Bought Jakes Reef Builders 400G Closed Loop System
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TrottingReef
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Well got the tank home. Now its clean up time and time to buy the replacement plumbing and set it up so the pumps are on the floor of the stand not suspended in the air how Jake had them. I accidently broke the 60B sump tank while cleaning it. But other than that the move went well, tank survived.
First step cleaning!
First step cleaning!
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TrottingReef
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Ohh the white door behind the stand in this picture thats covered in stickers was the Reef Builders bathroom door. Decided to take that too. The stickers are all different local fish stores most long closed.
D_Reep1106
Active Member
Awesome build coming together. This is awesome to see the tank being kept alive.
As for a closed loop with sand burowers. I have had success with Special Grade sand and I would change out the flow nozzles for flat nozzles that you can direct along the sand bed instead of in a cone that will stir up some sand no matter what. You should be able to get away with doing a sandbed on the whole bottom that way instead of doing the retaining wall design. The wrasse and everything will end up kicking sand over the wall anyways.
As for a closed loop with sand burowers. I have had success with Special Grade sand and I would change out the flow nozzles for flat nozzles that you can direct along the sand bed instead of in a cone that will stir up some sand no matter what. You should be able to get away with doing a sandbed on the whole bottom that way instead of doing the retaining wall design. The wrasse and everything will end up kicking sand over the wall anyways.
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TrottingReef
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Great reply, thank you.
backbayreef
2500 Club Member
Wonderful - very glad to see one of Jake's builds brought back to life! Can't wait to see how you'll re-aquascape with all these cool rock structures.
btw: this tank comes with an Abyzz AFC 150 (my dream wavemaker). I hope you didn't leave it behind, did you? ;)
btw: this tank comes with an Abyzz AFC 150 (my dream wavemaker). I hope you didn't leave it behind, did you? ;)
Abyzz Flow Cannon AFC 150 Review: Good for 20 Feet of Flow | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog
The Abyzz Flow Cannon AFC 150 is a water mover that has more in common with a trolling motor than an aquarium water pump but the AFC 150 is so powerful you could easily move a small boat with it.
reefbuilders.com
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TrottingReef
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It did not come with the Abyzz AFC 150 that they had in it for a while. Only equipment it came with was the closed loop Vectra L2 pumps.Wonderful - very glad to see one of Jake's builds brought back to life! Can't wait to see how you'll re-aquascape with all these cool rock structures.
btw: this tank comes with an Abyzz AFC 150 (my dream wavemaker). I hope you didn't leave it behind, did you? ;)
Abyzz Flow Cannon AFC 150 Review: Good for 20 Feet of Flow | Reef Builders | The Reef and Saltwater Aquarium Blog
The Abyzz Flow Cannon AFC 150 is a water mover that has more in common with a trolling motor than an aquarium water pump but the AFC 150 is so powerful you could easily move a small boat with it.reefbuilders.com
blackgate
Active Member
So depressing to see that studio come to an end. Absolutely loved watching Jake and that dream of his over the years. Kudos to you for getting that awesome tank! Looks like a great project!
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TrottingReef
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Yeah it was so hard each trip I went there to talk to Rob and plan things out as more and more gear left and it looked less and less like the Studio any more. By the end it was just my tank and the 300g penisula that was crated up and getting moved to Robs later that day. Was so depressing. Each trip got harder and harder to go there.
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TrottingReef
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I will, it will be slow unfortunately as I am moving in a year so not going to set it up until after the move. But I will be getting all my equipment between now and then. Good thing since it looks like I got $6k in gear I need to get.
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TrottingReef
Valuable Member
I decided against a LifeReef sump and gear. Going to have someone design a sump for me with design files I can give a local sign shop to pre cut acrylic for me with their CNC then I just need to put it together. Was initially thinking 72" long but after I drew it out and then verified my path for my equipment placement I realized the sump needs to be 73" or I guess I could just reduce the size of my macro algae chamber so I can make the other half the tank a little longer to fit my gear. My CaRX, KalcRX and Protein Skimmer side by side will take exactly 32" so will need to make the chamber a little longer to make sure it all fits.
Here is what I sent to @mermaid_life for designing the sump
Here is a hand drawn mockup of what I was thinking about. After I finished drawing I double checked my math and decided to do 73" or 72.5" because equipment in the top right chamber will be exactly 32" and I had originally planned 32" for the length of that chamber so I need to make it a little longer to make sure the three-fit next to each other. I also screwed up writing the kalc reactor was 8x8 but its same size as skimmer 9"x9".
