500g tank project middletown

R

russellqueen

New member
Hey guys and gals,
I am preparing to set up a 500G 108x30wx36h Starphire tank in mid/late january and was looking to see if anyone has experience with a project this big.

The tank and stand is currently being built, but I am looking for suggestions on lighting, pumps etc.

My thoughts as of now

Reflectors: 5 19inch luminarcs
lighting: 5 400w mogul base reeflux 14000K powered by coralvue ballast with 4 4 foot URI vho actinics, moonlights
I need to design an aluminum frame that will be suspended from the 9 ft ceiling that will house the lighting fixtures. Any suggestions? I was thinking aluminum.

Return pump SEQUENCE of appropriate GPH and head pressure (fish room will be in basement =14 ft of head.
?wavemaker vs electronic pump control.

Sump downstairs probably 2-3 150G rubbermaid tubs. for sand bed, refugium and maybe frag tank.

turn my current 90G into a sick tank.

Calc reactor vs KALKWASSER ???? no exp with either

Skimmer MR-3 or MR-4 undecided.

1/4 hp chiller just in case.

Any thoughts or help would be really appreciated. Also if anyone is free toward the end of january to help move this beast (1200lbs) that would be great.

Thanks in advance.

RUSS
 
hey Russ

sounds like a nice project! i think 4 luminarc reflectors will be all you need. those reflectors have a very nice spread to them and with 400w they will be 14" to 20" off the water. you will get plenty of coverage with just 4.

a sequence hammerhead should work fine for the return but i would call Champion lighting and ask them to calculate the head loss for you and give you there suggestion. i wouldn't put a wave maker on the main return, just let it run all the time. have the tank drilled for 2 Dart pumps for a closed loop and put 2 Ocean Motion switching valves on them.

for that size tank a Calcium reactor would be best.

those beckett skimmers work great but are power hogs. i would look into a Deltec or Bubbleking(there pricey but good) or PM "spazz" and ask him to make you a Dart skimmer for your tank. it will work better the the 2 i mentioned and cost less.

i also think you will need at least a 1/2 to 3/4 hp chiller. i have a 1/4hp chiller o my 450g system and its not enough.
 
Russ,

that sounds like an excellent reef project. plenty of room to grow very large corals. the tank almost sounds like the size of EXOTIC AQUATICS main display tank. about 8ft x 3 x 3 . I havent been there in about a year, but last time, the table top corals in it were about a foot in diameter and growing strong under what looked like 4 lumenarc 400's . with a fifth one over a side fuge. 20K bulbs which needed no actinic supplement. You might like to call or visit to see how they set it up. a surprisingly simple below tank sump and filtration. I suppose its still set up and running in the front window.
http://www.exoticaquatics.com/index.html

I found this pump flow calculator that seems pretty simple to use. bends and valves and pipe diameter are needed to calculate a better flow estimate at any given pump head and length of pipeline for a variety of popular pumps.

http://www.reefs.org/pumps/

I didn't check , but there might also be a calculator here on reef central. plus the LARGE REEF TANK FORUM. to see other projects for ideas. Your equipment is all top shelf, so a little extra planning and calculating should help set it up with the desired results. Measure twice, cut once.

It will be great to hear how it comes together.

ken
 
Thanks for all of the imput guys!!!

Getting ready to move the 90 into rubbermaid sumps and start curing the live rock in the next few weeks.

Keep posting your suggestions and I will try and keep updating.

thanks

RUSS
 
I wish I could help but I've only maintained large FO systems, as well as my little reef, and never set up a large reef tank. I wouldn't be much help either lifting things as I have a bad arm. Thought about setting up automation devices for lighting insted of timers? Or maybe some sort of aquacontroller?

Jon
 
I was actually thinking about getting the dimmers on the halide ballasts, but unsure how I could control them??

Just found some of those pesky montipora eating nudibrachs tonight. I had them a year ago on a flower pot, but now they are on my big monti cap. I tried the flatworm exit, but I guess that it does not work on Nudibrachs.

I have been sucking them out, but will probably look for a 6 line wrasse on tuesday.

FYI did you all know that Newark Tropicals closed today???
 
What? As in the store closed? Newark Tropicals will not be selling any more fish? Did I miss any clearance stuff? I had just told a friend about two weeks ago the only reason I would buy dry goods from there is if the store was closing and they had some good deals.
 
Yup, I called this weekend looking for some flatworm exit hoping that would kill nudibrachs and they said that they were closing their doors that day and everything including the big 300 gallon display was 50% off. Go figure??

Still trying to figure what I am going to do about these nudibrachs since the flatworm exit did nothing.
 
