Garage1217's 225G starphire / led / awesome build! - Page 12

Fig70g · 09/08/2011, 02:04 PM

Hello fellow FRAG member!
Just got caught up as well, amazing ideas and construction!! Although it is taking a long time, you are thinking about each and every part of the tank process which is making this an incredible build!
Adding this to my list of builds to reference when I build my dream tank in the next couple years, keep the pics coming!

Garage1217 · 09/08/2011, 06:54 PM

Right on

And yes, it is going slow as I had to stop the project for a bit but she is rolling again now!

110galreef · 09/08/2011, 07:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garage1217

Still a ways to go... Goal of filling by my birthday "March 5th" .

Any new ETA of WATER?!!

Garage1217 · 09/08/2011, 09:32 PM

Yeah... missed that deadline lol Actually had to cold stop the project around then. I literally was not even able to touch it until this last week!

Ok updates! The doom lifter is now in place in the attic with cables ran through the roof! And yeah, I am VERY tired. To understand what it feels like in An Az attic, turn your oven on low and get in for around 45 minutes lol.

Here are some pics of tonight's fun!

Cables at both ends locked in place / ferrule crimped as a safety catch. Wrapped the cable around the pulley section so you can see how it will work. With the cables fully extended / light sitting on the tank, it will be wrapped a minimum of 6 turns around the shaft to eliminate stress at the clamped end.

Here is a pic of it mounted in the attic. I aligned the assembly via my laser plumb shining up through the hole in the roof. You can see the edge of the laser dead center in the middle of the pulley section. And yeah... the hole through the plywood looks like a beaver chewed through it DOH! My long drill bit snapped so I had to guess where the hole was in the drywall lol And obviously I did not get it right the first time hahaha.

Sorry for the blurry pic, it just shows the laser shining through the hole and how I aligned the fixture

And at last... Cables hanging through the ceiling! Need to find some nice decorative covers for the roof now

About the only thing that I think I will change is the pulley width. It is 1" now, I may cut it down to .5" as I think there will be to much cable drift. Also I plan to make a guide for the cable so it does not chew up the drywall on the ceiling as the cable drifts a little bit in each direction. Will have to figure that out / test it once it is running which hopefully will be this weekend if the clamps arrive.

Tomorrow I will be running wire down through the drywall for the speed control / power supply. Then as soon as the Y clamps come in, she will be ready to go!

110galreef · 09/09/2011, 06:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garage1217

Yeah... missed that deadline lol Actually had to cold stop the project around then. I literally was not even able to touch it until this last week!

Yeah I know, just busting your chops as I saw this when re-reading the thread! We all thought something happened to you as you left us Hanging for a few months literally!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garage1217

About the only thing that I think I will change is the pulley width. It is 1" now, I may cut it down to .5" as I think there will be to much cable drift. Also I plan to make a guide for the cable so it does not chew up the drywall on the ceiling as the cable drifts a little bit in each direction. Will have to figure that out / test it once it is running which hopefully will be this weekend if the clamps arrive.

Why not go with some sort of aluminum insert in the drywall w/ a flange of somesort on the drywall side. Or even a hard plastic or nylon insert. That would allow it to guide thru w/o chewing the drywall. Maybe a little vaseline to lub it. Plus it really shouldn't wear as you will probably only be going up & down 2x's a week? Plus if the cable starts to frey or the inserts starts to wear, they should be an easy cheap swap years from now.

KoralKing · 09/09/2011, 07:06 AM

wow you got some pretty sweet looking equipment. this is going to be a beast when it is finished! cant wait to see some LR in there!

Garage1217 · 09/09/2011, 09:57 AM

Agreed, but the main guide will be on the attic side. Already have the guides for the drywall side

Will take pics of them tonight. I picked up some bronze guides and when I got home, I realized the potential for little bronze shavings to end up at some point in the tank lol yeah... really bad idea so bought plastic guides instead.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 110galreef

Yeah I know, just busting your chops as I saw this when re-reading the thread! We all thought something happened to you as you left us Hanging for a few months literally!

Why not go with some sort of aluminum insert in the drywall w/ a flange of somesort on the drywall side. Or even a hard plastic or nylon insert. That would allow it to guide thru w/o chewing the drywall. Maybe a little vaseline to lub it. Plus it really shouldn't wear as you will probably only be going up & down 2x's a week? Plus if the cable starts to frey or the inserts starts to wear, they should be an easy cheap swap years from now.

TheFishMan65 · 09/09/2011, 11:02 AM

You might consider friendly plastic or polymorph which are low melting plastics. You can form it to whatever shape you like. And it it gets into the tank it will act the same as bio pellets.

