Sneeks 200g Acropora Tank

[sneekapeek]

Hello All,
Just wanted to put my build out there so people, as well as me, can track the progress of the build. My experience throughout reefing and findings of a larger tank. I’ve kept mostly small 40-80g tanks in the past. This step up to 200g has been a challenge I perceived to be rewarding, more stable and just a wow factor in comparison. Most people I’ve shown irl to date, say pictures don’t give it justice. Here’s some build info-

Tank- 200g acrylic 3/4” thick 72”x24”x30”
Sump- 100g acrylic 5/8” thick 52”x19”x24”
Powerheads- Mp60’s 2x now 4x future
Return pump- Ecotech L2 Vectra 3100gph
Skimmer- Bubble Magus Curve 9
ATO- Tunze 3155
Dosing Pump- Ecotech Versa 3x
Lighting- TMC Aquaray Aquabeam 2000np 12x / Aquaray UV 600 3x / Smart Controller 8 4x

Saltwater Mixing Station-
Tank- 100gallon tanks 2x
Pump- MRC LP-4200 pump for mixing and sending salt water
RO- Under Sink 80gpd

This tank is a custom tank I got done here in San Diego. It’s supported by a steel constructed stand. To be fitted in the corner of my office space. Which is the closest room to my garage so that I could tie in my saltwater mixing station for easy turn ball valve flip a switch water changes. The whole idea of size and placement of the tank was based off how easy I could get water changes done. I wish to enjoy the tank, not make it a chore. And I thought if I was to get it, it would be based around this ease and convenience factor. I’ve lugged brute trash cans and I told myself I’d never do it again.

Thanks for looking and I’ll be keeping updates every so often on here. Glad to have a forum to track my progress. And for feedback of course.

 

[blaxsun]

Can’t wait to see it with corals!

 

[revhtree]

Looking like a winner so far!

 

[James_O]

Looking great! Love the shape of the tank, and how clear the whole setup is.

 

[sneekapeek]

Thanks guys, have 2 chromis in so far and getting cabinets in the next few weeks.
Battling heat because acrylic insulates so well. Besides that working on some cable management. And installation of dosers as I let the tank simmer. I had put siporax in from my 40g quarantine, next to this one, to help seed the tank. It’s been working well so far.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Awesome setup!!

 

[sneekapeek]

Thanks,
My plans for the tank is to run it with all tropic Marin products. Ie All for reef, bacto tricks, bacto balance, pro reef, reef actif, nitribiotic, amino organic, pro tect. Omegavital feed.

It’s going to be bare bottom hence painting the bottom white.

I’m excited, but my ocd kicks in and I have lots of work to do. No controllers on this tank. I try to keep things simple. The only thing is really wish I can do is run the solar on my house to a battery just in case of outages witch to be expected in this 3rd world country California. dang state can never keep the power on in the summer. Luckily, this build started in the winter.

 

[sneekapeek]

Here’s a short update of the tank. Got some skin put on the barebones finally, guys who did it gave me exactly what I wanted. Couldn’t be happier. Once the skin went up, the noise dropped dramatically. I even put weather strips on the doors to reduce light escaping and noise.
However, the heat has been lingering and I had to add a 1/3hp chiller into the mix. I wash pushing 84f with lid and cabinets up. Acrylic is extremely insulating and the cabinets don’t help with the heat. Thinking about putting a fan to exhaust the hot air into my garage. Might help the chiller from working so hard! Just like a bathroom fan that exhausts the humid air.
Also mounted some more equipment like the dosing pumps and plumbed them up. This tanks nearly complete with all equipment and tests have come out favorable to start stocking it some more. Just waiting for quarantine to produce favorable species to start introducing into main display. Meanwhile, I’d rather address all my hiccups prior to a fully stocked tank.

