My 50 gallon slice of the ocean

[LEOreefer]

great build sir! I just read from the 1st post. I have the Sca 90 gal and was playing around with the 50 for a Seahorse tank.
a few questions for ya:
I wanted to do the ghost over flow as well. did Steve charge for the drilling?
how do you like the overflow?
noise level?
anything else I should know about that overflow? if you had to do it over would you still go with it?
if you dont mind can you post some more pics of it top down shots if you can. thanks

I love the ikea apex box I have been meaning to do the same.

The apex box was the best thing I could have done. I don't consider myself to have a ton of equipment but this is what I do have
-hydra 52hd
-2 max gyres 230
-heater
-return pump
-2 nano power head in sump for circulation
-skimmer
-light for cheto reactor
-pump for cheto reactor
-pump for carbon reactor
-led light for apex cabinet
-light for under tank
-"mood " lighting on back of tank
-light for storage cabinet
-all apex probes
-wifi router

All those are ran into the apex controll cabinet and holy crap what a mess. I tried 3 times to organize the mess but it didn't help. The false back with control board keeps everything clean and tidy while also protecting from water and salt creep

 

[LEOreefer]

So today I decided to redo my aqua scape. I liked my old one but felt it was to bulky and took up to much room. So I came up with this and love it! This is the final scape as I used putty to secure the rocks

 

[LEOreefer]

I also starting to dive into the apex programming. I have been reading a ton over the last few weeks and feel like I have a pretty good idea on what's going on. Shout out to @msab for being such a huge help with programming and I still have a ton of questions I'm sure. Today I hooked a low level optical sensor into my ATO and a high water level sensor into my sump. Here's some pics as well has my bear final control board

 

[LEOreefer]

And for @Devaji some pics of the shadow overflow. There kind of hard to see on the black background

 

[needbiggertanks]

I like the scape redo. Looks good

 

[msab]

So are you adding the water and salt this weekend? What salt mix do you plan on using?

 

[LEOreefer]

So are you adding the water and salt this weekend? What salt mix do you plan on using?

Ugh you ask the question I've been battling with. I was thinking maybe reef crystals or Red Sea. I have a a lot of overtime at work so it's doubtful that I will have water in this weekend! Now another issue is what do I do withe a new tank while on on the honey moon lol

 

[LEOreefer]

I like the scape redo. Looks good

Thanks ! I'm much happier with this scape

 

[Barrett]

Ugh you ask the question I've been battling with. I was thinking maybe reef crystals or Red Sea. I have a a lot of overtime at work so it's doubtful that I will have water in this weekend! Now another issue is what do I do withe a new tank while on on the honey moon lol

I have been using the HW Reefer salt mix and love it. When is the honey moon? Ideally you could have the tank cycled and let it go through some of the uglies while you are away.

 

[Barrett]

So today I decided to redo my aqua scape. I liked my old one but felt it was to bulky and took up to much room. So I came up with this and love it! This is the final scape as I used putty to secure the rocks

What are you going to use for sand? Are you concerned about the gyres sorting up the sand? I can't wait for you to get water in and test the flow to see how you like the gyres in that tank.

 

[LEOreefer]

I have been using the HW Reefer salt mix and love it. When is the honey moon? Ideally you could have the tank cycled and let it go through some of the uglies while you are away.

The honeymoon is oct 24 -Nov 5th. That was the plan I was going with a cycle and let it run it's coarse going into October and live stock when I get back.

 

[LEOreefer]

What are you going to use for sand? Are you concerned about the gyres sorting up the sand? I can't wait for you to get water in and test the flow to see how you like the gyres in that tank.

I'm deff not going to use a sugar sized sand as I do thing the gyres will be strong. I moved them vertically on the back wall so there will be a ton of flow. I'm also not a fan of the crushed coral type sand so I'll prob settle on a grain size in between

 

[fishunt-72]

Are you happy with the overall quality of the tank? Did you have to send Steve your overflow for them to drill it properly? I'm in the process of having SC build a custom sized tank for me. My concern is they're $900 less than most of the quotes I received.

 

[LEOreefer]

Are you happy with the overall quality of the tank? Did you have to send Steve your overflow for them to drill it properly? I'm in the process of having SC build a custom sized tank for me. My concern is they're $900 less than most of the quotes I received.

The tank quality is extremely good and I'm very happy with it! All his tanks I believed are drilled for a 16" shadow overflow and they do not install it. You have to order and install the overflow itself. I did extensive research and I really couldn't find anything bad about there tanks.

 

[fishunt-72]

Yeah,I wasted all of last weekend reading through 90 pages on another forum about their tanks. I already have the Shadow overflow. My original plan was to install it on a Cadlights 50 that I have, but I now think I want a 120. As far as your choice of sand goes, I've always used Caribsea Fiji Pink & have been really happy with it.

 

[Barrett]

Yeah,I wasted all of last weekend reading through 90 pages on another forum about their tanks. I already have the Shadow overflow. My original plan was to install it on a Cadlights 50 that I have, but I now think I want a 120. As far as your choice of sand goes, I've always used Caribsea Fiji Pink & have been really happy with it.

I use Fiji pink in my tank as well, did have a little sand blowing around but after a few water changes and cleaning the sand I have got all the fine particles out that get in the water column when the sand is disturbed. I love my sc 50 so much I just ordered a 90 cube that will be drilled for a shadow overflow.

 

[LEOreefer]

I use Fiji pink in my tank as well, did have a little sand blowing around but after a few water changes and cleaning the sand I have got all the fine particles out that get in the water column when the sand is disturbed. I love my sc 50 so much I just ordered a 90 cube that will be drilled for a shadow overflow.

I look forward to hopefully seeing a build thread for the 90! I love the cube tanks I feel as though they make everything so visually appealing

 

[Barrett]

I look forward to hopefully seeing a build thread for the 90! I love the cube tanks I feel as though they make everything so visually appealing

It will be awhile as I just ordered it yesterday, I will slowly accumulate all the equipment, while still improving my 50 cube I have now.

 

[Barrett]

What return pump did you end up going with? I just got a jaebo dcp5000 to replace the stock sca pump that came with the pnp kit. I wanted to be able to dial it up and down and pause at feeding time.

 

[LEOreefer]

What return pump did you end up going with? I just got a jaebo dcp5000 to replace the stock sca pump that came with the pnp kit. I wanted to be able to dial it up and down and pause at feeding time.

I originally got the ehiem 3000 which had 792 gallons per hour of flow. I felt this wasn't enough as my drain was wide open and return wide open and I was still getting slight gurgling from the rear box. So I got the ehiem 5000 with 1320 gph flow rate. I haven't tested it yet but I'm sure this will be plenty