Garage1217 · 09/09/2011, 10:41 PM

BUUUAAAAAHAHAHAHAHA (EVIL LAUGH) I just ran a test on the lift system for the first time! For this test, I have it lifting two 58lb buckets of oceanic salt / 118lbs total weight and it did not even break a sweat or groan / moan... Well the roof let out a few creaks

wahahahaha hehehehe woooooo! (doing the truffle shuffle chunk style) Made my night!!! Had to make it lift something for now since I do not have the brackets to make it lift the light, so buckets of salt it is!

The video is large / 48MB but I show it lifting the two buckets and that it is rock stable / does not reverse or start to lower when power is not applied. And yes, both buckets are sealed lol no trickery. You can see how hard it is pulling on the bucket handles. VERY cool to finally see my vision of a lift system come to life! And yeah I could have been smoother on the trigger at the start. The slight bouncing was my fault... Gave her a little bit to much gas and then let off a tad DOH!

http://www.garage1217.com/REEFPICS/G...-LIFT-TEST.AVI

Now for the ghetto cheese part, My cheapy little speed controller that the manufacturer claimed would handle 30 amps easy if I beefed up the traces... well it smoked at around 6 amps lol So I needed a speed controller 5 minutes ago... Hmmmm what to do... AHHHH got it! I had an old dead 12V dewalt drill from ages ago that I was going to toss in the trash. I gutted the drill, wired up the trigger system which is rated for 25A and BAM! I have a reversible 25A ish... (power supply feeding the trigger is 29A max) speed control for free

Gonna mod the dewalt casing so it looks decent and will keep it.

It is functional, reliable and fits the hand nice lol not to mention it will be a conversation piece! First ghetto rigged item in the build... yes... WIN??? YES!!!!

bmullikin1 · 09/10/2011, 06:35 AM

I would be very nervous testing it out over such a nice tank. looks great, you have some awesome skills.

Garage1217 · 09/10/2011, 09:46 AM

No worries, I ran a series of tests before I decided to lift that much weight that high up lol. Also helps when you are confident in the design

Garage1217 · 09/10/2011, 09:18 PM

Light is up and running FINALLY! One major step closer! I am going to re-work some other plumbing items that I will detail in the next few days but other than that, she is very close to being ready to fill! And excuse the dust, she is still under construction

Garage1217 · 09/10/2011, 10:41 PM

And a pic of the moon light on / is controllable / dimmable as well. The moonlight consists of 8 royal blue plcc-6 leds and 4 white plcc-6 leds.

aquaph8 · 09/10/2011, 11:05 PM

Looking really nice Garage. Looking forward to some water.

richardinphx · 09/11/2011, 02:01 PM

Are U sure you aren't related to McGyver ?

keep you away from the duct tape and staple gun

Dono · 09/11/2011, 02:46 PM

I've been lurking your thread since its inception, but I thought I should finally chime in and commend you on your dedication and great execution thus far on your build. Keep it up man, you're doing great.

You definitely have me signed on to follow your build. Keep the pictures coming!

Garage1217 · 09/11/2011, 04:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by richardinphx

Are U sure you aren't related to McGyver ?

keep you away from the duct tape and staple gun

Thanks everyone! And MacGruber is more like it lol

Spent some time at home depot today. Finishing up the plumbing tonight and will run a line through the attic for the rodi which will have to travel from my kitchen sink to the office which is about a 50' run, then down the wall. Wanted to get that done as I REALLY do not want to haul jugs of water around.

This week I will be cleaning all my rock with Muriatic acid, pressure washing it and getting it all ready. Sooooo close, cannot wait!

It is sooo cool having the apex control the whole light fixture. It runs the fans, main leds and moon light. Very cool! Really enjoying its functionality. I was scared to death of it at first which is why I have run it in a test mode all this time, checking on it every week to make sure it is stable and so far so good! Just had one hiccup with the screen leds or the led driver in the screen failing but neptune got it back to me in record time / repaired.

feh · 09/11/2011, 05:11 PM

Curious about your power heads... are you playing to run them constantly or doing anything to create any kind of flow patterns?

Garage1217 · 09/11/2011, 05:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by feh

Curious about your power heads... are you playing to run them constantly or doing anything to create any kind of flow patterns?

I have always had constant flow in my tanks, nothing variable really. Tried variable once and I did not see any results or improvement so just did not use it. So just running 4 modified k4's for flow which is PLENTY-O-FLOW with the props that are on each one. Maybe someday I will look into it again. I can say pics of people running vortechs on fast pulses which shake their fish left to right every 2 seconds makes me sick.

