New Red Sea Reefer 525 G2 Deluxe

[AMPalsson]

Having been away from reefing for some 7 or 8 years, I decided to get started again and bought a Red Sea Reefer G2 Deluxe system.
It has been delivered and assembled for the most part.

So far, I have:
Red Sea Reefer G2 525
3 x Red Sea Reefled 90
2 x Red Seas Reef Wave 45
Red Sea Skimmer 600
Great White DC Return Pump 8000

There isn't much to see yet :

My old tank was the one in the attached photo

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Best of luck with the new tank!

 

[Rennurdoar]

Great start so far, welcome back! Looking forward to following along!

 

[AMPalsson]

Mostly ready for water now.

This setup is largely all Red Sea except the return pump which is a Great White DC 8000
This has taken me longer than expected because I have been away from the hobby a long time and things get forgotten.
The biggest headache was probably all the cables and wires and to route them properly and fix into place.
I left the right hand side clear to leave room for a future chiller but only the ATO+ controller and the Return Pump controllers are there.
I decided against using the little reservoir that cam included with the tank because sitting on top of the sump, I was concerned it would syphon feed into the sump and also because it would have been difficult to fill from the front.
Instead I bought a 25 Litre container that I stand next to the cabinet.

Only thing I am disappointed with so far is the plumbing for the returns.
It is quite close to the back and the right end of the sump so there is a risk the pump pay touch the sump sides and transmit vibrations into the glass with the associated noise.
I am getting the sand and some live rock delivered on Wednesday.

Updates coming later!

 

[AMPalsson]

Tank is wet!
I have filled up with salt water. Special Grade Seafloor sand and some 50kg Live Barrier Reef Rock
Set up flow schedules in the ReefWave pumps and a single light schedule (running at some 60% for now)
My observations so far and issues encountered:
1. The skimmer sits in the back section of the sump (refugium section??). I set the level according to the build manual (baffle 1cm below the top of the track) which has the water some 6 or 7cm too deep for the skimmer. To compensate, I made a stand out of egg crate to lift the skimmer but I should most likely just lower the level down to the 18-20cm recommended for the Skimmer.
My question is, do people typically run the skimmer in the back section or do they raise it up and have in the front where you cannot adjust the level?
2. I ended up with too much sand. I bought two 20lb bags of sand and dumped the lot into the tank before filling up with saltwater. Now, I have up to 1.5" deep sand in sections where the ReefWaves blow the sand into a hill. I will probably have to syphon off some of it
3. Lights are fantastic but I wish there was an on-off switch on the lights themselves, rather than have to go through the Super Slow ReefBeats app
4. On the positive, - this tank and the whole kit oozes quality! It wasn't the cheapest but you get what you pay for, I guess

 

[Tahiti]

You Aussie's must have some killer LFS. I mean you could just go to the GBR yourself and pick out what you want

 

[Lebowski_]

I actually love your rock wall in the old photo. Seems like every reef now a days is trying to create some kind of minimalist aquascape, but to me they just look like manicured lawns not reef tanks. Love seeing lots of live rock, I am sure the fish love it too.

 

[TheSharksDen]

I have my skimmer sitting on the bottom glass of the sump in the rear middle not elevated. Look at picture.

 

[dschuffert]

That is a great-looking tank. Welcome back!

 

[TheSharksDen]

Better view with lights on.

 

[FernBluffReef]

Using both socks plus the reef Matt? I believe socks come out in lieu of the Matt and then both the Matt and Skimmer fit up front and leave the fuge available should you desire.

I’m still waiting on my 525. One nice side of what you’ve done is the little ATO tank remains, I don’t think when setup to spec that can remain. Something to consider but either way I don’t think I’d keep the socks installed.

Very nice tank. Wish I could get rock like that.

 

[TheSharksDen]

Using both socks plus the reef Matt? I believe socks come out in lieu of the Matt and then both the Matt and Skimmer fit up front and leave the fuge available should you desire.

I’m still waiting on my 525. One nice side of what you’ve done is the little ATO tank remains, I don’t think when setup to spec that can remain. Something to consider but either way I don’t think I’d keep the socks installed.

Very nice tank. Wish I could get rock like that.

I left the socks also because the UV pump brings the water back to the front department that over flows where the socks go. Is it bad to have to much filtration? Honest question.

I like the top off tank (5 gallons) down there so it doesn’t have a container beside it line I had before but the included ball float value is garbage. I added a small pump inside it and that’s what the PVC pipe is for coming out of it to hold the water line in place so it won’t fall out and drain outside the sump.

here is a better pics of the rocks a year later.

Excited to see yours come together! Make sure to post pics!

 

[FernBluffReef]

Nice. I like the idea of leveraging the little tank that comes with also as you say you don’t need makeup water stored beside the cabinet although I assume it only lasts a few days at most.

