Chad's Reefer-S 850 Build

smariner007 · Aug 8, 2021

Well, I ordered it; Hopefully, my new Reefer-S 850 will be here in about 1 month. I ordered it from my LFS (Jamrock Corals), they have been very helpful in planning this tank!

A few things about me: I used to be heavily in this hobby, took a break for roughly 20 years, and I recently had emergency brain surgery due to an infection found in my brain. I am now recovering and hope this tank brings me joy and is therapeutic. I have had tanks in the past and here is a link to my reef aquarium that was featured in Advanced Aquarist. A lot has changed in this hobby since I had that reef tank!

A few things about the Reef Aquarium so far:
Location: Myrtle Beach, SC
Total System Volume: 850 Liters / 225 Gallons
Display dimensions: 71"x25.6"x26.75"
Lighting: 3x ReefLED 160S
Skimmer: Reefer Skimmer 900
Wave Pumps: ReefWave 45
Dosing Pumps: 2xReefDose 4

The current plan is to have an ATO and Auto Water Change System that I can change 10% of the water weekly.

Note: I did purchase the 5 Year Warranty from Red Sea.

As you can tell, I'm really looking forward to this build! Here's what the build will look like:

c_healy · Aug 8, 2021

Ooooh, this is going to be sweet!

smariner007 · Aug 8, 2021

Thank you, I've started rockwork on the tank... I'm going for more of a 3D look vs. stacked rocks...

c_healy · Aug 8, 2021

Nice. I just set up a custom 80. Worked on the rock-work for about a month of so while waiting on the tank to be built.
I still want to make a few more arches for mine, the works never ends! Hah

smariner007 · Aug 8, 2021

Exactly! That's why i started the rockwork first, so I could take my time, rebuild it if necessary...

ninjamyst · Aug 8, 2021

Doing the same with my build. Waiting till November to get my IM 200g peninsula. Just finished my NSA rockscape and gonna start cycling the rock in a tote soon.

smariner007 · Aug 8, 2021

I'm liking the NSA look so far. It is time-consuming but it "feels" like it's more your creation vs. a pile of rocks.

ninjamyst · Aug 8, 2021

smariner007 said:
I'm liking the NSA look so far. It is time-consuming but it "feels" like it's more your creation vs. a pile of rocks.

I spent weeks on mine. A few hours every Saturday. I love the creativity involved in making it nice. I just have to make sure not to go too high because I plan to have lots of SPS. I already feel like I went too high now. The highest rock is 15 inches for a 21 inch high tank.

smariner007 · Aug 9, 2021

Yes, take a look at that photo, it has a 2/3 which means that it's two-thirds the height of the tank when it reaches that mark... That was my safety check to make sure it wasn't too high, but still high enough... Hopefully, this will give SPS enough room to grow vertically as well...