Marineland 90 Back from the Dead

RynosaurusRex

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Welcome to the Revival of my old school Marineland 90gal.
THEN:
I set this tank up long ago with mixed reef asperations that never came to see the light of day because I was doing everything wrong. Water changes were me filling a brute can from the bathtub with 5 gallon buckets (temp tested with my hand) then adding salt, let it mix and pumped back into tank. My ATO was "oh crap tank needs water" when return line started shooting air bubbles in the display. So it was no wonder the first coral I bought ( small zoa frag ) just melted away when I put it in my tank. Looking back with the temp and salinity swings I'm surprised my fish were alive. I then had a power outage at my house that lasted 7 days that ended my reef tank dreams. The tank was torn down and moved to storage in my basement for years.
NOW:
Years later I finished my basement and as I was furnishing it my reef dreams resurfaced. Who am I kidding they never really left just ended in epic failure. So I pulled out the old tank, slapped a few pieces of trim on the stand, a coat of paint to match the walls, and got the "were doing this again" from the wife. I explained to her how much better it was gonna be this time around because I had a tool at my disposal I didn't have the first time around.... YOU TUBE !! and so the journey begins....
GOALS:
2-3yrs success with this tank so I can upgrade to something bigger
Share coral growth pics cause that's what everyone wants to see
Learn a thing or two along the way
Not end in epic failure

Nuff words time for pics

47006.jpeg

This was initial pic for wifes approval
 
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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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Since I'm not trying to break the bank but not trying to do a full budget build I decided to build a reef pi controller. I'll prolly change this in the future because I want to move the relays to where my electric receptacles are.
20210522_165358.jpg
I put in a pwm board for 10v out but havent used it. I also made a board so I can add more temp sensors if I need in the future. Currently I have 2 connected

Adding LEDS to the stand
20210521_150614.jpg
 
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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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Next it was on to plumbing. The tank only had two holes one for drain and one for return using a durso setup that it originally came with so i plumbed it up and added some water
20210529_164856.jpg
I quickly learned this was not gonna work as the drain was super bubbly and acting like a skimmer in the filter sock and my skimmer water outlet was just dumping out bubbly water also

Begin plumbing fiasco .... don't worry i eventually get there

So I tried to make a reverse durso to fix my bubbly drain but it was just a loud gurgling mess so it had to go. I also bought a new skimmer (bubble magus curve 5) and began breaking it in
48291.jpeg

I then decided to change the plumbing and go full siphon so I ditched all the durso pipework and put in a ball valve from home depot..

20211101_185836.jpg


That didn't last long before it became an issue making fine adjustments. Should have bit the bullet and just bought a gate valve so....
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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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I added a carbon/gfo reactor and a cheap grow light i got from amazon that fit perfect in the fuge of the sump. The brackets holding the light are just one I designed and 3d printed. I changed those up too to hold the light lower i was getting lots of light spillage into skimmer and return section.
20210702_001521.jpg

Filtration is now done.... or is it ? When budget allows I'm gonna replace QuietOne pump with dual dc pumps for redundancy and to be quieter.
 
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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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For Lights I decided to go with a T5 LED hybrid. I got the Aquatic Life 48' fixture and 2 AI prime 16's. When I mounted the fixture I had to remove the boards on top of original canopy. Needless to say this looked totally ridiculous. Not to mention the canopy was really to short for the tank so that meant time for a new canopy.. Buy or DIY?
DIY of course
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I used garden underlayment paper for the black part ... I'm such a cheapskate sometimes... I left the light hanging from ceiling so i can easliy remove canopy for maintenance.
 
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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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I've been testing like crazy and after I had a bunch of frags in the tank and noticed my ALK going down I figured it was time to start dosing. I already have reef pi up and running so I thought about DIY dosing. Most of the time I DIY but sometimes I don't wanna mess with it. I also spent like a month setting up my reef pi and a month of me manually dosing was prolly not gonna go well.
Enter Red Sea reef dose 4 and DIY Voss holders and dose line clips (i gotta DIY some part of the dose system)
20211213_170409[1].jpg
20211213_170422[1].jpg
 
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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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Some AOI Zoas I got from the LFS. Took a while before any new heads started growing but seems to be taking off now.
 

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RynosaurusRex

RynosaurusRex

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These were the first Zoas I put in the tank. GreenBay Packers or something? I dont know... All I do know is there growing
 

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RynosaurusRex

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Did my first mail order coral from Top Shelf Aquatics.. Everything looks goods and I got my first acros
 

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Mastering the art of locking and unlocking water pathways: What type of valves do you have on your aquarium plumbing?

  • Ball valves.

    Votes: 68 52.3%
  • Gate valves.

    Votes: 67 51.5%
  • Check valves.

    Votes: 33 25.4%
  • None.

    Votes: 29 22.3%
  • Other.

    Votes: 9 6.9%
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