How did that happen.......there is a 260 gallon aquarium in our walkout basement family room now....Not anymore

[Jeto2004]

One thing I learned about myself is that I should make things as easy as possible on me in the long run for “simple” maintenance tasks. So that means tank automation for me as much as possible. My wishlist after watching
/reading ) a lot about tank automation (Thank you Mr. Saltwater Tank - for the awesome tank automation series):

• Having a aquarium controller (I’m a confessing gear junky)
• Auto top off
• Water storage to have RO/DI for emergency water changes at hand
• Saltwater mixing station to support automated water change

First thing was building a saltwater mixing station. Looked at saltwater mixing station designs and probably copied the most used design in my garage. Also run RO/DI tubing for ATO, ATW from tank location and storage tanks, as well as from the RO/DI unit to the storage tanks. And as you can see although run an aquabus extension to a power bar and FMM module mounted over the storage tanks to control the pump and being able to add water level sensors to the storage tanks. So far I have installed to sensors high low for the RO/DI storage tank. Maybe in the future I will build a stand for it, but we have to wash out our garage after the winter with all the salt we bring in with the car, so probably shouldn’t be out of wood an aluminum stand would be great.

 

[Small triggers]

Awesome progress! Between Mr. Saltwater Tank, MelevsReef, and the BRS youtube channel, you should have ALOT of information to source from!

 

[Jeto2004]

Awesome progress! Between Mr. Saltwater Tank, MelevsReef, and the BRS youtube channel, you should have ALOT of information to source from!

Thank you! Yeah agree lots of good information there, but let’s not forget the community at R2R!!!

 

[Jeto2004]

Even for the previous plan of having a discuss freshwater tank I planed to have a sump. First I wanted to go the DIY route. Even found a local supplier for cast acrylic sheets here in Indy, but the cost of material is marginal lower then getting a ready stock sump. So decided to go the stock route to save some time. Treated myself to a Trigger Systems Sapphire CR44 sump.

Here I made my first big mistake. The face frame is screwed and glued to the stand for eternity and I closed of the only side access that I had. Without modification to the stand I was not able to get the sump in!!! Can you image how I screamed and let loose some bad words that echoed through the house? Luckily my daughter was out of town with her grandparents. So for a week or two I pondered should I send it back and get a smaller sump or should I try to modify the stand.

Well decided to modify the stand took me a whole day to get it in, but in it is!!!!

Two things I had to do to get it in. First sanded/cut the corners of the middle support beam - not that I much worried the inner beam is not really for structural support. However that was not enough I although had to cut out the rear support beams. Now I could get the sump into the stand. Since I tried to cut the beams as perpendicular as possible I was able to but a support beam back into place that I feel comfortable with.

Although plumbed in the sump to the overflow box and return - timeline wise we are know in mid of August of this year - getting closer to be caught up on the build.

 

[Jeto2004]

Ooh, one thing that I forgot to mention with the earlier post is that at the end of the hardscaping I added 70 pounds of Caribsea dry sand special grade. Didn’t want to go bare bottoms with my first reef/saltwater tank - Don’t know about you but every time I hear this term I hear Marry Beary talking about soaky bottoms on GBBS in my mind- giggle)!

 

[Jeto2004]

More things that got done.

Installed two aquarium dedicated 20 amp circuits and run them into the access cabinet to the right of the aquarium close to the ceiling
Out of plywood made controller boards to host all the modules and manage some of the power supplies that are mounted behind the board. Hang these two boards also into the access cabinet.
Struggled to find the right set of connection but was also able to connect my cor-20 to the plumbing.

 

[Jeto2004]

With the plumbing done it was time to fill the tank with water to test for leaks. Decided to fill the tank directly with RO/DI water. Since I could store 110 gallon of water, I put the RO/DI unit to the test. We have awesome water pressure in our house, actually it is to high for house appliances and we have a pressure reduction valve that is set to 80 PSI. So within 17 hours the RO/DI unit shutoff, great test of the manual shut off valve.
With the pump in the saltwater mixing station we pumped the water in the tank. It was a whole family event. I let my wife and daughter start the pump to involve them in the tank build.
Put one of the MP-40 in to circulate the water, wich made another mistake visible. I should have washed the sand I put in earlier.

 

[Jeto2004]

After the RO/DI unit made another batch of water the tank was full!! And I could start up the system to test for leaks in the plumbing and bulkheads. Had to tighten some of the bulkheads, but found a tiny leak a drop every 20-30 seconds in one of the return pipes entering the return bluck heads. Not best practice, but just shut of system and put additional pvc cement around the joint (twice). Let it sit overnight and started the pump back up. No leak after letting the system run for a few days, the cloudiness settled nicely. Played with the overflow return valves to find best settings. Also performed emergency overflow testing and power outage to make sure the sump could handle the back flow. All good to go!

 

[Jeto2004]

Let the system run a couple of days, the water cleared up nicely. Time for some salt!!!!!

Guess at the time point we officially joint the saltwater club!

 

[Jeto2004]

After a day this how it looked like:

 

[Eagle_Steve]

After a day this how it looked like:

Looking good. I love the scape.

 

[Paleozoic_reefer]

This looks like it's going to an epic build!!

 

[Jeto2004]

Looking good. I love the scape.

Thank you! Can’t wait to see how it will look with fish and corals......patience young one patience...... I tell myself

 

[Jeto2004]

This looks like it's going to an epic build!!

Thank you! Just chucking along - hope people will scream at me if they see major mistakes or have suggestions ideas to make it better.

 

[krbshappy71]

I really like your aquascaping, nice work!

 

[LisaMarie]

LOVE watching this build!

 

[Jon Fishman]

Following. Welcome. Not sure how I missed this

 

[Rjukan]

No screws all nails. It was a nailing piece of nailing craftsmanship.

That had me lol.

Everything looks great: the room you chose to have the tank in, the quality of the stand build, excellent choice of Planet Aquariums for the tank, mixing station etc. Just awesome.

Where are you at with the build present day? How lagged in time are these posts, or are they up to date?

 

[Jeto2004]

I really like your aquascaping, nice work!

Thank you!

 

[Jeto2004]

LOVE watching this build!

Thank you for the kind words. So far I enjoy the build tremendously and wonder were it will end up. But writing and sharing the build brings me more joy than I thought when I started this build threat.