I don’t believe extra filtering is a significant issue just not necessary and with a Matt roller I wondered why? So your UV is pulling water from later in the sump and then back to the beginning to be re-filtered? If I understood that correctly, I understand that isn’t optimal for a UV but it also helps me understand how you’re keeping flow in the area with the socks. Interesting idea. I’m penciling all these sorts of things down as I decide how to setup my sump in the end. Right now I’m leaning towards standing in the UV up in the sump and then pumping between compartments as you have done but have not concluded which compartments.

Thanks for the sharing and the ideas.

 

[TheSharksDen]

Here is inside pics of how I did my sump. I circled the UV tube in blue so you could see which chamber it takes from and returns to, the same chamber as the emergency overflow.

Thoughts?

 

[FernBluffReef]

So the UV is behind the stand? I have wood laminate floors so at this point I think mine will most likely be in the sump standing or mounted above to lessen risk of minor spills . My gut tells me I will remove the socks and put the matt roller in the sock chamber.

The chamber you have your roller installed, I now understand to be the optional refugium chamber. I plan on a refugium so I will put a fuge light there, but also am thinking I may stand the UV up in that chamber or mount on the panel above. I think I will then try and pump filtered water to the UV from the roller over the refugium wall to minimize unnecessarily recirculating.

It’s possible I may eventually install a second return and run the UV off of one at a lower rate, that is nirvana, but may not happen for a while. I would not expect such to be all that difficult as both of our tanks are already drilled for such - just requires plumbing which I’m terrified/terrible at.

Back to yours. Obviously what you have works and that is what matters most. As I understand it, the experts suggest not doing the way you have as it’s less effective, recirculating some water repetitively but really the volume being recirculated in the end isn’t all that significant IMO and is there any real harm in doing so, Not really. I personally will be very happy if mine is as mature as yours after understanding it’s about a year up.

 

[TheSharksDen]

So the UV is behind the stand? I have wood laminate floors so at this point I think mine will most likely be in the sump standing or mounted above to lessen risk of minor spills . My gut tells me I will remove the socks and put the matt roller in the sock chamber.

The chamber you have your roller installed, I now understand to be the optional refugium chamber. I plan on a refugium so I will put a fuge light there, but also am thinking I may stand the UV up in that chamber or mount on the panel above. I think I will then try and pump filtered water to the UV from the roller over the refugium wall to minimize unnecessarily recirculating.

It’s possible I may eventually install a second return and run the UV off of one at a lower rate, that is nirvana, but may not happen for a while. I would not expect such to be all that difficult as both of our tanks are already drilled for such - just requires plumbing which I’m terrified/terrible at.

Back to yours. Obviously what you have works and that is what matters most. As I understand it, the experts suggest not doing the way you have as it’s less effective, recirculating some water repetitively but really the volume being recirculated in the end isn’t all that significant IMO and is there any real harm in doing so, Not really. I personally will be very happy if mine is as mature as yours after understanding it’s about a year up.

That’s why I was asking! Lol I am still very new myself in this hobby (2-years). And when I got to local places here I get different answers depending on who I talk to. My UV light does sit on the ground behind my tank but it’s almost as long as the whole tank and wouldnt fit inside the bottom area.

My first tank I had a RS-170 was a used tank and had stuff in it. This tank I didn’t splurge on. I now want to look at this and possibly move stuff around. So should the water go from the sump into the UV pump/light and then pump directly into the display instead of the front chamber and recirculating? Can you explain your thoughts a little more to me so I can understand what you’re thinking? I’m 100% up to changing my stuff.

Yeah I don’t mind doing plumbing but the reason I used this way was I cut a soft hose and used clamp connected to prevent leaks. Plus I have the leak detector with the Apex back there.

Thoughts? And I need to look up and do some research on a refugium.

 

[CasperOe]

Welcome back into the hobby- and welcome to R2R! What a beauty of a tank you're coming back in with! Thanks for bringing us along, will be looking forward to seeing where it will land!

 

[FernBluffReef]

That’s why I was asking! Lol I am still very new myself in this hobby (2-years). And when I got to local places here I get different answers depending on who I talk to. My UV light does sit on the ground behind my tank but it’s almost as long as the whole tank and wouldnt fit inside the bottom area.

My first tank I had a RS-170 was a used tank and had stuff in it. This tank I didn’t splurge on. I now want to look at this and possibly move stuff around. So should the water go from the sump into the UV pump/light and then pump directly into the display instead of the front chamber and recirculating? Can you explain your thoughts a little more to me so I can understand what you’re thinking? I’m 100% up to changing my stuff.

Yeah I don’t mind doing plumbing but the reason I used this way was I cut a soft hose and used clamp connected to prevent leaks. Plus I have the leak detector with the Apex back there.

