Rick's Reef - a new 150g build

[Rick's Reef]

Hi all,

Well, I just joined R2R and introduced myself in the new member area - but I guess this is the better place to start a build thread . So let's get started...

I ordered a 150g (60 x 24 x 24) tank from SC Aquariums a few months ago. The stand and aquarium have been waiting as I built up the infrastructure. I think/hope I am about 2-3 weeks from filling so I will start posting some pics to document my progress.

The aquarium will be placed in what should be a dining room (but we have a nook and counter in the kitchen and we really can't justify a dining room that will be used 2x/year ...so yay, I get my "fish" room). First step was to prep the room.

Here you can see the wall all ready to go with the following:
1) Two 20A dedicated GFCI lines. The GFCI outlets are actually in the garage and these lines route up through the attic and down to the garage. The only thing on the lines is the fish tank and then in the garage some fish-related gear. There are outlets above a workbench but they are intended for fish stuff only (need to watch that).
2) The higher outlet is the wiring for (4) T5 bulbs as well as a string to pull through the (2) LED power lines. These run to the pantry on the opposite side of the wall. The architectural committee (spouse) did approve (after much debate) giving me the top shelf of the pantry to hold the ballasts, some equipment and the chiller.
3) The other thing in this picture is my bundle of poly lines that go up through the attic to the garage. This bundle carries various connections to my "backroom" setup in the garage. The garage gets pretty warm here in the desert but given my space constraints, I had to choose this option as a trade-off. The connections I have here are:
a) BLUE 1/4" line - fresh RO/DI water (pumped in from ATO reservoir in garage).
b) RED 1/4" line - out-going SW line from return pump that feeds the Calc Reactor.
c) BLACK 1/4" line - incoming SW line from Calc Reactor.
d) WHITE 1/4" line - incoming Kalkwasser.
e) BLACK 3/8" line - outgoing SW from water changes.
f) WHITE 3/8" line - incoming SW for water changes.
g) USB cable - "Aquabus" connection from Neptune controller under tank to the gear in the garage.

On the opposite of the wall is the lighting equipment. 4 dimmable T5 ballasts along with 2 LED ballasts. I am running (4) T5 bulbs along with 2 Kessil AP700's for lighting. Also on the electronics mounting board is an Apex VDM module to control the dimming and an EB8 to power the lights as well as the chiller.

Here is the stand from SC Aquariums (Espresso finish) installed. The bundle hanging from the hole in the wall is 2 molex harnesses I made to support 2 T5 ballasts each. The cord hanging down is to pull the LED power lines back through the wall. Unfortunately, the LED's have the connectors at the END of the line by the ballast instead of by the lights. I wish Kessil did it the other way around so the excess cordage would be by the ballast and make the connection easier but I am sure there are applications that have it the other way around. The sump is a 36g Trigger system sump that I drilled on the left side to take the output from a Theiling Rollermat.

I also built in a 3" dam across the front of the cabinet and then coated the other side, the bottom and about 20" up the back on all sides with Redguard. All told, this should hold about 10 gallons of water in the case of a leak/flood (and there is a leak sensor installed).

And here is a close up view with the rollermat installed. Key notes of interest (hard to see), but the vertical pipe on the left is from the primary overflow from the BeanAnimal setup. This has a gate valve so I can control the flow through the rollermat and again, hard to see, but the horizontal pipe going into the rollermat is a 1" flow monitor from Neptune. The second vertical gate valve is the relief from the overflow to control the flow through the rollermat. Together, these 2 lines are intended to handle 99% of the tank overflow. The 3rd gate valve you can see going into the Sump with no connection will be connected to the open channel silent drain.

Here you can also see 6 little ball valves mounted vertically - (4) 1/4" and (2) 3/8". These are for the various poly lines listed above (fresh water, calc reactor, etc) so that I can shut them off from under the tank. There is a similar manifold in the garage so I can gate them on that end also. All of this is illuminated with an LED strip around the inside of the stand (you can see reflected a little in the rollermat). These lights are purely for maintenance work - not intended for normal use.

Well, I think that is all for now. More pics to come soon.

Cheers,
Rick

 

[ngoodermuth]

Very nice, very well planned out. I look forward to seeing this progress!

 

[Daveobrien]

Has the tank been put on the stand yet? We're ready for it!

 

[Rick's Reef]

The tank is not on the stand yet . Happy hour has been offered to some co-workers for help moving the stand this Friday though!

The set back was caused by my realization that my overflow (which would never leak, right?) was right over my wall outlets, which were a pair of straight 20A plugs. I was not comfortable with this arrangement so I replaced the outlets with splash covers and re-wired the electrical to the tank.