Girly Gears · 09/12/2011, 06:58 PM

Oooooo...pretty lights! I'm loving the inspirational fish stickers BTW....

4ddiction · 09/12/2011, 07:01 PM

LOL small world. Guess we enjoy the same hobbies. Im Joyride from Scionlife hahaha

Garage1217 · 09/12/2011, 08:42 PM

Hey right on man! Yes it is a small world indeed lol!

Garage1217 · 09/12/2011, 08:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Girly Gears

Oooooo...pretty lights! I'm loving the inspirational fish stickers BTW....

haha yeah the wife stuck them on the tank as she was getting irritated that I had to been able to finish it yet and she wanted to see fish in the house again

4ddiction · 09/12/2011, 09:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garage1217

Hey right on man! Yes it is a small world indeed lol!

Haha yeah, found a new thing to throw my money into instead of my tc lol even though my clutch is slipping under boost haha.

Garage1217 · 09/12/2011, 09:28 PM

Doh! Yeah this hobby destroys my wallet but I love it. been in it for many many years. I do miss my tC and my turbo setup! Still building my 93 mr2 turbo however and that will make up for it all

09/08/2011, 02:04 PM	#276
Fig70g Registered Member Join Date: Jan 2008 Location: Scottsdale, AZ Posts: 637	Hello fellow FRAG member! Just got caught up as well, amazing ideas and construction!! Although it is taking a long time, you are thinking about each and every part of the tank process which is making this an incredible build! Adding this to my list of builds to reference when I build my dream tank in the next couple years, keep the pics coming! __________________ Kevin "The older you get, the more rules they are going to try and get you to follow. You just gotta keep on livin', man. L-I-V-I-N" Current Tank Info: 75g mixed reef, 30g sump, Little Giant 3MDQ return, split to 5g fuge. ASM G1x skimmer. T5 lighting

09/08/2011, 06:54 PM	#277
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	Right on And yes, it is going slow as I had to stop the project for a bit but she is rolling again now! __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more!

09/08/2011, 09:32 PM	#279
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	Yeah... missed that deadline lol Actually had to cold stop the project around then. I literally was not even able to touch it until this last week! Ok updates! The doom lifter is now in place in the attic with cables ran through the roof! And yeah, I am VERY tired. To understand what it feels like in An Az attic, turn your oven on low and get in for around 45 minutes lol. Here are some pics of tonight's fun! Cables at both ends locked in place / ferrule crimped as a safety catch. Wrapped the cable around the pulley section so you can see how it will work. With the cables fully extended / light sitting on the tank, it will be wrapped a minimum of 6 turns around the shaft to eliminate stress at the clamped end. Here is a pic of it mounted in the attic. I aligned the assembly via my laser plumb shining up through the hole in the roof. You can see the edge of the laser dead center in the middle of the pulley section. And yeah... the hole through the plywood looks like a beaver chewed through it DOH! My long drill bit snapped so I had to guess where the hole was in the drywall lol And obviously I did not get it right the first time hahaha. Sorry for the blurry pic, it just shows the laser shining through the hole and how I aligned the fixture And at last... Cables hanging through the ceiling! Need to find some nice decorative covers for the roof now About the only thing that I think I will change is the pulley width. It is 1" now, I may cut it down to .5" as I think there will be to much cable drift. Also I plan to make a guide for the cable so it does not chew up the drywall on the ceiling as the cable drifts a little bit in each direction. Will have to figure that out / test it once it is running which hopefully will be this weekend if the clamps arrive. Tomorrow I will be running wire down through the drywall for the speed control / power supply. Then as soon as the Y clamps come in, she will be ready to go! __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more! Last edited by Garage1217; 09/08/2011 at 09:50 PM.

09/09/2011, 11:02 AM	#283
TheFishMan65 Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Northern VA Posts: 4,618	You might consider friendly plastic or polymorph which are low melting plastics. You can form it to whatever shape you like. And it it gets into the tank it will act the same as bio pellets. __________________ Click my home page for Thread Summaries Current Tank Info: 75 gallon lps and fish

