Window to a reef - 75 gallon build thread

[xtm]

Hey Philly,

I am really impressed with how you made your cabinet and canopy.. it looks neat and the door handles look pro. My only concern is the use of eggcrate on your overflow box. Since the box itself is acrylic, it's very easy to cut through it with Dremel and make the slits. This will ensure smooth flow all over the box and also efficient surface skimming (by surface skimming, I mean removing the thin surface film)

I am also using an All Seas Marine skimmer (G2) and in my opinion, it's very versatile and customizable. To answer your question, your pump (which is a Sedra 5000) connects to the main skimmer body and pumps heavily aerated water by the use of Venturi (the airline tubing that goes to the intake of your pump).

The chamber gets filled with water saturated with bubbles and the bubbles move UP all the way into the throat of the collection cup. You can adjust the height of the bubbles by lowering or raising the output pipe (up and down)

You want the bubble level to be at the middle of the throat. Leave it like this for about an hour and you should start seeing some foam production.

When you get to the deep side of skimmers then I'll show you how to get even more skimmate out of your ASM. Once you start modding it with gate valve, mesh mod, and recirc mod, you will be producing dark, THICK skimmate it won't be funny. But since you're just "starting out", I won't confuse you yet.

Feel free to ask any questions and I'll try to help

[Phillybean]

Thanks for the kudo's on the stand. It's the first wood project I've ever done and got a lot of help on it. THe handles were expensive, but I really like how they finish it off.

My overflow box is actually glass, that's why I went with the eggcrate.

I'll be sure you ask you more questions on the ASM

[Phillybean]

I made my Phosban Reactor tonight. I started off with a 32 oz Water Bottle from Wal Mart.



Then I drilled a pilot hole in the cap, followed by a 3/4" bit. It was just slightly too small for the 1/2" PVC I had, so I sanded it bigger until it fit.



I then drilled another pilot hole in the bottom. This was followed by a 1" bit. Again I sanded the hole a big bigger to fit a 1/2" elbow.



I then siliconed the inside and outside of both the cap and bottom of the bottle.




I used a white bristle pad for the bottom to ensure no media will get out. This pic is a little blurry:


Here is the final image:


To be on the safe side I will use a mesh bag to place the GFO in. I'll by making another one to run them side by side. One with GFO and the other with Carbon.

[Phillybean]

I'm planning on getting the The Tide single DI system from the Filter Guys, any feedback on this unit?

[Phillybean]

Order Time!

I used the last of my gift cards to fish.com. Although I've had lots of problems with them, I still have $350 worth of gift cards.

Again I am having it shipped just south of the border in Oroville Washington, my mother in law will pick it up and I will get it off here and back to my apartment on Feb 8th.

I ordered
100#'s of AragAlive Bahama Oolite
20#'s of ArigAlive Fiji Pink
Coralife Hydrometer
Coralife Shoulder Length Gloves
Coralife Single Day/Nite & Wave Timer
Stealth 200Watt Heater
Digital Thermometer
2 - 50 Gallon bags of Reef Crystals salt

It gets better...my father in law works on an Orchard and was telling me of all the extra plumbing supplies they have and don't need. Including...hundreds of feet of 1/2" Flex PVC and more 1/2" fittings then he knows what to do with...I gave him a list and he said he will get me everything I need I knew I got married for a reason...(don't tell my wife I said that lol)

All that is left to buy is the rock, some 2" and 1 1/2" PCV & fittings, and my DI unit. Woot Woot!!

[Jah2707]

Question about the Phosban Reactor. Are you going to us a pump to pump the water up the bottle? If so is that really going to work correctly? If it does then I would totally make like 3 of these. I am been wanting to buy three but I can't find them for under $50(w pump) It might be fine but it looks like you have the pad on the bottom of the bottle and if you push the water down then the Phosban will get compressed? Does anyone else know what I mean?

[Phillybean]

I plan on having it pump up. Once I have the Phosban I'm going to put it in Mesh Bags and put another pad on the top.

It's a similar design to other DIY Phosban Reactors so it should work. I'll know for sure in March when I have my tank running.

[kar93]

Thats a really good idea for the phosban reactor i might try that myself. What pump will you be using for it?

[Jah2707]

Are you going to hang it on the side of you sump or place it in your sump? It looks like I might be off to Wal-mart to find a bottle.