The other thing I realized was that it was going to be a major pain in the rear to plumb my Synergy reef overflow in and get everything lined up once the tank was in place. So out to the garage to measure up and cut some scrap wood I went. I created a jig to hold the Synergy Reef overflow at the exact placement that it would be with the tank in place so that I could plumb in the 3 drains for my BeanAnimal setup. As my sump is full and running, I used some scrap PVC to connect in place of where the tank return couplers would tie in (the white PVC is scrap, the gray are the proper return lines) and then I fit those returns directly into the SynergyReef returns. I have ~1k gph flowing through the system right now with this jig to ensure there are no leaks.

The left return is my emergency. The middle is my main return with 2" flow sensor on it and the right return is the open channel drain that will be dialed in to a trickle.

Soooo...the way is paved for the tank move this Friday and a fill over the weekend .

Rick

 

[Rick's Reef]

I also finished up the canopy frame. I still need to cut and stain the outer shell to match the stand (espresso), but the frame is all done. I have (4) 5' T5 bulbs fitted along with (2) Kessil AP700's. The back 2 T5's are fixed but the front 2 are on a flip up support that allows me to access the tank when open the canopy top. The AP700's are mounted on oak cross bars that can slide back for easier access also. All of the wood is coated with poly.

Across the back of the canopy I have 4 computer fans (super quiet Noctua's with an inline resistor to slow them down) that had left over from various computer builds. These guys are very quiet and I have the outer 2 blowing in and the inner 2 blowing out.

I have to say, I am not super patient with wood (and not a woodworker), but this time I made a point of taking the time to properly countersink the star-head screws and then cover with putty before applying the poly.

 

[Rick's Reef]

Ok, obviously I skipped some posts, but going to try and catch up.

The canopy is not finished yet, but the tank is on the stand, filled and about 2 weeks ago I received my first shipment from Tampa Bay Saltwater! My second shipment is on the plane as I type, so I thought I would post these pics before the second batch arrives.

 

[Rick's Reef]

And after about 6 hours of opening boxes, acclimation and aquascaping, batch 2 is in!

Thanks to tbsaltwater.com for the extra goodies (sponges, gorgonians, etc).

 

[Smprc]

How's the tank doing? Question, that's the 20 inch overflow right? how much flow does your meter read and is it quiet? I can't seem to quiet my overflow, I have the 16" and I get quit a bit of noise from the weir. If I turn the down the return pump to setting 1, then yes silent, but I want the turn over. I have it at setting 4 of 5 and its a Various 8.

 

[Rick's Reef]

Sorry @Smprc, I missed your reply. The tank is doing well. Just added 7 new frags from WWC.

I do have the 20” overflow. I run 2 return pumps, each around 380gph for ~750 total...the delta goes through a GFO/C reactor. The overflow is pretty quiet, not distracting at all.

When I had about 1000gph flowing through it, it was louder from the water flowing into the Synergy box outside of the tank. One thing I would change - I wish the outside box was about an inch taller to give me more margin to tune the bean animal overflow.

 

[915MANG]

Keep the pics coming, I just pulled the trigger for a 150g ;Shamefullyembarrased

 

[LBReefer]

Promising tank. Subscribed. What’s on your fish list?

 

[Rick's Reef]

Thanks for the comments...even though they were 8 months ago . To say I am delinquent in posting an update is quite the understatement.

It's been about 13 months since the water and live rock went in and about 10 months since I last posted pictures . Well, no time like the present so here is an update. BTW, I am on R2R quite a bit but I usually am just a lurker...anyway, here are some updates.

First, the fish list @LBReefer (again, sorry as you asked in May!):
- Mandarin Goby (captive bred from AlgaeBarn - she has easily doubled in size since I got her)
- Regal Angel (my fav)
- Flame Angel
- Tailspot Blenny
- 2 Lyretail Anthias (was a trio from LiveAquaria, one of them died in quarantine - not LA's fault, was caused by my well intentioned autistic son...long story)
- 1 kole tang
- 3 pajama cardinals
- 1 Poweder Blue Tang (should arrive this week and go into a 1 month quarantine)

Here is what the tank looks like now:

Some changes I have made on the water circulation - I really liked the 2 maxspect gyre 250s across the back of the tank but to add more turbulence I added eductors to the 2 pump returns. Last week I also reinstalled one MP40 on the back wall and I plan to add another to the right next weekend (just waiting for a new wet side as this guy was pretty old from a tank I had 10 years ago).

Notice the birds nest on the right...that one was in the original photos I shared back in February. Now it is just a monster!

