250gal and 2x100gal set up

futrtrubl · 04/01/2006, 11:24 AM

My questions (see bellow for background information):
Is there a better way to do the water outflow on the display tanks short of drilling the tanks?
Is the UV sterilizer nescessary? Can you identify it (picture at www.edowner.net/UVSter.jpg )?
I've worked out that the main tank will need about 750-1500 watts of lighting and each 100 gal tank will need about 300-500
watts. Is this correct? If so what are your recomendations for this, bearing in mind that all supplies will need to be shipped in from the US?
If my calculations are correct I'll need about 3750 gph of flow for the main tank and 1500gph for the smaller tanks. Correct?
How much of this should be seawater input in a fully open system (no other filtration/skimming cicles)?
Is a fully open system recommended? If I go semi-open what would my seawater input requirements be now, and what other cleaning cycle requirements?
If we continue using a fully open system would a chiller be able to do anything since the water would only get a single pass through it? Would setting up a "chill tank" upstream make better sense?

The background:
I work at a marine lab in Jamaica and have been tasked with getting our aquariums up and running again. One is a ~250-300gal tank (245x75x60cm), "European" style if I understand the term correctly (lots of reinforcement along the top edges meaning no good edge to hang stuff). We have 2 other display tanks at about 100gal each (150x60x45), non-European. We also have about a dozen tanks up to 20gals that could be used at the display location and another set of fixed specimen tanks up to 100gal at another location that can be used for support (quarantene etc). The display tanks and the specimen tanks all recieve water from the sea 24/7, though during power outages we may loose flow if the backup generator fails to start automatically (not a rare occurence). Water flows out of the display tanks through a very simple syphon system, meaning that if the seawater pump fails the syphon takes out water untill it looses suction and if the seawater pump starts back up at
that point the tank overflows.
The main tank will hold a reef system, simulating the local reef at 50ft. One 100 gal tank will be a mangrove system, and the other 100 is unassigned. Seawater flow branches off, after passing through a UV sterilizer, to each tank to keep them seperate to stop cross contamination and contamination from the sea.
During periods of high seawater temperature we do get some coral bleaching and death in the tanks and so we've planned to get a chiller.

Thanks for any help, Edward.

PS. I'll most likely have more questions once these are answered ;']

bertoni · 04/01/2006, 05:56 PM

To Reef Central

For flow, you could just put some powerheads into the tanks, if looks aren't critical.

I don't use a UV sterilizer. They might help make the water a bit clearer, according to some reports.

What animals do you intend to keep? That will influence both flow and lighting quite a bit. The mangrove tank won't require strong lighting, but I don't know much about light levels at 50'.

If you can go with an all-open system, that'll make some things easier. I've never had that luxury, so I don't know much about pitfalls.

futrtrubl · 04/08/2006, 11:10 PM

Thanks for the welcome!

Yup, powerheads are the plan... though looks are critical. What would be a better idea for water movement?

The main tank will be as representative of the forereef at about 50+ft as we can get in a 250gal tank, so various corals, fish, inverts and macroalgaes. As to the corals I'm afraid I only understand the scientific catagorizations of them (we'll have a few gorgonians, mostly hermatypic corals and probably a Millepora sp.) so sps and lps etc mean nothing to me ;']

From the feedback I'm getting it seems that for a fully open system to do what I want it will be harder than a semi-closed system. So the plan currently is to have a constant inflow of fresh seawater to a sump. This sump will have the chiller attached to it and will circulate water with the display tanks. Excess water will flow out and back to the sea.

The main problem at the moment is getting the excess water out gracefully. Currently we have a very simple siphon system going. So when the power goes it siphons till it can't siphon anymore, then when the power comes back on the tanks overflow and flood the lab. Needless to say this is something we want to avoid ;']

Edward

bertoni · 04/09/2006, 01:14 PM

SPS and LPS don't mean much in any case.

You should be able to use an overflow box type of setup or drill the tank to dump excess water. This animation should help:

http://www.melevsreef.com/what_sump.html

Note that the overflow box doesn't lose siphon when the pump goes out.

bertoni · 04/09/2006, 01:17 PM

For water flow, some Tunze Streams on controllers would be high-end and very capable. You could look into some Seio pumps as well. They are cheaper, but can't be used with a controller. To inject some random water motion, you could use a SCWD or two, or perhaps an OceansMotions device, or even some simple powerheads on a timer.

The pumps could be hidden in rocks or fake rocks. Tunze sells such items for their pumps.

If you can drill the tank, you could look into a closed loop.

futrtrubl · 04/10/2006, 12:59 AM

Ahhhh, that overflow box is just what we need. Perfect, since we can't drill the tank.. well we can, but there is only one person in the area set up to drill glass and she can only drill 3/8 diameter holes.
I look at those pumps, but what's a SCWD?

Edward

bertoni · 04/10/2006, 11:12 AM

http://www.marinedepot.com/md_viewIt...product=3Q1111

There's a link for the SCWD.

