Mission Impossible: Reefer 250, 3 reactors, refugium, skimmer, lights, action! Pic heavy.

[Mebeknob]

Nice build!

How are those tube mounts supposed to attach?

Also is there something on the inside floor of the tank? Looks like foam or something

 

[Butuz]

Nice build!

How are those tube mounts supposed to attach?

Also is there something on the inside floor of the tank? Looks like foam or something

Thanks. The probe and doser tube mounts will be glued to the inside wall of the sump. I will figure out placement this weekend. Buy inside floor, if you mean the inside of the cabinet, then, yes, this comes with the Red Sea cabinet.

 

[Zuma]

As others have mentioned great build, the plumbing reminds me of a small water treatment plant!

 

[Butuz]

As others have mentioned great build, the plumbing reminds me of a small water treatment plant!

Hahaha. It is indeed. Joking aside, I was contemplating on adding a UV sterilizer but absolutely was left with no space to do so. That would have truly turned it into a water treatment facility!

 

[Butuz]

Guys, need your input please. I’d like to mount the holder for dosing tubes. As you have seen, kind of running out of space! Also trying to keep it organized. Since my dosing container is on the right of the sump and since I will be mounting the eKoral doser to the panel above the refugium, I am thinking about the positioning in the pic below. I need it slightly higher where it is otherwise it will get in the way when removing the refugium. The only downside I see is that the dosing liquid will drop and travel 5-6 inches before it hits the water. Any downside? Thoughts? I dont want to mount it to the sump wall since then the tubes will be all over the place. The current way, they go up from the dosing container to the doser and straight down to the sump. Appreciate the feedback.

 

[ikolbaba06]

Everything looks great! I will say that you have a lot of media along with a fuge and biopellets planned? You will likely come across too low nutrients unless you are feeding like crazy. Marine pure and what I think you have is matrix will drop nitrates like crazy eventually. You may think about using only one or two of those methods and see how it goes. I use matrix in my tank and I had to pull some out because my nutrient lvls were dropping too fast.

 

[Butuz]

Everything looks great! I will say that you have a lot of media along with a fuge and biopellets planned? You will likely come across too low nutrients unless you are feeding like crazy. Marine pure and what I think you have is matrix will drop nitrates like crazy eventually. You may think about using only one or two of those methods and see how it goes. I use matrix in my tank and I had to pull some out because my nutrient lvls were dropping too fast.

Thanks, - agree. Not intending to feed like crazy. I am likely not to use biopellets until I am forced to. I also talked to Algea Barn guys at length and decided not to use GFO since the fuge and tank will be seeded with copepods after cycling is done. So, reactor 1 will have carbon, reactor 2 in the back (that feeds the refugium) will have miracle mud with low flow. That leaves me with an empty reactor that I was planning on using for biopellets. Any suggestions what to do with it, leave it empty or?

 

[psidriven]

The only downside I see is that the dosing liquid will drop and travel 5-6 inches before it hits the water. Any downside? Thoughts?

If you're dosing chemicals, drops from that height may cause splashes and build up on your sump walls. This should be mainly a visual issue, but may affect your dosing accuracy as well if you're only dosing small amounts.

 

[Butuz]

If you're dosing chemicals, drops from that height may cause splashes and build up on your sump walls. This should be mainly a visual issue, but may affect your dosing accuracy as well if you're only dosing small amounts.

Thanks, makes sense. Dont know yet what I will be dosing.

 

[James Mikell]

You can always make those hard tubes longer so the drop wont be as high.

 

[Butuz]

OK guys. Decided on final placement for both dosing lines and probe holders. Btw, you are going to laugh your @#$ off, but I actually conducted a water drop test to see whether a 4” drop would result in a major splash. I am pleased to report that it does not. Please do not try this at home as this test was conducted in a highly controlled environment by a semi-professional. Dare I say, this just might be the first drop test in the history of R2R. Sigh ... I think @Fritzhamer was right with his diagnosis, I do have an OCD problem ... time to seek professional help ... in the meantime, enjoy the pics!

 

[psidriven]

and knowing is half the battle.

 

[blesk]

Nice build following

 

[Butuz]

Guys, the day has come. She is getting wet! At 75gpd RODI, should be full by tomorrow morning.

 

[Viner87]

Mega attention to detail [emoji1303]

 

[PDR]

Are you leak testing or planning to mix the salt in the tank?

 

[Butuz]

Allright, guys. Done, leak tested (since 9 am), so far so good. Mixed salt. Took a little bit messing with drain valves to fine tune it. Dead silent now. However, Varios 6 is audible, not sure if its supposed to be super silent. MP40 is doing better now, not as noisy. I do have one item that I couldn’t tackle, Nyos 120. It came with no instructions and youtube is either silent on it or something in German. There are two dials, pictured, - what shoild I do? Open it all the way, etc? I played with it, its either pushing lots of bubbles into the skimmer cup or its pushing TONS of microbubbles into the sump area from below. Confused. Do they have a break in period? In the meantime, enjoy the pics of my labor for the past 4 weekends, finally. PS cycling with Seachem Stability.

 

[wesman42]

Most skimmers have a roughly 2-week break-in period. I ran mine at a low-er level, and the cup filled up within 2 hours. It had a drain that I just dumped back into the sump because the tank was still cycling and it's not like there was anything for it to skim out. I just had it on so I could break it in. As for your last reactor...you could save it and run calcium when the time dictates! It's a great way to maintain calcium stability..but it's also pretty advanced and I haven't done enough research to make it worth my time yet.

 

[Butuz]

Most skimmers have a roughly 2-week break-in period. I ran mine at a low-er level, and the cup filled up within 2 hours. It had a drain that I just dumped back into the sump because the tank was still cycling and it's not like there was anything for it to skim out. I just had it on so I could break it in. As for your last reactor...you could save it and run calcium when the time dictates! It's a great way to maintain calcium stability..but it's also pretty advanced and I haven't done enough research to make it worth my time yet.

Thanks, so did you open or close that large valve on Nyos? How about the small one next to it, - open all the way for max air intake? Thanks.

Btw, moved the wet side of the noisy MP40, confirmed, its the wet side as the other one ran silent on that same dry side.

 

[wesman42]

Thanks, so did you open or close that large valve on Nyos? How about the small one next to it, - open all the way for max air intake? Thanks.

Btw, moved the wet side of the noisy MP40, confirmed, its the wet side as the other one ran silent on that same dry side.

Well, I have a reef octopus 110. The valve was closed as far as it would go and it was STILL overkill. I raised it up a little bit on a stand to roughly 9" of water and it was much more manageable adjustment-wise.

Man! Call up Ecotech and let them know their product is pooping on it's first run! From what I hear they have excellent support.