Slice of Ocean Build - 48g Fiji Cube

[ladz]

Any update on the missing tank?

 

[certain_code]

Any update on the missing tank?

Disappointingly, no. Understanding as I can be about this but also being realistic with it, I don't think I could recommend FijiCube at this point to anyone. While the cost and (hopefully) the build quality will change my mind, their customer support (or lack thereof) has been pretty disappointing. So far this is essentially what happened to date.

- 12/3 order placed with FijiCube
- 12/5 order shipped (incorrect tracking number provided)
- 12/7 reached out to FijiCube customer service on an update. No response.
- 12/8 reached out again to FijiCube on an update. No response.
- 12/9 reached out again and got a response with the correct tracking information. Tracking with freight company showed a 12/13 estimated delivery and that the shipment had been unloaded from the trailer in Los Angeles.
- 12/14 called freight company customer support. Said to have handed off shipment to local terminal and that they would reach out.
- 12/15 called freight company customer support again, no update on status.
- 12/16 reached out to FijiCube support and freight company. Freight company provided local terminal contact information. Local terminal said they received the bill but not the actual freight. No response from FijiCube.
- 12/17 emailed FijiCube and called freight company. Freight company admitted to needing a "dock sweep" and not having a status. FijiCube response said they would contact the freight company.
- 12/18 No response from FijiCube for an update. Freight company opens a 30 day investigation on where the shipment it. Dock sweep did not find the shipment.
- 12/19 Response from FijiCube, freight company is performing a "dock sweep"
- 12/20 Emailed FijiCube and called freight company. No response from FijiCube. Freight company recommended waiting the 30 days or contacting FijiCube to ship a new order. Emailed FijiCube about this and requested a new order be shipped and the old order to be returned if found.
- 12/21 FijiCube response is that I need to wait the 30 days for the freight company investigation to be completed before they would take any action. Freight company will not take any action until the 30 days are completed on 1/17/2022


So all in all I am at a stand still. FijiCube support is only reachable by email it seems and reachable is a stretch of the word. It usually takes at least 24-48 hours to get a response and their responses usually are just following up on what I either told them or what the freight company has told me. The freight company wont do anything until the 30 day investigation is up and FijiCube is seemingly not going to do anything to try to make this right until then either.

Considering I just spent over $1000 with a company, I would not say this is anywhere near the level of customer service I would expect. My biggest concern at this point is on day 20-something of this investigation I am going to get a 420 pound delivery of a shipment that has been sitting and getting banged around in a warehouse in LA and I will need to place another order and go through all of this again. Just not a great situation to be in.

/rant


I did get my rock scape set up, epoxied, and cycling last night and this morning. So at least that is some good news. Haha

 

[Zoacoral]

Man that sucks. Im sorry to hear about your luck. Who is it from fijicube that your talking to?. Im pretty sure if you email them and tell them to call you they will.

 

[certain_code]

Man that sucks. Im sorry to hear about your luck. Who is it from fijicube that your talking to?. Im pretty sure if you email them and tell them to call you they will.

Yeah, it is really a bummer overall. I work a ton so was hoping that some down time through the holidays would allow for some time to really get the cabinet all arranged and going before eventually getting water in it. Not sure what timing looks like but worst case scenario has the freight company investigation wrapping on 1/17 and assuming the tank is missing or damaged, probably looking like end of January for tank delivery.

 

[Zoacoral]

Yeah, it is really a bummer overall. I work a ton so was hoping that some down time through the holidays would allow for some time to really get the cabinet all arranged and going before eventually getting water in it. Not sure what timing looks like but worst case scenario has the freight company investigation wrapping on 1/17 and assuming the tank is missing or damaged, probably looking like end of January for tank delivery.

Yeah i was looking into buying a tank from them. However i just started a new job so i have no time built up to take off . They couldnt give me a time as to when it would come. They just said someone has to be there to inspect it. I am working nights, so its pretty much impossible for me to be home to take delivery

 

[ladz]

Yeah, it is really a bummer overall. I work a ton so was hoping that some down time through the holidays would allow for some time to really get the cabinet all arranged and going before eventually getting water in it. Not sure what timing looks like but worst case scenario has the freight company investigation wrapping on 1/17 and assuming the tank is missing or damaged, probably looking like end of January for tank delivery.

Man really hope that’s not the case for you. That’s just a little bit of bad luck coupled with a frustrating company. Hopefully things shake out and you take delivery soon.

 

[certain_code]

Welp. Still no word on when or if I will get the tank I originally ordered anytime soon so channeling that effort into making a RODI and mixing station. I ordered two 30 gallon plastic drums from ULine that get here today. Since I will most likely have time to reorder plumbing from BRS whenever the tank gets here, I will use the plumbing I have to hopefully rig everything up and get it going.

Plan for it is to stack two 30 gallon drums on top on each other ideally without any additional support system or stands. I will probably create a shelf by putting a flat board between them just to support the pump. The top tank will be accessible for adding salt and the bottom will be a constantly filled with RI/DI from the bathroom on the other side of the wall. Plan is to have waste water from the auto-waterchange pumps follow the RODI line back into the bathroom but everything else just directly interfaced with the tank to support automatic water changes and auto-top off.

