Wieloch’s 150 Reef build

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

So like most people in this hobby, I saw a “pretty” aquarium and knew I had to have one just like it. Also like most marine aquarists, I’ve had basic freshwater aquariums for as long as I can remember at different stages in life and figured “how hard could it be”. I should have tried to answer that question before I got started, but that’s a different story.

I’m back dating this post to when I first started building my aquarium until current. Just bare with me.

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

It took some digging but I found my original tank. My plan was to completely get rid of the “sump” with the bio balls because I had zero idea what it was or how to use it, take the HOB filter and put it on the larger tank and cap off the overflows, because who needs those right? I never actually got water in this baby before I got rid of it thankfully. I found a new tank on criagslist that I guy had set up as a coral reef aquarium so I had to buy it right?

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

I actually did like this tank, a standard 125, but I still refused to do research. I took the guy at his word that I could use it as is. So I cleaned it out, pumped it full of water and hit a busy patch in life. During that busy patch, I found the BRS160 YouTube channel and it couldn’t have come sooner. From there I watched the whole series and researched every day, every spare minute on reef aquariums and soon realized that I was setting myself up for failure.

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

The aquarium was plumbed with a Fluval FX6 canister filter, I didn’t have any power heads, and the light was a generic flourecnet 3’ fixture. Never mind that it was 3’ too short for the tank, it was just a regular household fixture. Like I said, I still liked the aquarium, so bought a new to me 6’ 6 bulb T5 fixture, a bunch of used hydor powerheads, and had plans to drill the tank for overflows.

This was not the aquarium that I stuck with.

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

So I was perusing Craigslist again one night, and I came upon an add for a 150 gallon reef aquarium that wasn’t too far from me and was a fairly decent price. By this point I’ve set up two tanks and retooled the equipment that I had 3 times so as you could assume, my fiancé wasn’t too thrilled that I wanted to bring another tank into the house and go a completely different direction. She told me if I could get it for $300, she’d be all for it. She since told me that she never thought I would have gotten the guy down to that price but here it is, in my garage.

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

The plumbing and sump that came with it wasn’t what I was planning on doing. The center chamber was the return section and the drain was the far left section. The far right section housed the algae screen and recirculated water back to the return section. This wasn’t my best option, or at least I thought it wasn’t... so I capped off the bulkhead in the center chamber, made that my refugium, drilled the hole for a bulkhead in the far right chamber and that became the return. I added a couple of baffles for micro bubble dispersion and made a filter sock holder

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

I have since come to the realization that I made my return section far too small and need to keep a pretty close eye on the water level because it can start sucking air pretty quickly. I would love to upgrade the sump but the demensions under the tank do not afford me the room needed and having an external sump isn’t possible.

I also ditched the filter sock holder after a few weeks, I got tired of changing it and/or washing it.

ReefQueen · Jan 25, 2018

Following

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

So by this point I have my tank and stand in place. The only plumbing that I save from the old owners setup were the standpipes for the durso overflows and the returns. Used a combination of hard pvc and tubing underneath to make it easier for modifications later. I added a few extra valves on the return pipe to make a manifold for any upgrades later on that needed water. After that, it was time for rock.

I have plenty of caves for Fish to swim and for flow to get behind so that there aren’t any pockets that build up nutrients. I just wish that I would have used smaller rocks to round my structures out and make it easier to remove a rock without everything crashing down. All in all I think it was a decent design and it’s been great to look at since.

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

TIME TO ADD WATER!!! I remember how excited I was for this until I realized how much of a pain it was. I had 2 30 gallon garbage cans to fill up and a 75GPD RO/DO system that I Y’d off to fill both cans at the same time. The first fill I overflowed the garbage cans on the floor because I wasn’t paying attention! Luckily it was in the laundry room with cement floors and a drain. It took 3 whole days to make the water, bring to temp, mix the salt, and pump in to the tank.

I had made a mistake here as well. I mixed saltwater in what is now my “clean” barrel to save time when filling my tank. I used a hydrometer when I mixed the water originally but when it was time for a water change I had upgraded to a refraxtometer. I then calibrated with RO/DI water from my clean barrel because that’s supposed to be zero right? WRONG! Turns out I was mixing my salt to 1.027 for the first couple of months. The residual salt in my clean barrel threw off my calibration and I hadn’t realized it until I bought calibration fluid and checked because my refractometer was reading different from the hydrometer. So that was a lesson learned!

Wieloch89 · Jan 25, 2018

Also very soon after this pic, I removed the filter sock, moved the skimmer over 1 chamber, and made the center my refugium like I had planned to do in the first place.