I will do my best to keep the full tank shot up to date. Updated 5/14/21
Heres were things start to get fun!
I am finally setting up a new tank after some time out of the hobby. The wife and I purchased a home back in December and I've had a nagging thought in my mind that I would like to setup a new reef aquarium. After some discussions and negotiating it seems like we finally have an agreement. The past few months I've also been doing a ton of research on what's changed in the hobby and been reading through loads of build threads here on r2r. I've been plotting and planning and it's finally time to get the ball rolling on this.
First stop the location:
The tank will go in our first floor living area which will be my man cave... safe space? I'm not sure what the kids are calling these days. But it will have a wine fridge, my xbox and reef tank!
The tank will be custom made. I'm still courting some manufactures and have not put a deposit yet. once that is finalized and I have a deposit out there, I will add the manufacturer to the thread. The tank will be 280 gallons, 84x32x24". Placed on a custom steel stand, with removable panels. The sump will likely be from reef synergy, a ts60 xl in storm cloud. I will order the tank and sump at the same time. probably within the next month.
This is where the tank will be placed, I'm happy that this time the tank will go on a tile floor, last tank left some water damage that we had to fix when we sold. Our house is a duplex, the tank will be on our first floor which is a concrete slab, so no reinforcing the floor to be done either.
This week things started moving along with the first purchases. I woke up on Tuesday morning, and BRS had a sale! I decided to grab my rock while it was 10% off. I went with about 200 lbs of Marco rocks, mostly shelf rock but I was thinking some of the regular rock mixed in would be nice. This will be my first time using dry rock. Live rock is hard to get these days and I don't want to deal with pests. I also want to take my time and aquascape the tank over a period of weeks and get it perfect. I will aquascape it on the table and then cement sections of it together. Depending on how far out the tank is at the point I decide I'm satisfied with the aquascape I may begin cycling the rock in a garbage can. My shipment of rock will be arriving tomorrow and I cant wait to get started with it.
Today we had an electrician in to add two dedicated 20a circuits to power the tank! I will be splitting the load between the two circuits, specifically making sure that my two return pumps will be split between the two.
The circuits run from the breaker, through the outside wall and around the house. It was a lot easier to do it this way than poking holes in the sheet rock all over the place. I think they did a nice job and its not that much of an eyesore.
Now that the electrical work is done, I will start working on the fishroom. Unfortunately, I will still have my sump under my stand for this build. The only way to do it would have been to annex the neighbors first floor, lol.
The fish room, will be just a short walk down the hallway and will contain, my saltwater mixing station, rodi reservoir, fish and coral QT systems, a work bench and a slop sink.
Fishroom photo is below, its got a ways to go but I have a layout. The scratching post will be a coral QT, right of that will be the fish QT rack, I will probably have 2 or 3 20 gallon long aquariums for fish QT. Then the two Xs on the floor will be my salt and fresh water tanks. Where the cat litter is, lol, I will put a 3' rolling work bench and where the air purifier is, will be my slop sink. Nothing is really finalized here, I just wanted to get an idea that everything comfortably fits.
Next steps and updates will be on aquascaping, installing the slop sink and likely ordering the tank / sump! I can't wait to continue to post about the tank as it progresses.
Heres were things start to get fun!
I am finally setting up a new tank after some time out of the hobby. The wife and I purchased a home back in December and I've had a nagging thought in my mind that I would like to setup a new reef aquarium. After some discussions and negotiating it seems like we finally have an agreement. The past few months I've also been doing a ton of research on what's changed in the hobby and been reading through loads of build threads here on r2r. I've been plotting and planning and it's finally time to get the ball rolling on this.
First stop the location:
The tank will go in our first floor living area which will be my man cave... safe space? I'm not sure what the kids are calling these days. But it will have a wine fridge, my xbox and reef tank!
The tank will be custom made. I'm still courting some manufactures and have not put a deposit yet. once that is finalized and I have a deposit out there, I will add the manufacturer to the thread. The tank will be 280 gallons, 84x32x24". Placed on a custom steel stand, with removable panels. The sump will likely be from reef synergy, a ts60 xl in storm cloud. I will order the tank and sump at the same time. probably within the next month.
This is where the tank will be placed, I'm happy that this time the tank will go on a tile floor, last tank left some water damage that we had to fix when we sold. Our house is a duplex, the tank will be on our first floor which is a concrete slab, so no reinforcing the floor to be done either.
This week things started moving along with the first purchases. I woke up on Tuesday morning, and BRS had a sale! I decided to grab my rock while it was 10% off. I went with about 200 lbs of Marco rocks, mostly shelf rock but I was thinking some of the regular rock mixed in would be nice. This will be my first time using dry rock. Live rock is hard to get these days and I don't want to deal with pests. I also want to take my time and aquascape the tank over a period of weeks and get it perfect. I will aquascape it on the table and then cement sections of it together. Depending on how far out the tank is at the point I decide I'm satisfied with the aquascape I may begin cycling the rock in a garbage can. My shipment of rock will be arriving tomorrow and I cant wait to get started with it.
Today we had an electrician in to add two dedicated 20a circuits to power the tank! I will be splitting the load between the two circuits, specifically making sure that my two return pumps will be split between the two.
The circuits run from the breaker, through the outside wall and around the house. It was a lot easier to do it this way than poking holes in the sheet rock all over the place. I think they did a nice job and its not that much of an eyesore.
Now that the electrical work is done, I will start working on the fishroom. Unfortunately, I will still have my sump under my stand for this build. The only way to do it would have been to annex the neighbors first floor, lol.
The fish room, will be just a short walk down the hallway and will contain, my saltwater mixing station, rodi reservoir, fish and coral QT systems, a work bench and a slop sink.
Fishroom photo is below, its got a ways to go but I have a layout. The scratching post will be a coral QT, right of that will be the fish QT rack, I will probably have 2 or 3 20 gallon long aquariums for fish QT. Then the two Xs on the floor will be my salt and fresh water tanks. Where the cat litter is, lol, I will put a 3' rolling work bench and where the air purifier is, will be my slop sink. Nothing is really finalized here, I just wanted to get an idea that everything comfortably fits.
Next steps and updates will be on aquascaping, installing the slop sink and likely ordering the tank / sump! I can't wait to continue to post about the tank as it progresses.
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