135g Reef Cube Planning / Build
- Thread starter raidendex
- Start date
Definitely thinking it out
raidendex
Well-known member
Finally decided to cut some lumber and assemble the stand today 
Mostly as planned, but I did end up using four 2x6 legs along with four 2x4 legs instead of either 2x4 legs. No real reason to do that aside from that I had enough 2x6 and some cut offs, so decided to use it. I guess it would add some extra shear strength...
Still need to do cutouts and do epoxy pond shield on the bottom, as well as, treat rest of it with polyurethane finish, but will probably wait for hard wood for the "skin" to arrive first to do this. Unfortunately will have to do this all in the roof, but I guess that's what the windows are for lol
Anyways, some pics of the project
Mostly as planned, but I did end up using four 2x6 legs along with four 2x4 legs instead of either 2x4 legs. No real reason to do that aside from that I had enough 2x6 and some cut offs, so decided to use it. I guess it would add some extra shear strength...Still need to do cutouts and do epoxy pond shield on the bottom, as well as, treat rest of it with polyurethane finish, but will probably wait for hard wood for the "skin" to arrive first to do this. Unfortunately will have to do this all in the roof, but I guess that's what the windows are for lol
Anyways, some pics of the project
raidendex
Well-known member
Put together another plan to potentially automate RO/DI water production and refill of the ATO container. Same system is also tied into 2 20g QT tanks.
Also got the stand skin lumber today. Will need to go through and try to match it up a bit to make 3 panels for the 3 sides of the stand and then do some gluing. If I'm not too lazy this weekend hopefully will get it all assembled as far as I can without putting the tank on top
And last piece of update. Painted inside of the stand with same pond shield epoxy as the utility shelf. Not super pretty but it will work and will be mostly unseen hehe.
Also got the stand skin lumber today. Will need to go through and try to match it up a bit to make 3 panels for the 3 sides of the stand and then do some gluing. If I'm not too lazy this weekend hopefully will get it all assembled as far as I can without putting the tank on top
And last piece of update. Painted inside of the stand with same pond shield epoxy as the utility shelf. Not super pretty but it will work and will be mostly unseen hehe.
raidendex
Well-known member
If you mean the woodworking shop it's very basic hehe. Most of cutting I do on dewalt portable table saw and then just bunch of pipe clamps lol.
Cutting plywood is super annoying. Throw few 2x4 on driveway sheet on top clamp 4 or 8 foot long level on a line and clamp to make a track and use battery powered circular saw to cut across. I'm actually so tired of it, now looking at track saw lol.
Have some routers and bunch of bits, but those not super commonly used, just to give an edge a nicer finish etc.
Have miter saw, but again rarely use as it has no wheels like table one heh.
Cutting plywood is super annoying. Throw few 2x4 on driveway sheet on top clamp 4 or 8 foot long level on a line and clamp to make a track and use battery powered circular saw to cut across. I'm actually so tired of it, now looking at track saw lol.
Have some routers and bunch of bits, but those not super commonly used, just to give an edge a nicer finish etc.
Have miter saw, but again rarely use as it has no wheels like table one heh.
raidendex
Well-known member
Finished the stand over the weekend with spar urethane and glued up the 3 panels for the stand skin. They match up a bit better on the front, middle one is facing front up, other two are back up.
Decided to not glue any of them to the stand. Side ones will attach with bolts. This way if needed I can remove them, otherwise will be fairly securely attached. Not 100% sure on the front one yet, but probably friction fit with some magnets.
Decided to not glue any of them to the stand. Side ones will attach with bolts. This way if needed I can remove them, otherwise will be fairly securely attached. Not 100% sure on the front one yet, but probably friction fit with some magnets.
I've always thought these button-fix things look interesting.
Button-fix - The hidden detail that holds everything together
Looks awesome!
Looks fantastic
raidendex
Well-known member
Filled tank with saltwater and sand yesterday.
Tried for a minute to make something out of rock and started use epoxy to bind pieces together, but quickly got annoyed with it lol. Also not sure how I feel with bunch of epoxy in the tank or super complicated structures that need it.
I did come up with a layout that looked naturale to me while providing fair amount of spaces throughout for the fish to swim through or hide, but didn't yet recreate this in the tank.
