470g inwall construction thread

Had a minor emergency this morning.....temp in my live rock holding tubs was 87....at 8am. Summer in Oklahoma!! Anyway....wife wasn't exactly thrilled with the idea of two 150g tubs full of 400lbs of LR in our living room....so I hooked up a "do-it-yourself" chiller. Consists of a mag9 pump, 25' of 3/4" clear pvc flex, a large cooler, and 40lbs of ice to cover the pvc. The vice-grips on the outflow are there to restrict flow giving the water more of a chance to cool. Temp is dropping a degree and hour and is now down to a cool 82! Cooler weather is forecast by Monday!!!
chiller.jpg
 
Very ingenues Curt. :thumbsup:

I wonder if a guy got one of those cheap small refrigerators and coiled a ton of hose inside how well that would work as a chiller?
 
Lunchbucket said:
they are NOT supposed to be very efficient. i think the ice will work just dandy

Lunchbucket
Click to expand...

as in not much return for the electricity used to cool the water?

I think the ice will work great I guess I went off on a tangent and was thinking (typing) out loud :)
 
Thanks guys....its 11pm and the temp is down to a perfect 78! BTW....garage air temp is 92. I've removed some of the ice...my thermostat if you will....and now off to bed.
 
Busy Saturday....Plumbing the tank sandwiched between my son's two baseball games. A special thanks to my friends, Larry and Craven, who spent their afternoon working on the tank's plumbing. I could not have done this project without them!!
Plumbing is roughly half completed. Now for some pics!!
 
Working on the return
brian1.jpg


Now the completed return. Return consists of 1 1/2" PVC "T" off into five 1" ballvalves running across the back of the tank. On the tankside, there are five 3/4" "Y"s giving 10 separate adjustable returns 5" from the tank bottom across the rear of the tank. Return is powered by a Sequence Barracuda pump. The drains shown are 2" into the sump. The 2" bulkhead and PVC in the upper left corner is for a closed loop which are connect to two 1" spray bars down each side of the tank.
returns1.jpg


And finally, my wife's Saturday contribution to the tank.....while she's obviously not into the mechanics of the tank...she does enjoy looking at it.
cathpool.jpg
 
BTW - You figure out what you are going to do with the vent fan? I have a tube fan very much like that. Moves just under 300 CFM and I'm using it to vent a 150 sq/ft tank room and its not doing a great job. Part of my problem is that I'm restricted to re-using an existing 4 inch outside opening. Thus I had to reduce to 4 inch vent pipe.
 
awesome set-up

awesome set-up

curthendrix said:
Yes, I am keeping a round figure of the cost although I choose not look at it very often and definately keep that figure off my wife's radar!! I will post the figure when the project is completed as long as my spouse continues to show no interest in reefcentral!!
Click to expand...

you might as well keep a running total for the cost in your thread, if you were worried about your wife seeing it you just made that problem seem minor compared to the photo :lol: jk it's not that bad, but I know my girlfriend would freak out.

your tank is going to be amazing, it's amazing before it even has water in it. great job on the design and planning stages, it shows. your 155 has some gorgeous coral in it. how long has it been set up? Were your colonies grown from frags, or small colonies?
 
hmm...how you going to get away from having the WHOLE tank drain w/ the returns sitting that low? i know you said return...i HOPE you were meaning closed loop returns!!! prolly...but just checking

Lunchbucket
 
And finally, my wife's Saturday contribution to the tank.....while she's obviously not into the mechanics of the tank...she does enjoy looking at it.
Click to expand...

I assume the red X means she found out!!!:D
 
Thought I better do a pre-empitive strike and get rid of the evidence!! What picture??????

Those are returns.....will utilize a check-valve to prevent a major problem!!!
 
check valves

Curt, be careful with check valves!!! I had one that failed, and I've read many horror stories on RC. Even the good ones. They are just not reliable for the long run. imho.

Are all the returns that low? I don't want to throw a wrench into your plans, Please research the check valves before you commit to the returns being that low.

good move on the picture, but now we all have our silly comments about it :rolleyes:
 
Those are the only returns that are low in the tank. I have ballvalves plumbed into each return so I can manual cut the flow should my checkvalve fail....as long as I'm around!! I will probably end up hooking a generator up to that pump as an extra precaution also. I didn't make much progress on the tank today as we are waiting for additional plumbing parts. We did get the 1" seaswirls which are also being used as returns set on the tank.
seaswirl.jpg
 
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