04/01/2006, 11:24 AM	#1
futrtrubl Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Jamaica Posts: 154	250gal and 2x100gal set up My questions (see bellow for background information): Is there a better way to do the water outflow on the display tanks short of drilling the tanks? Is the UV sterilizer nescessary? Can you identify it (picture at www.edowner.net/UVSter.jpg )? I've worked out that the main tank will need about 750-1500 watts of lighting and each 100 gal tank will need about 300-500 watts. Is this correct? If so what are your recomendations for this, bearing in mind that all supplies will need to be shipped in from the US? If my calculations are correct I'll need about 3750 gph of flow for the main tank and 1500gph for the smaller tanks. Correct? How much of this should be seawater input in a fully open system (no other filtration/skimming cicles)? Is a fully open system recommended? If I go semi-open what would my seawater input requirements be now, and what other cleaning cycle requirements? If we continue using a fully open system would a chiller be able to do anything since the water would only get a single pass through it? Would setting up a "chill tank" upstream make better sense? The background: I work at a marine lab in Jamaica and have been tasked with getting our aquariums up and running again. One is a ~250-300gal tank (245x75x60cm), "European" style if I understand the term correctly (lots of reinforcement along the top edges meaning no good edge to hang stuff). We have 2 other display tanks at about 100gal each (150x60x45), non-European. We also have about a dozen tanks up to 20gals that could be used at the display location and another set of fixed specimen tanks up to 100gal at another location that can be used for support (quarantene etc). The display tanks and the specimen tanks all recieve water from the sea 24/7, though during power outages we may loose flow if the backup generator fails to start automatically (not a rare occurence). Water flows out of the display tanks through a very simple syphon system, meaning that if the seawater pump fails the syphon takes out water untill it looses suction and if the seawater pump starts back up at that point the tank overflows. The main tank will hold a reef system, simulating the local reef at 50ft. One 100 gal tank will be a mangrove system, and the other 100 is unassigned. Seawater flow branches off, after passing through a UV sterilizer, to each tank to keep them seperate to stop cross contamination and contamination from the sea. During periods of high seawater temperature we do get some coral bleaching and death in the tanks and so we've planned to get a chiller. Thanks for any help, Edward. PS. I'll most likely have more questions once these are answered ;'] __________________ how U mine for fish?!! Current Tank Info: Looking after the labs 250g and 2x 100g tanks Last edited by futrtrubl; 04/01/2006 at 11:43 AM.

04/01/2006, 05:56 PM	#2
bertoni RC Mod Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Mountain View, CA, USA Posts: 88,616	*To Reef Central* For flow, you could just put some powerheads into the tanks, if looks aren't critical. I don't use a UV sterilizer. They might help make the water a bit clearer, according to some reports. What animals do you intend to keep? That will influence both flow and lighting quite a bit. The mangrove tank won't require strong lighting, but I don't know much about light levels at 50'. If you can go with an all-open system, that'll make some things easier. I've never had that luxury, so I don't know much about pitfalls. __________________ Jonathan Bertoni

04/08/2006, 11:10 PM	#3
futrtrubl Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Jamaica Posts: 154	Thanks for the welcome! Yup, powerheads are the plan... though looks are critical. What would be a better idea for water movement? The main tank will be as representative of the forereef at about 50+ft as we can get in a 250gal tank, so various corals, fish, inverts and macroalgaes. As to the corals I'm afraid I only understand the scientific catagorizations of them (we'll have a few gorgonians, mostly hermatypic corals and probably a Millepora sp.) so sps and lps etc mean nothing to me ;'] From the feedback I'm getting it seems that for a fully open system to do what I want it will be harder than a semi-closed system. So the plan currently is to have a constant inflow of fresh seawater to a sump. This sump will have the chiller attached to it and will circulate water with the display tanks. Excess water will flow out and back to the sea. The main problem at the moment is getting the excess water out gracefully. Currently we have a very simple siphon system going. So when the power goes it siphons till it can't siphon anymore, then when the power comes back on the tanks overflow and flood the lab. Needless to say this is something we want to avoid ;'] Edward __________________ how U mine for fish?!! Current Tank Info: Looking after the labs 250g and 2x 100g tanks

04/09/2006, 01:14 PM	#4
bertoni RC Mod Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Mountain View, CA, USA Posts: 88,616	SPS and LPS don't mean much in any case. You should be able to use an overflow box type of setup or drill the tank to dump excess water. This animation should help: http://www.melevsreef.com/what_sump.html Note that the overflow box doesn't lose siphon when the pump goes out. __________________ Jonathan Bertoni

04/09/2006, 01:17 PM	#5
bertoni RC Mod Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Mountain View, CA, USA Posts: 88,616	For water flow, some Tunze Streams on controllers would be high-end and very capable. You could look into some Seio pumps as well. They are cheaper, but can't be used with a controller. To inject some random water motion, you could use a SCWD or two, or perhaps an OceansMotions device, or even some simple powerheads on a timer. The pumps could be hidden in rocks or fake rocks. Tunze sells such items for their pumps. If you can drill the tank, you could look into a closed loop. __________________ Jonathan Bertoni

04/10/2006, 12:59 AM	#6
futrtrubl Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Jamaica Posts: 154	Ahhhh, that overflow box is just what we need. Perfect, since we can't drill the tank.. well we can, but there is only one person in the area set up to drill glass and she can only drill 3/8 diameter holes. I look at those pumps, but what's a SCWD? Edward __________________ how U mine for fish?!! Current Tank Info: Looking after the labs 250g and 2x 100g tanks

04/10/2006, 11:12 AM	#7
bertoni RC Mod Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Mountain View, CA, USA Posts: 88,616	http://www.marinedepot.com/md_viewIt...product=3Q1111 There's a link for the SCWD. __________________ Jonathan Bertoni