CreamCity's 120 Eurobraced Tank + High end Coral and Lots of DIY

[Jedi1199]

Just found this thread. You do excellent work. Must be nice to have your own mill!! lol

Cooking has been a passion of mine for decades. Most people say "You should be a chef." I always tell them that cooking is my joy. I do it to escape the real world. If I had to do it for a job, I would lose the enjoyment of it and it would just be a job.

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Just found this thread. You do excellent work. Must be nice to have your own mill!! lol

Cooking has been a passion of mine for decades. Most people say "You should be a chef." I always tell them that cooking is my joy. I do it to escape the real world. If I had to do it for a job, I would lose the enjoyment of it and it would just be a job.

welcome! Thank you!! I appreciate the compliments. I certainly can’t disagree about cooking. I enjoy the creative element of it and it’s ability to bring people together. Thank you for following along!

 

[CreamCityCorals]

My trip got pushed back a few days so….I kept making progress and …..Well, we have water!


couple leaky bulkheads but crossing my fingers on them now…

sooooo much left to do. But wanted to at least get it going and hopefully get salt in it before I go so we can start cycling. Gonna be a long process but I’m pumped to share it with yall

 

[biecacka]

looking great man!!


corey

 

[CreamCityCorals]

CreamCity Red Handed Tenuis

 

[CreamCityCorals]

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Alright Yall

Quick update...

Been absolutely hectic! In and out of town....this is a busy time of year for me.

Tank has been running and cycling for about a month now. Seems to be fully cycled as nitrates are rising quickly now.

I got sand in both the display and the lagoon in the sump. Been dosing Microbacter 7 daily as well as added quite a bit of Aquabiomics live rock

I have started fish Qt as well as black Molly acclimation. I will be adding about 10 of these guys to get the bioload slowly increased over the next 3-4 weeks while my first small batch of fish are going through QT.


First 3 fish.. All going into the display

Gladiator Clown.... I have had for a couple years
Yellow Eye Kole.... that has been with me for a while
Powder Blue Hybrid Baby....This guy is brand new and came in with velvet and is in a bit of rough shape. Will take a bit of extra care..

My QT Process

I use hydrogen Peroxide with a 36 hr TTM method. I combine this will medicated foods and praziquantel stages.

I am considering modifying my qt process this time by adding a final stage... I am considering putting these guys into a observation tank post treatment and allowing them to fatten up. While doing this I would test the tank with DNA Sequencing to see if any parasites are present. I think this would be a good way to confirm I am not missing anything.

I have never had a clean slate system and so the over done QT process is something I am being very serious about this go around to see if this stuff can realistically be kept out of a reef tank. We will see.....will keep everyone posted on my progress with this.

The time I have had to work on the tank has been spent on getting the RO Station done.

This has been a fairly complex schematic that has taken me awhile to conceptualize into a balance of simplicity and effectiveness.

I had considered getting a commercial system and going nuts with it but really no need for it...


SOOOO....I am on Well Water....This is awesome but it presents a real challenge. Pressure, Co2, and longevity of the well pump are all issues that are hard to deal with. The well pump we currently have is old and will likely need to be replaced...but running RO for 12+ hrs is killing is rather quickly. The constant on and off of the pump trying to maintain pressure is a death sentence for the pump....So my goal was to create a system with the following..

High adjustable pressure
Reduced load on the well pump
Zero TDS ultra pure water
Longevity of DI resin


This is what I came up with....

I am using a 150 gallon rubbermaid container. This will act as my initial reservoir. This takes the well roughly 1.5 hrs to fill.....Like watering your grass or washing your car. I can chop that up into 30 min segments if needed.

this is what that looks like...

I used PVC Sheet to cut a cover. Its not perfect but it works. I made a removable lid as well.

This is the inlet of water from 3/4" PEX line. That is a 1" bulkhead

This sits under the table for my RO set up.

Also all pvc sheet...


Once the water fills in the rubbermaid, there is a internal pump that will pressurize the line. With a booster pump I am able to get whatever PSI I want through dual membranes. I am planning to keep it at 80-85psi.

Additionally I will heat the water to 80 degrees in the rubbermaid. This dramatically increases the water production of the membranes and the overall performance.

Today I began to get the RO set up mounted. Will Update as I make more progress!

 

[Dreamscapesaquatics]

Pretty amazing build. Thanks for sharing. And the free lessons.

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Pretty amazing build. Thanks for sharing. And the free lessons.

Appreciate you following along! It’s a slow process but it should be pretty fun once it’s going!!

 

[biecacka]

Great process so far. Really a good idea on the RODI system. If you ever have questions about your rodi system and it’s uniqueness, you could probably ask @Buckeye Hydro, they are very helpful!

corey

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Great setup!!

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Hey Y'all! Thank you for all of the kind words!

Here is a bit of an update. I posted my findings on instagram but my bet is they will be useful here.