[Phillybean]

I'm going to use a powerhead. It's a old one I have that does about 100GPH. I'm going to place it on the outside of the sump. The great thing is it comes with something to hold the lid on. When I drilled it I broke it off, however it is still attached to the bottle, so hanging it will be easy.

[chrismunn]

cool

[Twz]

How many GPH is that pump?
it looks like it could do quite a bit of GPH
If i were to change one thing on my tank i wouldn't have gotten the 1800 GPH pump to run through my sump look into doing a closed loop system and
i think this guy is freaking brilliant
his site is www.melevsreef.com

[Phillybean]

Hey TWZ

Which pump are you speaking about?

My sump return is a Mag 5. With about 4 feet of head, it should be about 400 GPH.

I have a closed loop on a Dart. I hope to have it plumbed within the next two weeks or so. Also with 4' head it should be 2800GPH.

I will have a 100 GPH Powerhead on the Phosban Reactor(s).

[Phillybean]

Well after an action packed weekend, I have updates!

My inlaws picked up my order for me. I paid 16 dollars in duty fees so I was very happy to say the least. Best part of all...my father in law who works on an Orchard hooked me up with all kinds of PVC







Bad news, as I expected the boxes were in rough shape. They packed 2 - 3 bags of sand per box and the boxes were quite weak. To say the least, fedex dropped them a double times. Of the six bags of live sand, only two were sealed with water. One of my bags of Reef Crystals had a hole in it and was under the leaky sand. It's quite clumpy, but I hope will still do that job. In hindsight, I should have just got a bucket of IO. No one local sells Reef Crystals...only IO.

Everything else came in good shape. Including these bad boys:

[Phillybean]

Since I had just about all the PVC I needed, I decided to start and finish my closed loop. As you can see from the prior pictures, I had some plywood resting on the sump. I wanted to make a shelf for it, so after some measuring and cutting, here is what I came up with:



Before I start the story about the closed loop...let's just say for a few hours I hated life...

To start, I took the dart apart and cleaned it. There was quite a bit of build up in the pump, so I was happy I did. Very easy to take apart as well.

I made a few mistakes on the plumbing. First mistake was glueing everything in place before dry fitting. Second mistake was glueing the elbow and pipe into the bulkhead on an angle. After fighting with the pipe for about 45 minutes trying to get it to fit into the pump I decided to find some Spaflex.
First up - Rona (Canadian Lowes) - No Spaflex
Homehard Ware - No Spaflex
Home Depot - No Spaflex
Pro Source Irrigation Supply - No Spaflex
Apple Valley Irrigation Systems - No Spaflex
Arctic Spas - No Spaflex
Petro Canada to fill up SUV - No Spaflex
Valley Pool & Spa Inc - SPAFLEX!!!

I picked up three feet of 2" Spaflex for $12. I got home, unpacked everything and realized I bough 1 1/2" Spaflex. No big deal since I could use it for the output anyway. One quick phonecall to Valley Pool to find out...they don't have any 2" Spaflex.

With my blood boiling I went to Rona and picked up a 2" to 1 1/2" reducer. I know you shouldn't limit the intake of a pump, but I was really out of options. I ended up using about 2 feet.

The return went really easily, I decided to mount a "tower" with T's leading off to the other returns. Here is how the finish product looked:



I then enjoyed a couple Heineken's and relaxed.

[darkcirca]

Just want to throw this in:
Did you get the Deep Six hydrometer by Coralife? Personally I stay clear of hydrometers all together, this one in particular. I had been having problems with calcium/alkalinity and snails dying, so we decided to just buy a refractometer, well turns out my tank was pretty high. I was using the Deep Six hydrometer then, which read 1.025, but in turn my tank was 1.030. I'm glad to have that issue solved, and the $45 on the refractometer was the best I spent so far.

Thanks for the store on fish.com though, I had considered buying from them, but now I will be steering clear. I've had enough issues with Dr.F&S and TFP, and I feel that fish.com and I would have even more problems. Thanks

[Phillybean]

Hey darkcirca, yes I picked up the coralife deep six. Now I think I'm going to have to go with a refractometer. Where do you find one for $45?

No worries about my fish.com story, the more we share good and bad experiences on this site the less money companies with poor service make and the more good ones do.

[darkcirca]

Mine was from ThatPetPlace, but the prices went up since I bought it.
Dr.F&S has one on sale for cheaper (it's ATC as well). Not sure on shipping to Canada, I believe you have to call them, but if you have someone in the US that you can ship to, it's an option:
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...57&pcatid=9957

[Phillybean]

WOW It's been along time!

