Alex's 8x3x2' Australian Reef Build (340gal)

[pauloshannassy]

90kg of rock! Looking forward to seeing the scape.

I added more live rock from my other tank last week and finally nitrite dropped to 0 today. Did a 80% water change to lower nitrates then will transfer a few fish over tomorrow I think.

Will your display be setup before your other baby arrives?

Cheers

 

[Peckoltia]

Thanks Paul. Hopefully the rock arrives safely, without too much breakage.

My plumber who was meant to drill the wall has decided to go on holidays, which is my own fault for not being more organised. Have found someone else to do it though, and will be done by the end of the weekend hopefully, and the painter is already tee’d up. Should be quick once that’s done. So should be mostly done before bubs arrives.

 

[Peckoltia]

Update - got the mixing station mostly plumbed. All dry fitted then glued. Only a couple very minor leaks which I have since rectified. Pretty happy with it and seems to be working a treat so far. The left barrel is SW and the right RODI. I like the 'closed loop' on the left as I can turn the pump on and really churn the water to either mix salt or get the water full of oxygen before a water change. Each drum holds 220L (~60gal). All that is left to do is clamp a flexible hose on the reducer and install drill a hole for the float switch to plumb the RODI line into so I don't flood my garage.

 

[Valentini89]

Looks great so far

 

[Peckoltia]

Looks great so far

Thanks.

I crowed a bit early and have a very slow leak in one of the glued joins (first time that's happened to me) - so will wait until I do a water change on the QT and empty the barrel to rectify the leak. Luckily I used quite a few unions, saved me some major headaches. :headwally:

 

[Peckoltia]

Finally some more progress - getting the wall drilled was a major headache, with my usual avenues unable to help me for the foreseeable future. Ended up getting one of my dads mates to help out, and must say he did a fantastic job with the 4 holes through a double brick wall - nice and straight and hardly a chip out of the plaster or the garage brick wall! really neat job. This was really holding me up.

The electrician is also at my house as I type this doing some jobs including doing all the wiring of the powerboards in the garage for all the equipment for the QT tank and sump/display! So some jobs are getting done. Wall will finally be painted this week also.

Once that's done things will start coming together very quickly!

On a side note my algae reactor arrived today, got an ITC ALR 3 - I must say it is bigger than I was expecting. Seems to be well made too. Also got a call from the delivery company my skimmer will finally be delivered today too! So things are starting to move quickly now!

 

[Peckoltia]

My skimmer finally arrived yesterday, after a very long wait. Ended up going with a Nyos Quantum 300 - beast of a skimmer, first thing I noticed was the sheer size and had me second guessing if i measured incorrectly and have it not fit in the sump! (full size lighter on top of the cup for a size reference) I must say, putting it together it feels very well made, solid and precise construction with no play in the pieces once put together. Really easy to assemble, took me all of 5 minutes with a flat head screw driver. Fits in the sump nicely, and looks the part next to the algae reactor. I turned the light on the algae reactor for a pic for no other reason than it looked awesome!

I'm still undecided whether I will run the algae reactor in the sump or having it external as it does take up a lot of room in the sump.

 

[McPuff]

I'm still undecided whether I will run the algae reactor in the sump or having it external as it does take up a lot of room in the sump.

I would run it externally so you can also block the light spill from encouraging algae growth in your sump or other equipment.

 

[Peckoltia]

I would run it externally so you can also block the light spill from encouraging algae growth in your sump or other equipment.

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. Running it external (either behind or next to my sump) as it's all blacked out.

Wall is getting painted this morning and we are off and running!

 

[Peckoltia]

Wall has now been painted black, and I must say it really pops already with the black stand and the rest of the house being painted 'ivory white'. The light brackets are currently at the powder coaters, getting finished in 'satin black' like the stand. Should look pretty spectacular once the tank gets pushed back on the wall, putting a real focus on the tanks inhabitants.

 

[pauloshannassy]

Looking great!

 

[Peckoltia]

Looking great!

Thanks Paul. Not long now until there is water in the tank. Leak tested the overflow box (synergy ghost) and all the pipe work I have done so far over the weekend. Not a single leak from the bulkheads or any joins which is always a good start!

Hopefully collect the lighting brackets/arms at some stage this week from the powder coaters. Then I just need to drill a couple holes in them for the light hanging kits to feed through and they are done. Just finalizing a couple things with the supplier of the lights and then get them shipped over.

Will keep the thread updated with how I have suspended the lights when there is something to show for it!

There is also a shortage of Carib Sea 'life rock' in Australia at the minute. Have put my order in, and hopefully will land at my supplier on the 21st of this month. So if everything stays to schedule the tank should be up and running with water by early August.