09/09/2011, 10:41 PM	#284
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	BUUUAAAAAHAHAHAHAHA (EVIL LAUGH) I just ran a test on the lift system for the first time! For this test, I have it lifting two 58lb buckets of oceanic salt / 118lbs total weight and it did not even break a sweat or groan / moan... Well the roof let out a few creaks wahahahaha hehehehe woooooo! (doing the truffle shuffle chunk style) Made my night!!! Had to make it lift something for now since I do not have the brackets to make it lift the light, so buckets of salt it is! The video is large / 48MB but I show it lifting the two buckets and that it is rock stable / does not reverse or start to lower when power is not applied. And yes, both buckets are sealed lol no trickery. You can see how hard it is pulling on the bucket handles. VERY cool to finally see my vision of a lift system come to life! And yeah I could have been smoother on the trigger at the start. The slight bouncing was my fault... Gave her a little bit to much gas and then let off a tad DOH! http://www.garage1217.com/REEFPICS/G...-LIFT-TEST.AVI Now for the ghetto cheese part, My cheapy little speed controller that the manufacturer claimed would handle 30 amps easy if I beefed up the traces... well it smoked at around 6 amps lol So I needed a speed controller 5 minutes ago... Hmmmm what to do... AHHHH got it! I had an old dead 12V dewalt drill from ages ago that I was going to toss in the trash. I gutted the drill, wired up the trigger system which is rated for 25A and BAM! I have a reversible 25A ish... (power supply feeding the trigger is 29A max) speed control for free Gonna mod the dewalt casing so it looks decent and will keep it. It is functional, reliable and fits the hand nice lol not to mention it will be a conversation piece! First ghetto rigged item in the build... yes... WIN??? YES!!!! __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more! Last edited by Garage1217; 09/09/2011 at 11:19 PM.

09/09/2011, 07:06 AM	#281
KoralKing Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: Orlando/Tampa Posts: 41	wow you got some pretty sweet looking equipment. this is going to be a beast when it is finished! cant wait to see some LR in there!

09/10/2011, 06:35 AM	#285
bmullikin1 Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: seminole florida Posts: 1,797	I would be very nervous testing it out over such a nice tank. looks great, you have some awesome skills.

09/10/2011, 09:46 AM	#286
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	No worries, I ran a series of tests before I decided to lift that much weight that high up lol. Also helps when you are confident in the design __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more!

09/10/2011, 09:18 PM	#287
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	Light is up and running FINALLY! One major step closer! I am going to re-work some other plumbing items that I will detail in the next few days but other than that, she is very close to being ready to fill! And excuse the dust, she is still under construction __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more!

09/10/2011, 10:41 PM	#288
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	And a pic of the moon light on / is controllable / dimmable as well. The moonlight consists of 8 royal blue plcc-6 leds and 4 white plcc-6 leds. __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more!

09/10/2011, 11:05 PM	#289
aquaph8 Love The Fish Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Tucson, AZ Posts: 5,652	Looking really nice Garage. Looking forward to some water. __________________ Brett Current Tank Info: Leemar 60x36x24, 8x80 T5/LED Sfiligoi GENESIS Alpha 300 skimmer

09/11/2011, 02:01 PM	#290
richardinphx Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Posts: 149	Are U sure you aren't related to McGyver ? keep you away from the duct tape and staple gun

09/11/2011, 02:46 PM	#291
Dono Registered Member Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Fort Lauderdale Posts: 324	I've been lurking your thread since its inception, but I thought I should finally chime in and commend you on your dedication and great execution thus far on your build. Keep it up man, you're doing great. You definitely have me signed on to follow your build. Keep the pictures coming!

09/11/2011, 05:11 PM	#293
feh Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2011 Location: Atlanta area Posts: 535	Curious about your power heads... are you playing to run them constantly or doing anything to create any kind of flow patterns?

09/12/2011, 06:58 PM	#295
Girly Gears Registered Member Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Deland, Fl Posts: 121	Oooooo...pretty lights! I'm loving the inspirational fish stickers BTW....

09/12/2011, 07:01 PM	#296
4ddiction Registered Member Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: New Jersey Posts: 141	LOL small world. Guess we enjoy the same hobbies. Im Joyride from Scionlife hahaha

09/12/2011, 08:42 PM	#297
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	Hey right on man! Yes it is a small world indeed lol! __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more!

09/12/2011, 09:28 PM	#300
Garage1217 GET OFF MY LAWN Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Globally Posts: 5,863	Doh! Yeah this hobby destroys my wallet but I love it. been in it for many many years. I do miss my tC and my turbo setup! Still building my 93 mr2 turbo however and that will make up for it all __________________ No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness ~ Aristotle If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it? ~ Albert Einstein I'm just as bent as ever. Hellishly so ~ Captain Jack Sparrow Current Tank Info: Systems and goodies by Lee-Mar / Coralvue / Neptune Systems / Jager / Spectrapure / Cree / Meanwell + more!

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