New Swiss 1900 liter (500G) Build

[Mortie31]

How do you run the tank water through them? If I understand correctly they take 20mm connections so I'd have to put together a dedicated pump and piping to run water through it?

I run mine off a small pump, but they could be Teed into a return pump line

 

[Laith]

I've got my hands on a decent DSLR camera (Canon D70) so once I've learned how to use it for reef tank pics I'll try to get some pics of coral and fish...

 

[Laith]

Beginning of the next phase of the uglies ;Wideyed

GHA... and it ended up covering my back wall too. Long thick strands ;Rage .

Hence my first new fish purchase:

These pics are still just iPhone pics. Need to get that DSLR out!

 

[Laith]

I'm still showing pretty much zero PO4 and NO3. I'm pretty sure that's because the back wall of the DT has become a super macro algae refugium that's sucking it all up! ;Shamefullyembarrased

So I manually scraped everything off the back wall, took out lots of it and let the rollermat take out the rest. Speaking of which, this thing works very well... and beats washing filter socks! ;Joyful

 

[Laith]

Today I'll be receiving another two yellow tangs and a kole tang... and a sea hare. That should help get through this ugly bit!

Will be interesting to see how the current yellow tang reacts to suddenly having some competition. I hope that by adding three tangs in one go that it will dissipate any aggression and let them settle in better.

 

[Laith]

Also purchased one of these. I had one on my other tank and really liked it. The new style Tunze Care Magnet works well but the Flipper Max saves time as it covers a larger surface area. I use the Tunze on the bottom of the glass as that is really good at avoiding grinding gravel against the glass.

 

[Laith]

Skimmer silently (very silently!) working away. Haven't hooked it up to the Avast bucket yet but I did add the tap to make it easier to empty.

The swabbie wipes down the inside of the neck very well... I have it running for five minutes every six hours. Allows for very consistent skimming.

 

[Laith]

And I replaced the two Tunze osmolator magnetic sensor supports with these Tunze rail supports. I've set one slightly lower than the other. The magnet supports did not give me confidence as they didn't grip very well across the 19mm PVC wall of the sump. Now I sleep better! ;Happy

You can also see the GHL high sump level sensor (the grey float sensor). I'll cut the acrylic rod that holds it much shorter. At the moment this just turns off the skimmer to keep it from overflowing (and sends me an alarm). The osmolators have their own high level float sensors that turn them off.

And I hooked up the RE reactor, filled with a liter of carbon. It's hooked up directly to the return pump I had running on my old tank, a Red Dragon 50, with a ball valve to regulate the flow. On my list of projects is to put together a manifold with three or four outlets powered by this pump...

 

[Laith]

And when I was testing the reaction of the system when return pumps were turned off, individually and both, I discovered a surprising (at least to me) problem. As a reminder, I have two return pumps on two return lines, each pump running at 50%.

I have my return lines ending about 1-1.5cm under the DT water level. The sump can easily handle that amount of water flowing back through the return lines until the outlets are above water and break the siphons.

However: if one return pump was turned off and the second return pump continued running, the running pump kept the DT water level at a point where the siphon did NOT break on the return line of the pump that was turned off... So I ended up with very little water going over the overflow as most of the water pumped up by the working pump was coming back down the return line that had now become a 40mm drain pipe!

And when I turned the second pump back on, it struggled to start pumping water up the return line that was now a drain. The impeller was spinning so fast in the wrong direction that it could not start pumping water up the return line.

After a discussion with Ridgeway (he of SWUBE fame on Ultimate Reef), he suggested putting in a siphon break higher up on the return outlet by drilling a 6mm hole in the pipe and using some 1/4" tubing and a 90 degree bend to have that break just barely under the normal DT water level.

Like this:

And this on the second return:

And voila! problem solved. Now the siphon breaks even if one pump keeps running. And as the return is no longer acting as a drain, when the pump comes back on it has no problem starting up and running normally.

I'm thinking about having a second one of these on each return in case one gets blocked but that isn't urgent at the moment. I'll look at doing that before the next time I'm planning on being away from the tank for a long period.

Many thanks to Ridgeway for the advice! ;Happy

 

[Laith]

And from my favourite source of coral... thanks Ridgeway!

and nine others. Beautiful pieces but the iPhone shots don't do them justice so I'll stop there.

Now to get going on that DSLR practice!! ;Shamefullyembarrased

 

[Laith]

And the final part of the renovation of the living/dining room area is almost finished: laying parquet flooring over the tile we had...

Here you can see the "before":

And now:

Very happy with the result! ;Joyful ;Happy

 

[najer]

Nice work, get that camera fired up!

 

[eonflux123]

Now for the construction of the two water tanks, one for fresh saltwater and one for RO/DI topup water...

RO/DI tank:

And the fresh saltwater tank:

This is amazing! What material are you using for the sump/tanks to seal it?! Are you melting them? Silicone? Friction?

 

[Laith]

This is amazing! What material are you using for the sump/tanks to seal it?! Are you melting them? Silicone? Friction?

The tanks are made out of solid 19mm PVC panels glued together with PVC glue. For good measure the builder also screwed the panels together though I don't think that was necessary.

 

[Laith]

Nice work, get that camera fired up!

;Bookworm ;Wideyed

 

[Laith]

UPS delivery ;Happy

 

[Laith]

Well packaged... even with insulation foil.

All healthy! ;Joyful

 

[Laith]

The shipment had:

- 2x yellow tangs (Zebrasoma flavescens)
- 1x Kole tang (Tenochaetus strigosus)
- 1x Lawnmower blenny (Salarias fasciatus)
- 1x Sea hare (Dolabella auricularia)
- 1x Tuxedo urchin (Mespilia globulus)

So now livestock consists of:

- 3x yellow tangs (Zebrasoma flavescens)
- 1x Kole tang (Tenochaetus strigosus)
- 1x Lawnmower blenny (Salarias fasciatus)
- 1x Sea hare (Dolabella auricularia)
- 2x Tuxedo urchins (Mespilia globulus)
- 1x Coral beauty angelfish (Centropyge bispinosa)
- 1x Foxface rabbitfish (Siganus vulpinus)
- 2x Black & White Clownfish (Amphiprion ocellaris)
- 2x Blue damselfish (Chrysiptera cyanea)
- 2x Cleaner shrimp (Lysmata amboinensis)
- 1x large black brittle starfish (Ophiocomina nigra) that came tiny with my original live rock...
- 4x Fighting conch snails (Strombus sp)
- 7-8x Nassarius snails
- About 20-25x Trochus snails

I've never been good at using the Latin species names for fish or coral but I'm trying to learn! Many of the reefers I know rattle off the species names and I usually have no idea what they're talking about ;Wideyed ;Shamefullyembarrased ;Shamefullyembarrased .

 

[MrWheelock]

Thats pretty awesome! They even gave youa drip manifold and tubing to acclimate!

 

[Laith]

Thats pretty awesome! They even gave youa drip manifold and tubing to acclimate!

Yes... for free too! ;Happy