RODI SET UP FINDINGS

So I got the RO set up running and have to say....All and All it is a total success.

It takes my well pump about 30-40 mins to completely fill up the 150 gallon reservoir. So now I only run the well for that time instead of 12 hrs for the same amount of water. This is huge for me, as I can do more water changes if I want and the system volume doesn't have to be nearly as restricted.

My other big finding....HEATING THE WATER before sending through the membranes is massive if you want to hit your spec GPD. My source water coming in from the well is roughly 54F degrees. If I were to run this through the membranes as I have in the past, I would only see 68.4% of my 180 GPD membranes performance AT THE SAME PRESSURE. This means I would only see 122 GPD.

However, If I heat the water to 77-80F degrees I am seeing about 185 GPD of OVER performance on my membranes.

I have kept the pressure at 80 PSI and am seeing water very very quickly...at least compared to what Im use to LOL

I am seeing about 7-8 TDS post membranes. This is after 600-640 TDS from the well. Thats fairly solid.

I am getting almost exactly 2:1 waste to product water using this set up as well!

Additionally, I de gas my water before running it through DI this results in significantly longer lasting DI resin.

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Also was able to finally get the equipment area going. I have a separate stand I am using that will contain all of my filtration..... Skimmer, Scrubber, and Calc Reactor. Additionally, I will be using a vertex reactor as a water source for my Alkatronic and Calc Reactor feed. Hoping this works..

Anyways....I built a PVC tray below all of the equipment that will have a drain in case of any leaks while I am away. The tray will keep everything clean and easily maintained as well. PVC is sure getting expensive.... I glued the PVC using solvent and then screwed together for strength. Sanded and used silicone around the seams to seal.

Got the skimmer going before I left, which I felt was most important. Running a reef octopus Regal 300 EXT. The Nyos 160 was not going to be big enough and I wanted to go external as well.

Having issues with my dosetronic but got that temporarily set up.

 

[CreamCityCorals]

In terms of the system....

its been about 6 weeks now. I acclimated black mollies over 5 days and added a handful fo them to the mangrove lagoon. they seem to be doing well.

Sad news from QT.... my powder blue hybrid was too weak to survive TTM. Unfortunately, I need to consider a way to fatten up fish before going through the modified TTM.

The List of things to do seems to be never ending but I do enjoy he process

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Long overdue update.

System has been up and running for almost 3 months now, still a baby but going smoothly. Here are some updated pics of the display with 2 Radion g4 xr30 pros. First batch of torches are in….s

 

[Jedi1199]

Torches look to be in a bit of a severe flow situation? I find that mine do best in a very low flow area.

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Parameters are solid, nutrients have stayed fairly low. I am dosing microbacter 7 daily which has kept things in check. My fish load is low at this point, I like to keep the load low early until the tank begins to stabilize.

Alk 8.4
Ph 8.0-8.1 currently....I am continuing to bump this up slowly with Kalk
Phos .02
Nitrates 18.5


I have been able to get quite a bit done in the fish room as well.

The trough is completely plumbed and I have got most of the scape done. The scape is elevated on drilled out PVC couplings, allowing flow to get underneath and kick up detritus.

tank needs to be cleaned once the scape is done. Unfortunately it’s hard to get a good picture from above.

return line is a spray bar that should provide some nice flow along the bottom of the tank and under the structure.

Additionally I installed the overflow box and a “dry box” in the corner. This will allow me to have 3 mp60s along that wall and keep the dry sides dry. I havnt cleaned up the silicone yet, but it’s on my list.

basic plumbing. Had the ball valve laying around so I used it, instead of the standard gate valve

Filtration area is the next big thing to complete, in addition to getting the trough cleaned and filled. Running skimmer without removing much, trying to allow nutrients to build a little bit. Airline is ran outside

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Torches look to be in a bit of a severe flow situation? I find that mine do best in a very low flow area.

Definitely not severe flow, probably hard to tell in the pics. But certainly enough flow to keep them moving

check out the videos I have posted on Instagram to see the flow if interested.

I like gentle but medium flow that keeps them moving and dancing. This is how they are found in the ocean, fairly consistent current.

 

[CreamCityCorals]

Was able to pick up another powder blue hybrid and get him through qt. Such an amazing fish, seems like the ones I’ve seen almost always come in super skinny.

slowly fattening this one up.

Here is a updated shot of the lagoon. I purchased the mangroves 2 weeks ago in freshwater. I have slowly been acclimating them to saltwater while they soak up some sunlight. They will be ready to go in tomorrow. I am likely to change these baskets, I am looking for something smaller that will work directly into the rock work.

lagoon is lit with 1 kessil a360x tuna sun. I have two quanta pro tropic sun bars to get that will go directly over the

 

[Jedi1199]

Here is a quick shot of my torches, hammers, and frorgspawns I took last night to show a fellow reefer...