Alex's Wonders in a Box (Singapore)

Alexcyf

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Hi fellow R2R reefers!

Its been a while since I last posted in reef2reef!

Some of you may have seen my old tank thread, https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/alexs-mixed-reef-from-singapore.232376/ which I have not been updating for almost a year.. to jot some memories, some of my fts when my previous mixed reef was at its prime..

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Had alot of ups and downs for this tank and eventually, back in late Q3 2020, I decommissioned this tank. Mainly due to my family's plan to a new place.

After 6 months of hiatus from reefing (since I had to rent a place till the renovation at my new place completes), I came back in action! Here I am, sharing my new reefing journey with reefers from all over the world.

Hope to hear your comments and suggestions, and continue to learn from R2R gurus in this hobby again:)
 
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Alexcyf

Alexcyf

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Thankful for the privilege to move together with my parents into a bigger place that allowed sufficient space for me to build a bigger tank with a fish room using the storeroom space under my stairs. This is probably slightly uncommon since most of us in Singapore, where land is scarce, live in high rise residential buildings.

The first post on my new tank will be dedicated to the tank design as well as some before and after shots :)


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Visualizing my fish room at my first visit..



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The plan is to knock off the wall and create a fish room right behind the main display tank, which is a 2 sided 6x2x2 hooded tank.


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and the artist impression of the tank.. except they don’t have a reef image to complete the illustration.
 
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Alexcyf

Alexcyf

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Had a trusted tank builder (same builder as my mixed reef previously) to build this new tank.

Here are the 2D drawings of the tank/sump layout, inclusive of the frag/lps tank and quarantine tank housed in the Fish room.

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The 4.5ft frag/lps tank is connected to the main display and sump and both tanks are powered by 2 separate return pumps (always preferred to make the insurance if one fails). The Quarantine Tank is a separate IOS tank housed below the frag/lps tank.

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You might be wondering why I called it a LPS tank. It’s probably because I am planning to keep the main display as a SPS dominated tank hopefully with a show size angel (wish me luck..) So here’s the dimensions of both the tanks in the fish room.

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Here’s the detailed layout of the main display and sump. Standard bean animal overflow and a simple sump layout since I needed a big space for the skimmers and calcium reactor (finally trying out CR after more than a decade of reefing)

An interesting detail you may notice is the 28mm hole at the back of the display tank. For those wondering, this is meant to connect to a waste water outlet pipe which allows me to drain water direct into sewage during water change.

Same as my previous tank, the tank will be chilled by a dip in titanium coil, powered by a condenser with trunking running within the crawl space in the false ceiling.
 
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Alexcyf

Alexcyf

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Some snapshots of the different stages of renovation!

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And the tank is delivered! This time around, I opted for a galvanized iron frame to allow full access (without a center pillar) to my sump.

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Guess it is always a little more challenging to build the carpentry around a hooded tank. Good thing I had a team of experienced carpenters working on the tank cabinet. Here's a shot of them fitting the suspended hood to the tank like a glove.

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The almost completed carpentry for the display tank. Looks pretty much like how I imagined it. Also included an air vent to allow air circulation to main living space. Notice that the air vent's carpentry is designed in a way to prevent light from the tank to be “exposed” on the exterior.

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With the carpentry almost up, next up in action was my trusty tank builders. They had quite a tough time working in confined spaces to fulfill a rather demanding piping job..

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I thought they did an amazing job with the setup and piping work. Everything looks neat and professional!

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Stay tuned for more updates. Meanwhile, do share with me your comments :)
 
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Alexcyf

Alexcyf

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Love the plumbing. Wish I had a closet near my tank to use for equipment.
Ohhh.. that closet is not for equipment. Wife will probably murder me if I invade that space.

Will update soon on how I used the space under the staircase for equipment storage!
 
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Alexcyf

Alexcyf

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Now that the tank is up, its time to build the rockscape and kickstart the cycling process!

For the scape, I chose to use a combination of caribsea life rock (love the shapes) and my bleached/cured rocks from my previous mixed reef tank. Started by building the first tier of the rockscape.

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Here’s the final two island scape.. not the best shot as it looks like it’s full of rocks.. oh well, I wanted many crevices for fishes to hid and swim. Had enough of fishes fighting over limited real estate in my previous mixed reef which was a pennisula.

