Blitheran
Valuable Member
Alright! New build here we come!
I am extremely busy with work and with a new opportunity on the horizon this tank set up will be a little bit slow (potentially moving). My envision though is an SPS dominated reef with a floating aqua scape.
Equipment starting plan
Tank: Red Sea Reefer 170
Lighting: One XR-15 Gen 4 Pro
Flow: Two MP10 QDw
Controller: Neptune Apex
Rock: Rubble Rock glued and epoxied
Protein Skimmer: Nyos 120
Return Pump: Reef Octopus Return Pump
ATO: Tunze Nano ATO
To kick off this journey, I scored a used fish tank loaded with all the bells and whistles—Nyos skimmer, Clarisea, ATO, XR15, and a Reefer 170—all for a steal. I couldn’t pass it up.
First step was hauling the entire setup home and giving everything a deep clean.
Here’s a shot of me in the thick of it—scrubbing away while the garage looked like a total disaster zone. (And no, I’m not in the trades—those helmets came with the house when we bought it!)
The next step, after thoroughly cleaning the tank and scrubbing down all the equipment, was building the acrylic shelf. I chose 1/2-inch acrylic for durability. To shape it, I clamped it to my workbench, applied heat with a heat gun, and carefully bent it into a 90-degree angle before letting it cool and set.
Once that was done, I took some reef sale black silicone and siliconed it to the back of the reef tank.
I let that cure for 24 hours and it was ROCK solid!
Next was creating the aqua scape. The design with the scape was, something that is not attached to the acrylic and can actually be removed because moving soon is on the horizon, so I wanted to set my self up for success.
If you see above, I am creating the supporting base to sit perfectly on the acrylic and be a good foundation for the rest of the rock and allow me to be able to lift it off in the near future.
Here is the final result...
And that brings us to the present. I haven’t started the tank yet because it's clean and prepped, and I’ll need to tear it down for the upcoming move anyway. For now, I’ve got it sealed up with Saran wrap and ready to go. In the meantime, I’ve placed the rock in saltwater and added bottled MicroBacter to kickstart colonization. It doesn’t hurt the rock—and since time is on my side, I figured I might as well give it a head start.
I am extremely busy with work and with a new opportunity on the horizon this tank set up will be a little bit slow (potentially moving). My envision though is an SPS dominated reef with a floating aqua scape.
Equipment starting plan
Tank: Red Sea Reefer 170
Lighting: One XR-15 Gen 4 Pro
Flow: Two MP10 QDw
Controller: Neptune Apex
Rock: Rubble Rock glued and epoxied
Protein Skimmer: Nyos 120
Return Pump: Reef Octopus Return Pump
ATO: Tunze Nano ATO
To kick off this journey, I scored a used fish tank loaded with all the bells and whistles—Nyos skimmer, Clarisea, ATO, XR15, and a Reefer 170—all for a steal. I couldn’t pass it up.
First step was hauling the entire setup home and giving everything a deep clean.
Here’s a shot of me in the thick of it—scrubbing away while the garage looked like a total disaster zone. (And no, I’m not in the trades—those helmets came with the house when we bought it!)
The next step, after thoroughly cleaning the tank and scrubbing down all the equipment, was building the acrylic shelf. I chose 1/2-inch acrylic for durability. To shape it, I clamped it to my workbench, applied heat with a heat gun, and carefully bent it into a 90-degree angle before letting it cool and set.
Once that was done, I took some reef sale black silicone and siliconed it to the back of the reef tank.
I let that cure for 24 hours and it was ROCK solid!
Next was creating the aqua scape. The design with the scape was, something that is not attached to the acrylic and can actually be removed because moving soon is on the horizon, so I wanted to set my self up for success.
If you see above, I am creating the supporting base to sit perfectly on the acrylic and be a good foundation for the rest of the rock and allow me to be able to lift it off in the near future.
Here is the final result...
And that brings us to the present. I haven’t started the tank yet because it's clean and prepped, and I’ll need to tear it down for the upcoming move anyway. For now, I’ve got it sealed up with Saran wrap and ready to go. In the meantime, I’ve placed the rock in saltwater and added bottled MicroBacter to kickstart colonization. It doesn’t hurt the rock—and since time is on my side, I figured I might as well give it a head start.
. I just placed the last of my 
