some cable management and electric work to do.

 

[Millhugh718]

look great. I love to follow u and do the same thing but my wife ain't on my side haha

 

[Acorral]

Today I moved fish and coral to the aquarium..

It ended up with way too much rock for my taste... I will leave it like this s fee months toncolonize the new rock with the old one and later I will remove some of it...

Sorry for the shaky camera..

 

[ludnix]

Beautiful work Acorral! I really love your clean and smart setup. I hope you continue to update as everyone settles in.

 

[deaclauderdale]

Great work! Can you get a video that shows the canopy doors articulating?

 

[Acorral]

Great work! Can you get a video that shows the canopy doors articulating?

Here you go...



They stay where you put them... if you go past 20something degrees then it is soft close...

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Man, this is looking awesome!! So excited to watch it develop! Excelente trabajo! Me encanta!

 

[Acorral]

Just installed a CO2 scrubber.

 

[Acorral]

Almost 2 weeks from setup and everything is looking fine !

The tangs are establishing their territory so it's kind of violent environment right now...

The clowns I think missmatched their partners because the two couples I had are behaving like swingers and also some dights among them...

The corals are getting better each day, too soon to notice it on photos but in person one can definitely tell the difference

 

[Acorral]

Some new frags for the reef !!

 

[Acorral]

The fish list today looks like this:

Blue Tang
Purple Tang
2 Yellow Tangs
Kole Tang
5 Percula Clownfish
Cleaner Wrasse
Swissguard basslet
Randall goby
Black lined blenny
Neon dottyback
Green Mandarin
Spotted Mandarin
Yellowtail Damsel
Klausewitz Blenny
Male Flasher Wrasse

Some photos of the ones who posed for the camera today:

 

[Acorral]

Got a photo of the Randall Goby out of his lair...

 

[Acorral]

Today i got this harlequin tusk:

I have always wanted to have one, but now that I have it on QT, I am having second thoughts about having it in my reef tank...

I know he won't bother the corals but I am worried about the neon dottyback, randall goby and spotted mandarinfish... or even my perculas... do you think they will be safe? Or they will be lunch?

 

[sundog101]

No algae scrubber ?