Ted_C's 320 Build

[Ted_C]

A few small setbacks last night. Drained the sump:
I guess I cracked another bulkhead. In the sump this time. One of the returns was leaking at the bulkhead.

To save on space - I am plumbing the Waveline DC12000 returns like this: 1.5" threaded Bulkhead / 1.5" Close Nipple / 1.5" Threaded Spears True Union / Waveline DC12000 / 1.5" threaded / Slip Spears True Union. I must have over-tightened the 1.5" Close Nipple into the bulkhead and split it. The biggest surprise though - the 1.5" threaded union threads perfectly onto the outside threads of the DC12000's inlet.

I also plugged in the Tradewinds 1/2 HP chiller to get the settings done last night (after first purchasing it on April 2016). The Temperature controller wouldn't work. Called up Tradewinds last night for some technical support and they said they'd ship me out a new controller. Got to admire that awesome support. Anyone having thoughts about a chiller - do consider Tradewinds.

While I have the sump drained - I think I'm going to plumb in a 1.5" street 90 on the recirculation pump bulkhead so I can draw almost all water out of the sump for water changes. The bulkhead sits about 1.5" above the bottom of the sump now and leaves about 20 gallons in the bottom (I know because I bailed it out last night Haha).

I'm also thinking about re-building the return outlets on the seaswirls. I had pre-drilled the side outlet 90's for siphon break with the old internal box. I added an additional 1/2" height to the internal box so the sipon breaks sit too low. Rather than drill an additional hole - I think I will extend the outlets further into the water and drill a siphon break further up.

 

[Txdragonslayer]

After another 100 gallons today - I am close to being able to turn on the returns and get under operation. Its considerably more cloudy today but once I start getting flow through the filter socks it should clear up.

More Pics:

Wow that's a lot of pipes!

 

[Ted_C]

Allrighty! we're off and running. No more leaks. Fixed the bulkhead leak in the sump. wasn't happy with the returns / their height in the tank / siphon breaks and the holes they made in the screening so I re-did all of that. The eductors I got don't swivel so I put them on 45's on the side outlet elbows so I can swivel them a bit if I want to.

Had to cap off one of the open channels. I just couldn't get it quiet with two open channels. Not a big deal - I'm still looking for the sweet spot between return pump speed and drains. Two Waveline DC 12000's are running around 50% and I am still getting good quiet drainage out of the 1.5" beananimal setup - so I'm happy with what I can do at 50%

Since I had some water in the system - it's my first opportunity to try out all the equipment I got. Two big issues so far:
The controller that came with the Tradewinds chiller (Ranco) is DOA. No display. Nada. I haven't heard back from them yet or received the new controller. Makes me nervous that they forgot about me.
The NYOS quantum 300 skimmer - one pump is DOA. Also purchased in June 2016. I'm still trying to figure out who I go to for support on this since it's the first time I'm starting it up (LFS where I purchased it? Ecotech? Nyos?)

Without further ado - my pics from today:

 

[Ted_C]

A short video of the tank and overflow:

 

[lolgranny]

I made my current light rack from EZtube, and i was wondering what are the pieces that go directly on the tank braces of the AGE. im in the midst of getting a tank made from them and need to configure a new rack. Any help would be splendid.

 

[Ted_C]

I made my current light rack from EZtube, and i was wondering what are the pieces that go directly on the tank braces of the AGE. im in the midst of getting a tank made from them and need to configure a new rack. Any help would be splendid.

There are two types that go directly on the bracing - the 100-110 and 100-250-S
http://eztube.com/product/100-110-aluminum-extrusion/

Use these pieces (Single fin) around the perimeter with the fin on the outside of the tank's bracing. I also used these to hold the lights as well.

http://eztube.com/product/100-250s-aluminum-extrusion/

Use these pieces on the cross bracing (those braces that span the width of the tank). The bracing needs to be 1/4" or less as this makes a very tight fit.

 

[najer]

Great build.

 

[lolgranny]

There are two types that go directly on the bracing - the 100-110 and 100-250-S
http://eztube.com/product/100-110-aluminum-extrusion/

Use these pieces (Single fin) around the perimeter with the fin on the outside of the tank's bracing. I also used these to hold the lights as well.

http://eztube.com/product/100-250s-aluminum-extrusion/

Use these pieces on the cross bracing (those braces that span the width of the tank). The bracing needs to be 1/4" or less as this makes a very tight fit.

Thank you very much sir! I appreciate it!!

 

[lolgranny]

Shikaka!

 

[Maritimer]

That tank looks pretty sweet!

All that rock, arrayed the way it is, is going to make a fun maze for fish to explore, popping in and out and providing a flash of color here and there . . .

~Bruce

 

[Ted_C]

ll that rock, arrayed the way it is, is going to make a fun maze for fish to explore, popping in and out and providing a flash of color here and there . . .

