Sphinx's 125

sphinx15 · Mar 29, 2022

My tank shipped today!!! Should get to the freight terminal by Friday

sphinx15 · Mar 31, 2022

Well, instead of doing something useful like finishing the stand, I decided to work on the rockwork instead.

A while back I ordered 100lbs of Caribsea Moani dry rock. It was a little less than I thought I'd need but I have some leftover from the 60g I planned on using. Turns out Chewy thought that was silly and doubled my order!

That's 200lbs of dry rock and 120lbs of sand. I'm sure the delivery driver was thrilled...

Came nicely packed though and pretty much all intact. Roughly a dozen pieces in each box.

The Moani rock comes with a bacteria culture on it that supposedly helps get the tank going a bit faster, we'll see what happens. I mostly picked it for the price, but if the bacteria helps that'll be a nice bonus. It's not quite a porous as I was expecting, very few of those hole connect which makes the rock feel rather dense compared to the CaribSea South Seas I used in the past.

I didn't have much of a plan for the rockscape, that's never really been my forte. I do like the nsa style that's popular these days so I kinda went for that and tried to create a good number of caves and overhangs.

I think I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. What do you think? Any thoughts or suggestions?

sphinx15 · Apr 9, 2022

Alright, some good news and some bad news...

Good news is the tank arrived and we didn't drop it on anyone's toes! More importantly though, it looks fantastic! Super happy with the way it looks in the room.

The build quality seems excellent and the fit and finish is very good as well. If I could stop drooling over it I might actually get something productive done...

Unfortunately, the bad news...it's scratched

It's not awful but it is in the front panel and it's noticeable enough that it catches you eye pretty quickly. Needless to say, I'm pretty bummed. I have spoken to Joe at GlassCages and he has been great to work with. After some discussion he offered to replace the tank. He also had some ideas on buffing out, or at least softening, the scratches. Haven't had much luck yet, it's pretty deep, but I'll keep playing with it. Either way, a new tank should be on it's way soon.

So, some more good news and more bad news then. On the one hand, this tank without scratches will be spectacular. Absolutely will live up to dream tank status. On the other hand, it puts me in a bit of a pickle as far as moving the 60g. I need to move it asap so I either will set up the new tank, get everything moved over then have to do it again when the new new tank arrives. Or, I move the 60g into some kind of temp setup for the time being; I'm pretty (very) limited on space right now though. I don't know, still going back and forth on it...

sphinx15 · Apr 13, 2022

I had an electrician buddy of mine install a dedicated 20a circuit for the tank. I found a pretty neat recessed box that gives me two outlets and a place to run some 1/4 lines to the basement.

The lines run down to the mechanical room where I've got my mixing station. I'll be running the ato through the blue and 2-part through the white. The black cord is a USB to connect the Apex to the mixing station.

Not sure if it's necessary, but I added check valves to the 1/4 lines.

We'll see if I keep them, they seem to take a ton of pressure to push through...

sphinx15 · Apr 16, 2022

On today's episode of "Failed to Keep it Simple"...

sphinx15 · Apr 19, 2022

Made some progress on the electronics cabinet. Originally, I was planning on doing a custom cabinet that fit nicely into the stand. Unfortunately, I have to many projects going on right now and needed something a bit simpler and quicker. I ended up going with the Adaptive Reef cabinet.

Since I've never seen any pictures of it unassembled, here's what you get in the box:

Goes together super quick, just a few screws and everything is pre-drilled.

Since I can't leave well enough alone, the first thing I did was chop it down by 3 inches and cut some more holes in it for the power bar and Trident

I wanted to be able to take the cabinet in and out if needed so I mounted it to the stand with some chest latches.

Backup battery fits nicely in the bottom; I'll be connecting it to my Tunze powerheads.

Got the all good from the supervisor

Sean Clark · Apr 19, 2022

I like the latch idea that you used here. Nice solution.

sphinx15 · Apr 19, 2022

Sean Clark said:
I like the latch idea that you used here. Nice solution.

Thanks, I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out. Should make cable management a bit easier.

sphinx15 · Apr 21, 2022

I'm so behind on posts

Picked up a sump a while back. I saw Eshopps' Alpha Fuge line and really like the idea and layout of it. I wasn't able to find many reviews on it but I figured I'd take a chance on it anyway. I ended up finding an AF-300 locally. It's definitely oversized but I got it for a steal and you can never have too much sump right?

I'll do a more thorough review of it later once I get a better feel for it, but for now I'm super pleased with it.

Review Here

youcallmenny1 · Apr 21, 2022

Looks great! A lot of nice prep work going in to this.

sphinx15 · Apr 21, 2022

youcallmenny1 said:
Looks great! A lot of nice prep work going in to this.

Thanks! I'm trying to think it through and remember all the things I wish I did last time

sphinx15 · Apr 27, 2022

Plumbing is done! It went pretty smoothly if a little slow, I think I put about 20hrs into it... Turned out pretty nice though

Got the new mixing station all plumbed up as well.

sphinx15 · Apr 28, 2022

I did decide to go ahead with filling this tank and moving everything into it until the replacement arrives. A bit of a hassle but I really don't have a good place to set up another temporary system. I'm going to leave it bare bottom for now so I don't have to deal with cleaning the sand out. And, the plumbing *hopefully* will line right up on the new tank.

In the meantime...it's wet!

Pardon the terrible lighting, it was dark and the lights in that room are...sparse...

sphinx15 · May 9, 2022

Got everybody moved over to the new tank. Might be missing a few snails and 2 monti's that I couldn't for the life of me get off the rock. Otherwise all accounted for

I'll probably leave everything on plugs until the new tank arrives, just want to keep the swap simple.

I'm still waiting on another AP9X mounting arm, I was only able to find one locally.

And now we're all caught up on posts finally

sphinx15 · May 21, 2022

Finally got the 60 torn down. I will say, I am going to miss this view coming down the stairs every day

sphinx15 · Jun 26, 2022

I'm still here, I promise!

Been crazy busy with the remodel so haven't had much time for tank projects. But......

The new new tank is here and going in today!!! I have a small army of friends coming over to help out and a plan! I'm sure it'll all go awry in the first 3 minutes but we'll make it work

sphinx15 · Jun 26, 2022

sphinx15 · Jun 26, 2022

Success!! And it has sand

sphinx15 · Jun 29, 2022

So I ordered some coraline algae from Algae Barn to hopefully kickstart that process. Order confirmation, shipping notification, delivery notification, wife brought the box in out of the sun, all the normal, expected online order things. Except, when I went to go open the box it felt way too heavy...

Turns out they sent me pods, pods, and more pods!

I spoke to the folks at Algae Barn and apparently there was a mix up between my order an another (sorry to whoever was expecting a bunch of cool critters and got a bottle of pink juice instead!) They're going to resend the coraline, but in the meantime I guess I'm adding a pile of pods to the tank tonight

There were 4 urchins in the shipment as well but my tank can't even support the one I have now (hand feeding it until something starts growing in the tank it can munch on) which means I'll need to find them a new home. I'm going to swing by the lfs tomorrow and see if they'll take them; we'll see.