Whoa!! nudibranchs can wreak a lot of havoc. I once brought home a new young soft leather coral, and a couple days later noticed it was getting chewed up over night. next night i checked it out with flashlight after dark, and found some inch long nice fluffy white nudibranchs with snowflake like fins chewing on it. its their only food. luckily i was able to pick the coral out and scrape them off. apparently they hadn't had time to spawn in the tank.

do yours eat anything else? if not, clean the target coral. perhaps give it a short fresh water(rodi) bath in ph prepped water. for a minute. that might do it. I know a short fresh water dip kills the dreaded photosynthetic red flatworm. they don't travel far. probably spend the daylight hours on the bottom side of the coral rock.

short fresh water dips kills a lot of things, like even ick on fish. as long as it is PH adjusted and aerated for the fish.
 
Russ, you might also like to check out east coast aquatics. I believe they have their new 1000 gallon show tank up and running. They say that when Bill wants to re-arrange the corals on the reef rock, he sends in a diver!!! so, the employees must be pretty much , water logged, by now!!

http://www.eastcoastaquatics.com/pages/main/main.htm

I haven't been up there in quite a while, but i need to go again soon. It must be a sight. At the very least, one of the Seven Wonders of Prospect Park!! Pa.!!

I'm sure Bill has some advise to share about setting up LARGE tanks.
 
russellqueen who is making your tank?

I will be starting a 240 project in the about 2 months... im going with Aquariums for you in NJ.
 
Locally Mbbuna is probably your best resource experience wise.
He's got a great system and I'm sure he can give you some helpful and money saving advice.
 
The fight continues......
Ken, I did make a trip to ECA this weekend to get some flatworm exit that did not work. The show tank is really nice, but needs more coral and less fish.

Here is a link that has some really good info on the little "darling" Nudibranchs that are still eating away.

http://www.reeffarmers.com/tracygraynudi01.htm

I purchased a 100G rubbermaid and a lunare wrasse today and am going to quarantine all of my montis to do some serious dipping and scraping. Hopefully this will work. I also added 2 six line wrasses, an arrow crab and a algae blenny with some various hermit crabs today in hopes that something will eat the remaining nudis. TIme will tell.

I ordered the lighting, skimmer and calcium reactor from reefexotics today so things are moving along.

The tank is being made by a company in the Bronx in NY, will have to look for the name. I looked at Aquariumsforyou, but had a friend that did not have a good experience with one of their tanks "malfunctioning". They were significantly less in price than the place that I went with.

I will keep everyone UTD on the montipora move.

RUSS
 
Well all of the montipora were taken out of the 90 and put downstairs in a rubbermaid tub after multiple dips in marin tropic and Lugoils. Everything is looking good and no sign of new nudis. I will repeat in 7 days just to kill the little devils that were mere eggs and may have survived the first round of carnage. Luckily I got the Luminarcs and 400W reeflux bulbs with balasts earlier this week, so that is what is hanging over the tub now lighting the Montis.

It really killed me to break out all of that big Monti Cap that had been growing for 2 years. Man that thing was stuck to the LR and the Glass on either side. There was enough left to frag for the new setup when things are finally nudi free.

Also, I got my skimmer from MRC yesterday and the ring on the skimmer cup was broken. I have called them 2x, but have not heard back. We will see how this goes??

RUSS
 
here is a picture of the broken collection cup
95433Picture_004__500_x_375_.jpg
 
Sorry to hear about your monti's, but at least you were able to save some of them.

Good luck with the collection cup. That sucks that they didn't get back to you, have you tried to run the skimmer yet, does the cup leak?

As previously said you can fix it, but since you got it brand new you could also send it back. So what it comes down to is, do you want to wait on them to get you the new collection cup or do you just want to fix it?

Chris
 
update,

Anthony at Reefexotics is giving great follow-up on the whole thing, and I just forwarded the picture to Andy at MRC, so I should know something soon.

I realize that I could fix it with some sort of epoxy, but if I am going to spend $700 + on a skimmer setup, I really want it to be 100% functional with no chance for problems in the near future. While the epoxy may hold, the crack is in an area that if those screws are tightened on the top of the cup it may put too much stress on the "patch" over time and break down the road.

I'm sure that it will be sorted out soon, so 1 or 2 more days won't hurt anything.

I am still trying to figure out how I am going to plumb the 3 big rubbermaid sumps together with overflows on all of them that will be in my basement. Any suggestions??

Also if anyone knows a good electrician at a reasonable rate I will need to run another box for this whole setup.

Thanks

RUSS
 
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