~Bruce

Thanks! I hope so. I'm still tweaking it here and there

 

[Ted_C]

Hum this is interesting to me as that I wanted to do this. So considering water wants to take the easiest route and u have it come to a y fitting so it would try to go out of the othe y side since water is so lazy does the penductor or enductor (both the same ) which if u read how they work they work the best with back pressure. So does it even tech work at 5-6 x overflow? Because I really wanted to do this but was advised by sea swirl that a) it's not needed and b) that it wouldn't be worth it because u wouldn't get the "full results" and could c) could cause damage.
Now u have me wondering as I have extra penductors to try out. So I guess with all my rambling my question is when u put ur hand in front of the penductor does it feel like more flow then when u put ur hand on the other side of the y?

Also is it done filling up yet? I'm excited for ya.

Way back when - you asked me about this: "when u put ur hand in front of the penductor does it feel like more flow" I can finally answer this now that I have the tank up and running.

The answer is no. I get much more flow out of the 3/4" Locline fitting than I do the eductor. So much so that I can pratically point the eductor at the surface and get a small gentle ripple but the locline near blows water out of the aquarium. Hnestly, you'd be better off with 2x locline outlets instead of the more expensive eductor.

 

[justingraham]

Ok so u still have it y'ed correct if u made it only go thru the penductors how about then?

 

[Ted_C]

Ok so u still have it y'ed correct if u made it only go thru the penductors how about then?

No idea but it seems obvious that all the flow would go through them.

 

[justingraham]

I don't think so

I had two returns with one being regular and the other a penductor and all the flow went out of the loc line then when I put the penductor on both is when it worked

I don't know just trying to help ya

 

[Ted_C]

My next project after getting the tank up and running was to rectify an ongoing issue in my 150 gallon oceanic frag tank / quarantine tank.

When I first set it up - I figured egg crate and PVC support would be fine.

I've had a long standing problem with this tank and (what I assume are) dinoflagellates. I've run blackouts and they've come back. Currently I'm cleaning up (water changes occuring after 6 months without) after running dirty (running dirty allows other algaes to take hold and out-compete the dinos).

I've always thought egg-crate / PVC supports were bad ideas in our tanks. The egg crate messes up the flow and creates turbulence and can trap detritus. The PVC piping used for supports can also trap detritus. So I made some modular acrylic frag racks this past week. I used 1/4" black acrylic and 3/8" support rods. I drilled what feels like a million 1/2" holes. What made this go much faster: I clamped together all nine pieces of acrylic and made my hole template on the one largest piece and drilled through all nine pieces at once. They are modular as the frag tank is also a quarantine tank for the 320 gallon. I will need to remove them when I'm trying to catch the fish for transfer and acclimation.

 

[Ted_C]

I wasn't too happy with the amount of flow I was able to pump through the beananimal style overflow. I wanted a bit more turnover. I had problems with the initial design that prevented me from increasing flow or changing the full siphon while keeping the open channel flow to a minimum. So I tore apart the plumbing and re-did some things.

I lowered the inlet for the full siphon (I was working with fpt x fpt bulkheads - changed to s x fpt bulkheads).
I added a second gate valve on the one channel I had capped off (and also lowered the inlet)
I raised the inlet for the open channel.

Before, I was only able to comfortably run the 2x waveline dc 12000's at around 27% (3 out of 11 clicks). Now I can run them at 73% or more (7 out of 11 clicks) with very little overflow noise.

My drains are also submerged too low in the sump so the full siphon wasn't starting up. I rectified this by drilling out 4 1/2" holes into each pipe.

My only issue now - for some reason the external overflow box goes almost completely dry when I turn off the returns (despite having siphon breaks drilled into the 90's (it empties to the level at the bottom of the downturned 90)

 

[Ted_C]

Oh yea - a video of the overflow in action:

 

[Ted_C]

I guess I'm smack dab into the biological set-up / cycle. Water's really cloudy. I added a few pieces of live rock from my established 150 - which introduced some feather dusters and hydriods. I probably introduced some bubble algae too. Lots of diatoms popped up.

 

[Toomnymods]

My next step was to make water changes easier for the tank and for my rock curing setup.

Water Mixing station plumbing:

A spectrapure UHE Max 100 GPD RO/DI Unit:

Overall:

The copper work I had to do (I had the hardest time getting this to work - the solder just wouldn't hold since I apparantly hadn't cleaned the copper adequately): Tee on the left and the 3/4" to 1/2" 90 on the right + the plumbing to the valves for the slop sink.

Have you had any problems with spectrapure UHE unit? mine isn't doing its flush nor is the booster pump turning off after the water level is reached.. spectrapur has already sent me out a new controller for the booster pump but having the same issue :/ could you take a pic of how urs is wired? I know some of these plugs could go to the wrong area and im wondering if they wired mine backwards or something