Tyler's tanks.

tyler1503 · Dec 29, 2013

I've been posting things on my original thread in the meet and greet forum, but I've been here long enough now that I should probably start a new thread about my tanks here :)
My original thread with all the information on my tanks is here New to R2R :)
I'm currently in the progress of planning my big upgrade! I'm hopefully moving to a 4x2x2 foot tank in the new year. Ive put a lot of thought into this build but there's certain things I don't have enough knowledge about to do on my own.
I've just designed my sump and was hoping someone could help me improve it?
It's a very basic design and I don't want lots of fancy controllers or reactors hanging off the side. Just something clean and easy to maintain. Also, it's not for added water volume or anything, just a place to hide ugly equipment.
This is my drawing:

The first chamber has the drain, a filter sock and skimmer. The second chamber will house live food (shrimp, small fish etc. as this will be a predator tank). The last chamber will have my heaters and return.
I want the T join and valves on the return so I just have to put a bucket down, turn some valves and I've done half my water change!
This was a very quick drawing and is not to scale. I don't know how big I want each chamber to be either. I'll most likely be using the Fowlr tank described in the link above as the sump which is 24x14x16 tall.
The only issue I can see is live food escaping the middle chamber. I can't think of anything to stop this except stuff the bubble traps with filter wool and I don't want to do that.
I've never run a sump before so I don't know if I'm missing something.
Can anyone give me some advice please?

Flameback Pair · Dec 30, 2013

Do you know the footprint of your skimmer? A 24" long sump is pretty short. There is a lot of things to do to keep LF from escaping: gutterguard, eggcrate, teeth (notches) in the baffle just to name a few. Filter wool will just clog up.

tyler1503 · Dec 30, 2013

powers2001 said:
Do you know the footprint of your skimmer? A 24" long sump is pretty short. There is a lot of things to do to keep LF from escaping: gutterguard, eggcrate, teeth (notches) in the baffle just to name a few. Filter wool will just clog up.

21x13x50cm is my current skimmer. I'm wanting to upgrade it aswell, but I don't know what to. Probably just the bigger size of the current model. Which is the same, just taller.
Teeth! Why didn't I think of that? That's what I'll probably end up doing. It seems the easiest and least likely to fail.
I didn't want to use filter wool because of that reason.

tyler1503 · Jan 2, 2014

Done some fragging today. Hopefully these mushrooms heal up nicely before the bloke at the LFS goes on holidays! It's the 2nd time I've ever fragged something and the first time I've ever glued something down so I'm still lacking a bit of confidence, but I think they'll live :)
Still planning the upgrade to a 4x2x2. Considering adding a UV sterilizer to the return line. I think it'll do me well as I'm planning on housing live food in the sump that I collect from the wild, so it'll help control disease, plus I'll have an extremely heavy bio load, so hopefully it'll help kill any algae spores before they can take hold!

tyler1503 · Jan 14, 2014

Hey everyone! I'm putting together a rough fish list for my upgrade if i ever get around to it.
These are some fish I'm considering:
Valentini puffer.
Snowflake or zebra eel.
2 or 3 fuzzy dwarf Lionfish.
Sailfin or kole tang.
Foxface.
My cleanup crew will be mainly sea urchins and snails. I think they will be least likely to be eaten.
I'm really liking triggers lately and am considering a pineapple trigger if they're available here in Oz. Or a clown trigger, but they'll get too big eventually. Plus my CUC will get demolished :P
This is more of a thought I'm writing down as opposed to something solid to work from, but I do want to go with a predator tank and these are some of my favourite fish, or atleast the closest species to my favourite available to me.

tyler1503 · Jan 23, 2014

Bump for the fish list :)

tyler1503 · Jan 26, 2014

Added this little guy to the 5gal yesterday. Eating well already and is looking very healthy :)

joeyhatch11 · Jan 26, 2014

That's too funny lol. You say he's happy and healthy but appears dead cause the pics upside down. Lol

Genesis Corals · Jan 26, 2014

joeyhatch11 said:
That's too funny lol. You say he's happy and healthy but appears dead cause the pics upside down. Lol

I thought the same thing.

tyler1503 · Jan 26, 2014

Haha sorry guys! He is actually happy and healthy :P No dead chromis here!
I'll have to try and fix that.

tyler1503 · Mar 19, 2014

It's been a while since I've been here on R2R but I'm back now!
There's been a bit going on with my tanks, I added a mado and another sand goby. My chromis decided it was a good idea to eat the newly added Mado, then jump onto my carpet. So I've added 2 fish, then lost 2 fish.
I'm most exited (and a little nervous) about my most recent purchase. A 2nd hand 4x2x2 tank with stand, sump and all that jazz for an absolute steal. It was originally set up for cichlids, but with some minor adjustments it'll be perfect for a marine tank.
I'll make sure I post all the progress with that tank when I get it out of storage.
No new coral or anything yet, but I'm looking at a very nice little moon wrasse to put in the 120 when it's up and running.
I'm hopefully going for a dive today, so I'll likely have another new friend to bring home!

tyler1503 · Apr 24, 2014

Hmmm. Gota say goodbye to my snowflake eel tomorrow. He's become far too aggressive and took a lunge at my puffer today. I'll be sad to see him go, but I can't let him get to my puffer. I've become attached to the puffer a lot more than the eel, so out the eel goes. I'm way too sentimental for this lol.

tyler1503 · May 9, 2014

I did some fragging on Wednesday and some ugly brown zoas have already started colouring up. They're still dull, but if they've coloured up this well in 2 days I'm hoping in a few months they'll have some decent colours.
Before fragging;