 

[sneekapeek]

I was going back through some images of what I rockscaped and found this gem. For all the aviation and Star Wars fans, also the photo was taken on 9/11/21, I remember making this and thinking it’d work in my tank. I put the structure in the tank and it didn’t fit quite right! So I redid my scape and it is what it is now. I don’t know what I was thinking at the time, but this hobby sure brings out the best in everyone. It took me nearly a million tries until I did it how I liked. Even though I’ve been doing this for 15 years, I still think trial and error is the best way to learn. It makes us enjoy the journey or else this hobby would be too bland.

 

[sneekapeek]

Small update on the tank.

I have a few added fish, totaling 3 so far. Healthy as can be. 1x Royal gramma, 1x chromis, 1x mystery wrasse. They are funny because they school together sometimes. They seem to pair well.

In quarantine I have a pair of black and white clownfish ready to move in. But I’m waiting for more fish to exchange in the quarantine. I tend to take my time on any addition because it takes a while for me to process them in quarantine.

I have started dosing vibrant to help with algae, as well as to supplement good bacteria. Gonna try and run through 4 weeks of dosing 3x per week. And then cut it off for a month and see how the tank progresses through the dirty phases of getting the tank matured. I’ve heard great results with vibrant helping balance dinos and cyano, while reducing algae. We’ll see how things go.

 

[5280Reefer]

awesome tank! cant wait to see her fill in!

 

[sneekapeek]

She’s filling in finally, few update photos and big plans for the setup. I’ve always been wary of having the sump and ATO in my house so I will be rehousing the sump into the garage as well as putting a frag system setup with it. Should hopefully help with my concerns and will update as it progresses. That means more pumps, different skimmer etc.

Frag system will be 72”x24”x12” internal overflow acrylic rimless with separate lid. Gonna put a couple mp60s and some frag racks/4” tiles to start growing my favorite acros from boogers.

I’m hoping I won’t need my chiller as much since more water will be cooled out in the garage. I’m still going to plumb 500w heaters on 2 outlet pumps and keep my 1/3hp chiller. Running L2s for the two outlets and one on my soon to be Mrc-2r recirculating skimmer. Gonna ditch the bubble magus curve 9. Also run an ozone unit and co2 scrubber media for full effect. I might take scrubber media off, seems like 1 more thing to complicate the system. Also extra unnecessary resources.

Here’s some photos as of now. Excuse my photography skill. Have orange filters on a few shots. Excited that All for reef and sun-biotic salt is keeping the tank where I like it. Also dosing phos n Nitrate to help with #s a bit.
Thanks for looking!

 

[sneekapeek]

Took a couple extra shots last evening!

 

[NanoJHB]

How’s everything coming along?

 

[sneekapeek]

How’s everything coming along?

So far the main display took a dive when I was out on vacation. But, in other news I’m just finishing drywall in my garage to hang cabinets and then I plumb my frag tank in. Move the sump out there with it! And relocate my mixing station.
I’ll attach photo of work to be competed. I got my 100g frag tank and it’s a beauty. I can’t wait to showcase it!

 

[sneekapeek]

Finally some texture on the drywall, nearly ready for paint and then I hang cabinets to fit the frag tank in place.
I also ended up choosing a recirculating skimmer so that I don’t have to deal with a drop in.
You can see the frag tank in this photo 1” acrylic 6’x2’x1’ steel stand.

 

[sneekapeek]

Bit of an update added this frag system in garage, moved sump and equipment out there. Very happy with how things have turned out.
Everything is all plumbed together now.

Things to do still:
Plumb auto top off to tank with solenoid and float
Install lights
rack system for corals

 

[sneekapeek]

Put this in finally also! Had some height issues with my previous one so I’m gonna plug any holes up later. For now she is top off ready! Gonna add an additional bladder tank to help with pressure to reduce the stress on membrane because of the dribble effect inherent with this style of float valve!
Also changed the standpipe to help raise the height in overflow box to reduce waterfall noise.

 

[sneekapeek]

She making skum

 

[sneekapeek]

Ozone bouncing around like nvidia stock. Highly don’t recommend this unit, but it’s what I had from previous builds.