It's been a long slog so far, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. I started this process (moving on my FW stingrays) back in early feb. So 6/7 Months from day 1 to having water in the tank.

How's your tank tracking?

Thanks,

Alex

 

[pauloshannassy]

Hi Alex - yeah it’s a long wait but I’m sure it will be worth it. Looking forward to seeing some pics of the light setup.

The life rock must be pretty popular - my LFS got a relatively big shipment in when I got mine & all boxes were sold within a matter of hours..

My tank is doing pretty well I think. I’ve got some fish in there now who seem to be happy.
Starting to get some small coralline algae now.
Phosphates are 0.11 according to Hanna ULR checker (although not sure if this is the test kit, as this is way higher than it should be)
Nitrates about 2ppm

Cheers

 

[Peckoltia]

Hi Paul - Good to hear your tank is going well.

Lights have now been paid for. Unfortunately they are 4-6 weeks away from arriving at my door (waiting for new stock to land in Australia and be sent to to me). Which isn't a big deal as the tank will need to cycle anyway. It is just an issue with pushing the tank back onto the wall (and starting the cycle and finishing plumbing). As I wanted to fix my light brackets to the wall and suspend the lights before the tank was pushed onto the wall - just to make life easier not having to drill holes into the wall leaning over a 3' wide tank. Still undecided what I will do in regards to this.

I ended up going with 4x 120cm Illumagic Blaze X's. I tossed up whether to go down the Radion path, but with a 3' wide tank it is a bit awkward with each light apparently covering a 2x2' area, and the sheer volume of radion's that would be required (6 as an absolute minimum). Dalua Australia (the supplier of Illumagic in Australia) were also very good to deal with and always very happy to answer any questions as were Nature Aquarium in Melbourne who I bought the lights from - and like anyone I ask a lot.

 

[Peckoltia]

The long wait is now over - the lights have now been suspended!



I have to say I'm very happy with the results, definitely hitting the look I was going for with the 'sleek industrial' look. Looks amazing with the 'satin' finish on the stand and the hanging brackets as well as the black wall.



Now I need to figure out how to best hide the electrical chords from the lights, weather i run them up and into the ceiling or back and run them down the wall and hide the bulk of it behind the tank. Once that is done, the tank can be pushed back onto the wall and just some minor plumbing done and she is ready for water!



Been a long slog, but I am almost there. Please excuse the mess.

 

[McPuff]

WOw, that's going to look great. For the cords, I'd just run them up the wires and back to the wall. Easy and will look fine.

 

[Peckoltia]

Thanks McPuff.

Quick update, was just going to drill another hole in the wall to run the cables through, but didn't realize the ceiling in the garage behind is much lower than the living room, so had to rule that out.



Ended up running the cabling down the wall hidden in some television conduit. Looks pretty good for the most part, and hid the rest of the cabling behind the tank itself. Still a couple minor touch ups to be done.



But the tank is back on the wall and the plumbing is now drying.



Filled the tank up to see how 'unlevel the floor is'. Approximately 1/2" over and 8' length. Shimming the stand also isn't really an option with a 10 legged metal stand. Still unsure what I'm going to do about this if anything - the base of the tank is sitting on is a flat surface and the stand is bullet proof.



The other thing is there is a lot of light spill from the lights being the recommended 60cm/2' from the water surface, and it really illuminates my house and can even see it from the street (which i don't like) - am considering having a 'collar' fabricate and drilled into the wall around the lights to stop a bit of this light spill.



Hopefully have saltwater in it this weekend!

Sorry about the poor iphone pics. Have a mate who is a photographer that wants to take pics intermittently as the tank matures to track progress. May wait until the tank has inhabitants before I get him around.

 

[McPuff]

One option for leveling the stand is playing cards. For the 1/2" gaps you'll want to use something else, but for the smaller gaps in the middle legs you could definitely go with cards. Just cut them down a bit. This is done on pool/billiards tables as well. And I used cards to shim the gaps between my stand and tank. It's easy and they don't compress.

 

[Peckoltia]

Thanks for the tip - will look into using cards to shim the smaller gaps. It is annoying I'd just use composite shims for the larger gaps, but there is nowhere in Australia that sells them and can't find anywhere that will ship them from the states. Such a simple item too!

 

[Peckoltia]

Found some composite shims locally! I shimmed the 3 legs that were furthers off the ground. Now 9/10 legs touch the ground and the tank 4mm (5/32") off over the length of the tank.

I can't see how I can get this anymore level than this. The tank sits on a sheet of extra thick foam and a sheet of marine ply that has been painted with weather shield paint for added durability.

RODI line is in the tank, should be filled within the next few days.