Also decided to load the sand first before filling the tank up with water. By the way, I chose back the same sand from Caribsea (Bimini Pink), which gives me a nice combination of fine white sand with small pinkish rock chips. Highly recommended, since plain white sand cost so much in Sinapogre nowadays anyway..

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Alexcyf

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The next big task would be to fill this tank up with salt water!

Water change is one of the most critical process to maintain a healthy reef tank and this time around, I need to make the process as easy as possible..

Other than building an outlet for waste water, I also built an water inlet (complete with a basin) within the fish room. The RODI feeds from the water inlet and sends water into a 160litres mixing drum. This means I only need to turn on the RODI, pour my trusty tropic marin pro salt into the drum to prepare my new saltwater.

Here’s a short video of my mixing drum in her maiden mix. The drum is supported by two jebao pumps, one to provide circulation to mix the water and one to supply water to the display tank.



And this is how it looks like filling up the tank.. ah, the scape looks slightly better on video hehe.



Well, even though it seems pretty effortless, it still took me two days to fill the salt mix with RODI, for my tank. Had to install an old wavemaker to provide circulation for the live sand in the interim.
 

revhtree

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Welcome back and can’t wait to see the new system blossom!
 
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Alexcyf

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Just a post on my choice of lights.

Since the main display tank is going to be sps dominated, I went with T5s as my main light module. Old school SPS lovers would probably agree with my choice. Even though T5 doesn’t create the fluorescence glow from sps, it gives a fuller light coverage. Personally, I always like the solid and natural coloration that sps display under T5s too.

Naturally, I went with my favorite T5 module and got the ATI Sunpower Dimmable module from my local ATI distributor. Well, to still get a little of the LED effect, I added back my China made led strips with 100% blue cree bulbs (used it for my mixed reef and I had been very happy with the effect)

All of them are suspended from my hood using ati’s hanging kits, with the LED strips rotated at an angle for better coverage.
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For my LPS and frag tank, LED is a must. As I used AI Prime HD for my “frag sump” back in my mixed reef, I developed an affinity for AI lights. The blues are much better, at least to me, to bring out the eye popping colours in Zoas, Shrooms n LPS. Hence, I invested in a new AI hydra 64HD for my LPS tank and repaired my AI Prime (which went nuts after not using for 6 months).

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Now I am just waiting to save up to shop for some eye popping specimens to place under the AI lights :)
 
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Alexcyf

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Time to move down to the sump.

Singaporeans love to shop on Taobao for good deals. Along with furniture, house lightings and bathroom accessories for my new house, I ordered reef stuff from Taobao too!

Didn’t order any electronic reef equipment, in case anything goes wrong.. but i guess getting bio media can’t go that wrong. Bought almost 20kg of media. Even though I was in a rush and I ordered the delivery by freight (freight cost is almost the cost of the media) but still I managed a 50% savings if I were to purchase bio media locally!

Went with two types of bio media, both with good reviews that they don’t melt like some other brands. Hopefully it’s true and works well to keep nutrients under control. We will see..

Here’s some photos of the media!

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Alexcyf

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One thing that I have learnt much from my experiences, is to invest in equipment that can support your tank and reefing needs, especially in this day and age when livestocks cost so much.

So I am going to share a bit more in the following posts on my choices of equipment.

Starting with a full sump shot of my 5' by 1.5' sump!

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Circulation

First, a quick share on the heart of my tank, there are 2 "chambers". I am circulating both tanks with 2 return pump (1 Vectra VL2 and 1 Skimz Quietpro 6.0 I think). Both pumps feeds to both my display and my frag/lps tank, an insurance practice in case one pump fails.

Chiller

Have always used a dip in coil + condenser for my tanks. Less equipment required to circulate water to and less hot air around my tank. Managed to hid all the trunking within the false ceiling and housed the condenser on my back yard.

Stay tuned for updates on nutrient export, maintaining alkalinity and other parameters etc :)
 

revhtree

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A short pause from the equipment update. Fast forward to my current tank shots after doing some livestock shopping :)

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I really love your system my friend! Great job!
 

Robertellis30

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You must be a time traveler. From following along you’ve been set up for about a month. And already progressed that far along. What is your secrets sauce sir!!!??
 
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Alexcyf

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You must be a time traveler. From following along you’ve been set up for about a month. And already progressed that far along. What is your secrets sauce sir!!!??
Well the secret is that my journals are always backtracked . Tank actually is up for 3 months already :)
 

A worm with high fashion and practical utility: Have you ever kept feather dusters in your reef aquarium?

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