After finding out the call center I work was was being shut down, transferring to Ohio, being denied a visa to the US with everything in a Uhaul which was parked for three weeks waiting on lawyers...after of course losing my apartment...only to say sorry we're keeping you in Kelowna after all because we changed our minds and you still have a job...the reef been put on the backburner...until now.

That said, I'm happy to say I've moved, into a new place and have a nice home office to set it up in...so I did and after two busy weeks, finished everything!

Quick updates from the last one:

The closed loop is finished with lockline in place. No leaks after testing it. The dart is a little noisy, but not bad.
I remade my overflow box. The last one was too big and ugly for me. This one is 6x6x3 and is made with tinted glass.
I picked up a 29 gallon tank for as a quartine. Although not running right now, I have a fluval 304 as a filter on it.
I added a 'fuge light. Similar to the set up from Melevs website, but the highest K Rating bulb I could find is 4100k. It has a nice crisp white look to it though.

And the best part...it's cycling now!!!

FTS Shot:

Left Side

Right Side


Here is a top view showing the water movement:


Sump:


Q Tank and Power


Now for a couple ID's... It looks like I have either baby featherdusters or Aiptasia, each of which I have on the rock. What are they? There are 5 of 6 on this rock alone.


And I have these white worm castings on a lot of rock as well. They don't seem to move at all. The person I bought the rock off said they were "Waving Hands". I haven't heard of waving hands before though. Also, the worm in the middle is a bristle worm correct? Is this a good one or bad one? I have lots that come out during the day...I've counted 15 from one peice of rock, the largest was 7"


Finally...WOOT IT'S FINALLY RUNNING!!!

[Phillybean]

Anyone on the ID's?

[avp]

Looks like fanworms and an ordinary bristle worm to me. No problems with either. Good luck and welcome back to the game!

-avp

[SeaMac2]

I think "waving hands" are a nickname for anthelia, but I can't make them out in the pic. If those are worm tubes, I call them, well...worm tubes.

Agreed...featherdusters and bristleworm, both OK.

[Phillybean]

Time for an update...

My wife broke the camera so I have no pics sadly

I re-did some of the rock work to make it more open and less cluttered. A few peices are now seeding the 40 lbs of Carib Sea Reef Rock in the fuge. I picked this up from a local reefer and it was fairly cheap so we'll see how it goes.

The skimmer is pulling nice, disgustingly smelly green gunk from the tank. I plan on doing a gate valve mod over the next few weeks and a mesh wheel mod after that.

Cycle is over, I'm reading

0 Ammonia
0 Nitrite
5 Nitrate
1.5 Phos
7.8 PH
9 dKH
420 Calcium
1.026 SG
Tank goes from 78.5-80.5 thru-out the day. I beleive I need another heater to maintain in closer to 80 all the time.

I added two true percs today, both small, under an inch. Both tank bred. My wife got to pick the names, one of them, is missing one of the fins underneath him...poor guy didn't have a chance not to be called Nemo.

Other live stock is currently 5 hermit crabs and one small turbo snail.

I have some Seachem phosgaurd on it's way and I am waiting for the LFS to get some Cheato in. I'll be plumbing my DIY Phosban reactor this weekend sometime and will post on how it works. I'll try to borrow a camera to take some pics.

[Nereaga]

Originally posted by Phillybean


1.5 Phos
7.8 PH

I have some Seachem phosgaurd on it's way and I am waiting for the LFS to get some Cheato in. I'll be plumbing my DIY Phosban reactor this weekend sometime and will post on how it works. I'll try to borrow a camera to take some pics.

I think doing a phosphate reactor is a great idea! With that much PO4, you could see some significant unwanted algae growth.

Also, I would look into raising you ph a bit....

Build is absolutely beautiful! Nice work!

Brad

[Phillybean]

Thanks Nereaga, I'm happy about how it's all coming together.

I do have some alage problems so I think the Phosban will work. Still waiting for Cheato which will help as well.

Where is the best place to have the return? The Seachem Phosban I am getting can leech iron which Randy Holmes-Farly says is a good thing for Macro Algae. So I'm thinking of having the return for my fuge go thru the Phosban Reactor and have that drain into the fuge.

I agree regarding the PH. I am having a very hard time reading my PH Test. It doesn't seem to look like any of the colors on the chart, however the closest looks about 7.8. Regardless, I plan on getting an IV dropper and dripping Limewater into the tank this weekend, should solve the problem