A little diagram to make sure I was planning this right. The red diamonds in the diagram will be valves. I might also include an additional valve and output to fill buckets and such but the ideal plan is to never touch a bucket for any regular maintenance. I am going to get the tanks in place but probably work on the plumbing next week at the earliest.

 

[Kimosobey]

The mixing station plan is looking good!

I ordered my tank (same one) from Fiji on the 13th and they are still trying to find someone who can ship it for them so who knows when i'll actually see it. Hopefully it all works out and we get what we ordered.

Excited to see how the Neptune Sky does over your tank

 

[certain_code]

The mixing station plan is looking good!

I ordered my tank (same one) from Fiji on the 13th and they are still trying to find someone who can ship it for them so who knows when i'll actually see it. Hopefully it all works out and we get what we ordered.

Excited to see how the Neptune Sky does over your tank

Oh well that is interesting to hear...curious why they might not just be using the same freight company that has now essentially lost my tank. Good luck though! Hope you get that all figured out with them soon.


------------------

I did a little more "not the end of a work day" thinking on the water station this morning. I still would ideally like to find a way to not have any bulkheads lower on the tanks in the event of a leak but I think it would overcomplicate the need for valves and extra plumbing. I am planning on running an inline Eheim 1230 return pump that I have already. The head height is about 30" so it should be plenty of power and I will just run an extension when I need to make more salt water rather than dealing with a timers, float valves, etc. I sit about 2 feet away from the tanks 8 hours a day so quickly running the pump to fill the top tank is not an issue for me.

Each tank will have a BRS doser pumps connected for (very slow) auto water changes and I will have another attached for ATO. I need to test to see if the BRS pumps can pump over about 15ft horizontally with about a foot of head height otherwise I might need to find something more powerful. But at least making some progress here while waiting on whatever happens with the tank itself.

 

[certain_code]

Merry Christmas everyone! I hope everyone is enjoying it.

I had a realization on my mixing station again today. I realized there really is no reason to run the inline pump and go all crazy with plumbing this. And because of this, I don't need to drill lower holes in the tanks and potentially have a failure point there.

I don't have the need to ever quickly pass water between the tanks. The top will always be saltwater (since I can access the opening) and the bottom always fresh for ATO. Instead of all of these other plans I am going to just run my RO/DI line to a splitter/3 way valve. When I need more saltwater I will be able to run just one tank or constantly supply both with RODI. Still planning on dosing pumps as well to run top off and water changes. This will be a nice savings really of $200 or so in plumbing so not mad about that either.

 

[certain_code]

Tank status: Still missing. Still annoyed. FijiCube wont ship a new order until the 17th "officially missing" date. The freight company has no idea as there is clearly a huge disconnect between the warehouse itself and customer support.

ATO and AWC setup status: 80% done. I have everything plumbed for fresh water and it looks like I can generate about 13 hours or so. Not bad and I don't technically need any faster but I might upgrade my RODI unit with the BRS water saver to cut down on water wasted. My apartment water pressure fluctuates a bit between 60 and 65 PSI so I am right at and sometimes under the recommended pressure though.

Thinking more about the pumps for ATO and AWC, I will likely be going with the Neptune DOS for AWC and something I can throw inline for ATO. The key reasoning being this is that I want the pumps themselves in the tank stand and not require I run specific power into the closet where the water is stored. I only want to run the tubing through the wall and not need to worry about power.

Rock status: I used Brightwell XLM to kick off the cycle with Fritz Fishless Fuel ammonia. After almost a week, I am seeing Nitrate levels rising and a slight rise in Nitrite as well. Debating if I continue to dose the Fritz after the initial cycle is completed (and a water change) or if I just want to go the BRS route and just toss in a shrimp. Overall everything still looks very clean since there is no light getting at the rock so I will try to maintain the bioload in there while everything else is going on.

 

[Zoacoral]

Man thats some crappy customer service from fijicube. Ive always had good interactions when emailing them, even when i had a sump from them come damaged they was fast at getting me a new one. I would be tempted to tell them to cancel my order and if they say no id call my CC company. Its noy right that there keeping your money hostage basically

 

[certain_code]

Man thats some crappy customer service from fijicube. Ive always had good interactions when emailing them, even when i had a sump from them come damaged they was fast at getting me a new one. I would be tempted to tell them to cancel my order and if they say no id call my CC company. Its noy right that there keeping your money hostage basically

Yeah, I am getting pretty frustrated for that reason. I ordered almost a month ago at this point and neither company will do anything until the 17th since freight and FijiCube are just pointing fingers at each other.

What's worse is that when I ordered, I paid the full price not realizing there was a sale the following week. If I had just cancelled the order when it was 'lost' and made a completely new order I would likely already have the tank and saved a few hundred dollars assuming the freight company didn't lose that one too. I called the freight company yesterday and they are again following up....but not getting my hopes up. Every time I have talked to them and they mentioned "following up" I just end up needing to call them anyway. Neither company ever follows up unless I send multiple emails or call. I'm not being a jerk about this to anyone, I'm just trying to understand where something I paid $1000+ for is at this point and literally get the run around from everyone involved.