This should be a pretty simple design. It is a 3 chamber design. Half of the sump will be a large 75 gallon 32"x24" macro algae chamber, then the second half will be split between a frag rack chamber and a chamber for my Calcium reactor, kalc reactor and protein skimmer and then the pipes for the return feeds to the display tank. All the pumps will be external to the tank. I was originally going to put a brace on parts of the back panel for the bulkheads to go into but I decided to skip it and just plumb the pipes directly into the water with true union joints so I can take them in and out as I need. So they can be ignored on my design. I am hoping to avoid a euro brace if possible.
My thoughts are to order 2 96"x48" 1/4" sheets, one white one clear. Then each sheet gets cut in half lengthwise. Then the white sheet, half becomes the bottom sump panel and the other the back panel. Then the clear will give us the front panel and two side panels. Then I was going to get one half sheet of 1/4" blue acrylic that can be used for the internal walls. For the internal walls, the one that cuts the sump in half width wise with an overflow weir cut into the top 4" on the left side of that divider so the water overflows into the frag chamber. This will make the water in the fuge chamber 20" high. I then want a divider that goes lengthwise with cuts in it to allow water to freely pass between the frag chamber and the equipment chamber above it. I plan to run this half of the sump at 16". The skimmer I am getting uses an inlet at the top of the skimmer so sump water height is not an issue. I plan to use these 4" media reactors that basically will hang on the left side sump wall. They have brackets that will go over the side wall and hold them in place. The divider lines between the media reactors in the fuge and the equipment in the top return chamber are just so I could visualize the equipment layout I don't plan to have any internal walls or dividers beyond the 2 walls. I plan to put two magnetic gyre pumps inside the sump and I want to have 4 x 4 dose line blocks, two in the fuge chamber two in the frag chamber. For the two in the fuge have them spaced 10" apart and the 2 in the frag chamber 12" apart so basically one in each right side of the frag chamber.
Here is what I sent to @mermaid_life for designing the sump
Here is a hand drawn mockup of what I was thinking about. After I finished drawing I double checked my math and decided to do 73" or 72.5" because equipment in the top right chamber will be exactly 32" and I had originally planned 32" for the length of that chamber so I need to make it a little longer to make sure the three-fit next to each other. I also screwed up writing the kalc reactor was 8x8 but its same size as skimmer 9"x9".
This should be a pretty simple design. It is a 3 chamber design. Half of the sump will be a large 75 gallon 32"x24" macro algae chamber, then the second half will be split between a frag rack chamber and a chamber for my Calcium reactor, kalc reactor and protein skimmer and then the pipes for the return feeds to the display tank. All the pumps will be external to the tank. I was originally going to put a brace on parts of the back panel for the bulkheads to go into but I decided to skip it and just plumb the pipes directly into the water with true union joints so I can take them in and out as I need. So they can be ignored on my design. I am hoping to avoid a euro brace if possible.
My thoughts are to order 2 96"x48" 1/4" sheets, one white one clear. Then each sheet gets cut in half lengthwise. Then the white sheet, half becomes the bottom sump panel and the other the back panel. Then the clear will give us the front panel and two side panels. Then I was going to get one half sheet of 1/4" blue acrylic that can be used for the internal walls. For the internal walls, the one that cuts the sump in half width wise with an overflow weir cut into the top 4" on the left side of that divider so the water overflows into the frag chamber. This will make the water in the fuge chamber 20" high. I then want a divider that goes lengthwise with cuts in it to allow water to freely pass between the frag chamber and the equipment chamber above it. I plan to run this half of the sump at 16". The skimmer I am getting uses an inlet at the top of the skimmer so sump water height is not an issue. I plan to use these 4" media reactors that basically will hang on the left side sump wall. They have brackets that will go over the side wall and hold them in place. The divider lines between the media reactors in the fuge and the equipment in the top return chamber are just so I could visualize the equipment layout I don't plan to have any internal walls or dividers beyond the 2 walls. I plan to put two magnetic gyre pumps inside the sump and I want to have 4 x 4 dose line blocks, two in the fuge chamber two in the frag chamber. For the two in the fuge have them spaced 10" apart and the 2 in the frag chamber 12" apart so basically one in each right side of the frag chamber.
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Hey that’s pretty cool. Some nice stickers on there 
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TrottingReef
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Need more stickersHey that’s pretty cool. Some nice stickers on there
fish_collector
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Perhaps you should give Antonio at VCA a call regarding your closed loop setup, he might have some good info to maximize the efficiency of it all. He's a good guy, and in our reef club 
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Cool build. Following. 
backbayreef
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Checking in - how are we looking? ;)
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TrottingReef
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Getting ready to move into our new facility in last half of January start of February. Then will start the process of filling the tank. Decided to cap the 4 existing closed-loop holes down the center line with PVC plugs since its PVC bottom and then drill 4 2" holes in the 4 corners and add a Hydrotube 63 in an "H" configuration to replace the 2 Vectra pumps to power the closed loop. Corner holes will allow better flow control with the Hydrotube. I will post updates including pictures in Jan-Feb.
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