In the end I will probably just go with stacking approach, these macro rocks seem to lock together fairly well without need for glue unless you're trying to fight gravity =)
Anyways, for now just dumped all the rock into the tank to start curing. There is quite a bit more than I would be able to use, so probably 50% will go somewhere else, some I'm sure will make its way into the sump.
For now just have to wait for sump to be built to proceed further. Hopefully won't be more than few more weeks.
Tried for a minute to make something out of rock and started use epoxy to bind pieces together, but quickly got annoyed with it lol. Also not sure how I feel with bunch of epoxy in the tank or super complicated structures that need it.
I did come up with a layout that looked naturale to me while providing fair amount of spaces throughout for the fish to swim through or hide, but didn't yet recreate this in the tank.
In the end I will probably just go with stacking approach, these macro rocks seem to lock together fairly well without need for glue unless you're trying to fight gravity =)
Anyways, for now just dumped all the rock into the tank to start curing. There is quite a bit more than I would be able to use, so probably 50% will go somewhere else, some I'm sure will make its way into the sump.
For now just have to wait for sump to be built to proceed further. Hopefully won't be more than few more weeks.
raidendex
Well-known member
Switched up hardware a bit recently after looking for things I could from Kraken/WaveEngine. Basically all pumps will now be driven by two WaveEngines that are powered from Krakens. So with two 100AH batteries I should be able to run system fairly normally for a while now.
Added two Octo Pulse 4s for flow. They seem nice and quite so far, if not run at 100%. Gyre XF350 on the other hand are quite noisy at anything past about 40%, so will see how they perform, I might swap them for another two Octo Pulse 4s.
For return pumps I switched from Sicce Syncra ADV 5.5 to two VarioS 4. Probably won't need to really control them too much, but again lets me run them off of Kraken's battery at half power.
My LFS Top Shelf Aquatics was able to get me pretty much all the hardware I needed, so that was a sad day for my wallet.
But now I have all the hardware lol. Only things I am missing are one X10 that is on back order and one WaveEngine (got a broken one from BRS, pump port 1 was not powering up), so once that return gets processed will need to order another one, along with couple of bus cables.
However, I am still waiting to hear from Luna Reef about starting my sump build, so the main blocker at the moment before I can proceed further with the build.
Also I was able to setup a more automated RODI and ATO refill. So now RODI barrel refills once level drops low enough.
I can technically do the same for ATO barrel, but left that as a button press in Hydros app for now, as running that big pump controlled by two optical water switches seems a bit scary lol. RODI filtering has a fail safe of float valve that this does not with 1/4" pipe at the end.
And finally, just got a new 3D printer to my collection that hopefully should yield better results than my old FDM from Creality. As well as less toxic ones that my resin printer can do lol. As far as I can tell PETG should be a good fit here for near water environments, I do not plan however to put any of these into water as I do not trust quality of these plastics enough
Added two Octo Pulse 4s for flow. They seem nice and quite so far, if not run at 100%. Gyre XF350 on the other hand are quite noisy at anything past about 40%, so will see how they perform, I might swap them for another two Octo Pulse 4s.
For return pumps I switched from Sicce Syncra ADV 5.5 to two VarioS 4. Probably won't need to really control them too much, but again lets me run them off of Kraken's battery at half power.
My LFS Top Shelf Aquatics was able to get me pretty much all the hardware I needed, so that was a sad day for my wallet.
But now I have all the hardware lol. Only things I am missing are one X10 that is on back order and one WaveEngine (got a broken one from BRS, pump port 1 was not powering up), so once that return gets processed will need to order another one, along with couple of bus cables.
However, I am still waiting to hear from Luna Reef about starting my sump build, so the main blocker at the moment before I can proceed further with the build.
Also I was able to setup a more automated RODI and ATO refill. So now RODI barrel refills once level drops low enough.
I can technically do the same for ATO barrel, but left that as a button press in Hydros app for now, as running that big pump controlled by two optical water switches seems a bit scary lol. RODI filtering has a fail safe of float valve that this does not with 1/4" pipe at the end.
And finally, just got a new 3D printer to my collection that hopefully should yield better results than my old FDM from Creality. As well as less toxic ones that my resin printer can do lol. As far as I can tell PETG should be a good fit here for near water environments, I do not plan however to put any of these into water as I do not trust quality of these plastics enough
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