 

[certain_code]

Another week has started and still no update.

I have sent a final email to FijiCube at this point and have called the freight company again. Freight company has now done 4 "dock sweeps" that have resulted in no response from the team(s) performing them. No lost or found response at all. They are also now saying that the Jan 17th date I was given "is not a thing they do" and until it's found the shipment is essentially just in their system forever unless FijiCube does something about it.

I have no filed a claim with the freight company and emailed FijiCube asking them to resolve this issue and ship a new setup to me. If this ultimately is not resolved in one way or another by the end of this week I will be calling my credit card company to file a claim and get refunded and will be looking for another supplier.

 

[ladz]

I would move on. Based on my experience and seeing yours I don’t plan on using them for any future purchases.

 

[Zoacoral]

I would move on. Based on my experience and seeing yours I don’t plan on using them for any future purchases.

I agree. However, the couple of things i had from them was good quality. There customer service was good and very quick to respond and sort out an issue i had with receiving a broken sump.

I was holding out on purchasing the 48g int from them till i seen him receive his. I had a innvotive marine 50g EXT. However it just stuck out from my wall to much so i sold it to get something with internal overflow. But seeing how there treating the OP i think ill steer clear, also there recent price increase is also pushing me away from ordering.

I can get something similar from planet aquariums for roughly the same price now.

 

[ladz]

I agree. However, the couple of things i had from them was good quality. There customer service was good and very quick to respond and sort out an issue i had with receiving a broken sump.

I was holding out on purchasing the 48g int from them till i seen him receive his. I had a innvotive marine 50g EXT. However it just stuck out from my wall to much so i sold it to get something with internal overflow. But seeing how there treating the OP i think ill steer clear, also there recent price increase is also pushing me away from ordering.

I can get something similar from planet aquariums for roughly the same price now.

I have the same tank he ordered and just received it near the same time his was shipped. The tank I received had multiple small blemishes on the bezel of the glass, the stand top isn’t square, vinyl is peeling on the top of glass, and multiple bubbles in the vinyl. I emailed them about these things and they just never responded.

Sump is nice, dimensions are what I wanted, and addition of ATO container is nice with the package.

Use of the metric bulkheads is nice to save space for the overall size of the overflow but they are not easily source-able. The blemishes are small enough that they don’t bother me but I would’ve not expected any.

 

[certain_code]

I would move on. Based on my experience and seeing yours I don’t plan on using them for any future purchases.

I finally was actually able to talk to Fiji on the phone yesterday after my post. They ultimately were nice over the phone but made it clear they need to let the freight company policies play out before they could do anything really. As of yesterday, the plan is to wait until Monday the 9th when the freight company will allow a claim to be filed. At that point FijiCube will be shipping me a new setup. Of course the woman I spoke to was going to email to confirm stock availability of my setup but didnt do it.

I agree. However, the couple of things i had from them was good quality. There customer service was good and very quick to respond and sort out an issue i had with receiving a broken sump.

I was holding out on purchasing the 48g int from them till i seen him receive his. I had a innvotive marine 50g EXT. However it just stuck out from my wall to much so i sold it to get something with internal overflow. But seeing how there treating the OP i think ill steer clear, also there recent price increase is also pushing me away from ordering.

I can get something similar from planet aquariums for roughly the same price now.

Yeah I had the same thought and it's almost the full reason I went with FijiCube. I have limited space and even though I would prefer the tank real estate and benefit of the Bean Animal style overflow, the space off the wall was going to be an issue. I am already looking elsewhere for similar price range and footprint from other manufacturers. IM, Red Sea and CADE are probably the ones that are going to be my backup options.

I have the same tank he ordered and just received it near the same time his was shipped. The tank I received had multiple small blemishes on the bezel of the glass, the stand top isn’t square, vinyl is peeling on the top of glass, and multiple bubbles in the vinyl. I emailed them about these things and they just never responded.

Sump is nice, dimensions are what I wanted, and addition of ATO container is nice with the package.

Use of the metric bulkheads is nice to save space for the overall size of the overflow but they are not easily source-able. The blemishes are small enough that they don’t bother me but I would’ve not expected any.

Can you provide some photos of the blemishes? I dont have issue with anything minor and honestly expect some things at the price points they sell their tanks at but it would be nice to have an idea of what to be looking for whenever my tank shows up. Did you get the full setup or the tank, stand, and sump separately?

 

[jiffyjhn]

I've ordered several tanks from FijiCube. Here are some photos of blemishes on my recent tank order from them. Other tanks I had air bubbles in the glass.

Generally I get one issue or another when I order from them. But they are usually pretty responsive and and will try to make things right. They gave me some store credit for these blemishes.

 

[certain_code]

I've ordered several tanks from FijiCube. Here are some photos of blemishes on my recent tank order from them. Other tanks I had air bubbles in the glass.

Generally I get one issue or another when I order from them. But they are usually pretty responsive and and will try to make things right. They gave me some store credit for these blemishes.

Appreciate you sharing. I'd say those all look pretty minor and are what I would expect at this point.