Unfortunately, in 8 months my yoda has gone nowhere. In fact the tissue is receded along the base about half an inch - probably because this guys had been dislodged about 4 times from sea urchins until I finally spent 2 hours pulling 36 (!!!) of them out of the tank.

On the upside, that "cornbread" monti is doing quite well. Actually, montis across the board seem to be doing well in my tank.

Of course, there have been struggles...I have killed 2 tridacnas and am not eager to try another one . Even though I have some across that are doing well. And sadly, I have killed 2 hammers as well. I am at a complete loss as I have a beautiful frogspawn that has been doing well since I acquired it 7 months ago. I put 2 different hammers in the spot to the right of it and they both went downhill in just a few weeks . I would have expected with the frogspawn thriving so well that the conditions should be good for the hammer also. You can see the 2 dead heads for the hammer in the picture below on the right side. Any ideas?

My wife calls this acro Maleficent

This purple pavona has probably grown 5x but now has 2 white patches in the past month. You can see the one near the bottom in this picture and then the lobe at the top also has some bleaching. Hoping this does not spread because it is a very pretty specimen (pictures don't do it justice...I am not a photographer).

More monti success...the red fiery digitata below is the same one from back in Feb that was an inch long. It has quadrupled in size but for some reason only wants to grow to the left. You can also see the plating monti to the right and then another pink plating monti just above the digitata. Funny (sad) story - I actually broke this one in half separating it from the frag plate when I got it. The one on the upper left was the size of a nickel and now is almost 3 inches across. I guess to veteran fraggers it is obvious but I admit when I cracked the thing I was skeptical about just attaching the piece somewhere. Really happy how it turned out.

I will try to be better about posting in the new year .

 

[Rick's Reef]

By the way, I cannot say enough good things about the Kessil h380. My chaeto is growing wild, there must be 10 pounds of it in there (I need to harvest it). Unfortunately, it doesn't tumble and I wish I could back off the intensity some. I do have 2 positions to hang the light (low and high), but the high position causes some algae growth in the skimmer chamber due to the light spillage.

I have 4 red and green mithrax crabs in the sump, too (you can see one in the picture below). I also have a decorator crab in there that must be 3 inches across his body (not counting the legs).

On the less glamorous side, I just installed an RO/DI tank and faucet in the garage. I have an Aquatic delivery pump that draws from my RO/DI reservoir. This feeds a 2G pressurized tank and then I have a standard RO drinking water faucet installed in the garage sink.

I guess this is a bit pricey...I don't even want to think about it now but it was probably a couple hundred for the drinking water kit and the delivery pump. One downside is the delivery pump is kind of noisy so I have it on a timer to run between 5am and 6am. As long as I am not using more than 1.5g at one time that works. If I want to use more than that I can simply turn the outlet on in my Apex outside the 5-6am window.

I do have to say though that I use this A LOT more than I thought I would. I use it to:
- Rinse test vials
- Get Ro/di for calcium tests
- Make up fish food (Masstick fish food)
- Rinse ANYTHING that will go into the tank (if I wash something with tap water - filter socks, skimmer parts, sponge filters, etc)
- I fill 1g containers to add top off water to the reservoir for my quarantine tank that is my office
- My son has a lot of allergy/breathing problems and so we run a humidifier quite often - I use this to fill his humidifier to prevent hardwater issues

One last update on my Calcium Reactor. I keep my CR in the garage and I as I described in my initial build thread I have poly tubing running about 40 feet in the attic. To feed the reactor, I had a Tee running off of one of my return pumps. I was having a heck of time keeping this setup calibrated. Every time my feed cycle starts the pumps (EcoTech Vectras) go down to a trickle. Due to variations in flow, my alkalinity was not as stable as I would like.

So over Thanksgiving I finally bit the bullet and bought a continuous run doser. And I have to say I could not be happier the results. It is not super quiet, but that's okay because I have it mounted in the garage. The input draws through a 40' poly line routed through the attic to my sump, then goes to the reactor which then outputs another 40' line back into the sump by the returns. The doser I am using is a Kamoer FX-STP pump.

Dosing pump next to my ATO reservoir in the garage cabinets:

Reactor in the garage:

Thanks for reading!

 

[Daveobrien]

Rick, your setup looks nice. It's great to see this build coming along.

It's funny to hear that Birdsnest is your big grower too. Birdsnest was my Canary Coral finally survived and sent me on my SPS grow out journey. My colony grew right up to the height of my SeaSwirl rotating returns, and then refused to go higher. Over thanks giving I raised the returns 1.5" and the tips are back to vertical growth. Horizontal growth has been consistent.