Thoughts? And I need to look up and do some research on a refugium.

Been 20 years since I had my 180g reef and never cared back then - we just grew coral, clams and fish. We did have a few undesirables from real Fiji rock and I didn’t do much SPS back then - largely I did LPS so think hammers, torches, etc. along with the clams and fish.

Just coming back into the hobby now, I can also be considered a newbie so take some of my input in that context/grain of salt. Heck I don’t have my new DT tank yet (damaged twice in shipping, waiting for the third attempt) so trying to plan out some of my stuff hence why i asked some questions/observations of you having the same equipment.

I’ve been thru it all persay, but it’s been a long long time and lots has changed and lots forgotten. I’ll need to pull some pics of my old reef, I had corals so large we figured they needed to go back to the ocean at the time (no we didn’t and wouldn’t). That and most of the pics I have are from towards when I was retiring the reef hence not feeding the corals as they were just too big (trying to slow their growth) and as a result dealing with some algae etc as we needed to grow out elsewhere and had to move where the reef wasn’t practical anymore.

Anyway back to question

As I understand it, if we’re going to do UV in the sump - which you’re doing and I’m likely to do the same. The optimum is to take in the cleanest water into the UV we can - so I tentatively plan to pump water from post the Matt filter and then output somewhere downstream from there (most likely to the fuge or the skimmer compartment) - to avoid recirculating the same water over and over again reducing the effectiveness of the UV. I tentatively plan to output mine into the refugium but if that doesn’t work to the skimmer compartment.

In your case, if I understand correctly. You’re taking the cleanest water possible into the UV which is good (Ie from the return pump compartment and then pumping it directly back to the beginning (sock filter) which is bad (relatively speaking). As a result you’re filtering a lot of water over and over again. So as I understand it you should reorder things so as to avoid recirculating the same water. Could be I misunderstand how you have plumbed.

The even better option, which I’m reluctant to do as again I’m terrible with plumbing / reluctant to cut the Red Sea plumbing is to leave your UV pump where it is - in the return and send the UV output directly into the display. To do that as our tanks already have dual returns you’d remove the y pipe Red Sea provides that joins the two returns together and split it in half. Sending UV sterilized water up one return line and the other connected to your main return.

Hope that’s helpful

 

[FernBluffReef]

Hey AMpallson. Just discovered that SharkDen and I hijacked your build thread. New to the forum sorry for mixing up OPs. We will carry on further on our own threads. Again apologies. Please keep us up to date as to your tanks progress.

 

[TheSharksDen]

Been 20 years since I had my 180g reef and never cared back then - we just grew coral, clams and fish. We did have a few undesirables from real Fiji rock and I didn’t do much SPS back then - largely I did LPS so think hammers, torches, etc. along with the clams and fish.

Just coming back into the hobby now, I can also be considered a newbie so take some of my input in that context/grain of salt. Heck I don’t have my new DT tank yet (damaged twice in shipping, waiting for the third attempt) so trying to plan out some of my stuff hence why i asked some questions/observations of you having the same equipment.

I’ve been thru it all persay, but it’s been a long long time and lots has changed and lots forgotten. I’ll need to pull some pics of my old reef, I had corals so large we figured they needed to go back to the ocean at the time (no we didn’t and wouldn’t). That and most of the pics I have are from towards when I was retiring the reef hence not feeding the corals as they were just too big (trying to slow their growth) and as a result dealing with some algae etc as we needed to grow out elsewhere and had to move where the reef wasn’t practical anymore.

Anyway back to question

As I understand it, if we’re going to do UV in the sump - which you’re doing and I’m likely to do the same. The optimum is to take in the cleanest water into the UV we can - so I tentatively plan to pump water from post the Matt filter and then output somewhere downstream from there (most likely to the fuge or the skimmer compartment) - to avoid recirculating the same water over and over again reducing the effectiveness of the UV. I tentatively plan to output mine into the refugium but if that doesn’t work to the skimmer compartment.

In your case, if I understand correctly. You’re taking the cleanest water possible into the UV which is good (Ie from the return pump compartment and then pumping it directly back to the beginning (sock filter) which is bad (relatively speaking). As a result you’re filtering a lot of water over and over again. So as I understand it you should reorder things so as to avoid recirculating the same water. Could be I misunderstand how you have plumbed.

The even better option, which I’m reluctant to do as again I’m terrible with plumbing / reluctant to cut the Red Sea plumbing is to leave your UV pump where it is - in the return and send the UV output directly into the display. To do that as our tanks already have dual returns you’d remove the y pipe Red Sea provides that joins the two returns together and split it in half. Sending UV sterilized water up one return line and the other connected to your main return.

Hope that’s helpful

Thank you for the detailed reply! I’m going to look into this on my days off this week. I get exactly what your saying and didn’t see that at first.