Brando's 180g

[Brando5185]

Picked up a 180g set up off a local guy to upgrade from my 75g. I have a large haddoni and a large crispa that were taking up most of the real estate in the 75g. I managed to convince the wife that they need more room.

The tank was still running at the guys house, so I went over early on a Sat. morning to help with the tear down. That began a long long 3 day weekend of tearing it down, moving it, redoing things a little better and setting back up at my place.

Tank came with 180g (72x24x24) tank, stand, canopy, 75g sump, mag 9.5 return, RO extreme 200 skimmer, 72" green element LED light and about 150lbs live rock.

First thing was the LED light it came with wasn't enough for my anemones so I found another photon 32 to match the one I had over my 75g. These will be side by side and should give good coverage over the 180g.

-Uploading pics now-

 

[Brando5185]

Breaking the tank down. Guy had a large eel and puffer that I traded in at local LFS.

Got it in the house and ready to clean it.

Had to cut the plumbing during the tear down so I redid everything with screw unions.

Got it pushed back into position and checking the level. Had to go buy some shims to bring the left side up. Also got the 75g sump with skimmer in it waiting to slide in the left opening.

 

[Brando5185]

Got the newly mixed water going in. Checking the level as it slowly fills up checking for any shifting or settling. Check out my rock carrying bucket setup. Sump is in place as well.

Canopy on, both lights hung and started the rock work.

Got everything transferred over and everything is angry from the move.

Finally cleared up.

Everything is open and happy.

 

[Brando5185]

Overflow was driving me crazy!!!

I have always used durso drains that came with all the drilled tanks i have ever ran. They were all varying levels of noises but always had that waterfall sound no matter what indid.

This tank has a single back corner over flow with two holes drilled. One about 6" higher than the other. The pipes on the outside had the vent holes drilled in them to run like a durso. So i ran it this way and it was extremely loud and the water level would fluctuate and have the slurping noise every so often.

Looked up ways to quiet it down and came across the herbie style. Off to lowes i went. I got a 90° elbow and a 1" ball valve for the lower drain. I put the elbow on the lowest hole with the opening down to increase the space between the two holes. Then i plugged the vent hole for the lower hole piping (this will let me pull a vacumn). i put the ball valve on lower hole drain pipe into the sump, and also made sure the pipe exit was about 1-2" under the surface of the water.

Kicked the pump back on, adjusted the valve to where the water level in the overflow covered the lower hole and barely has a trickle going into the top hole. The top hole will be my emergency drain if the bottom ever clogs.

After all said and done. HOLY SMOKES! This setup is completely silent! Also no more bubbles from the drain pipe into the sump. If you have problems with noisy overflows then try this setup.

 

[Brando5185]

Overflows with the elbow in.


Valve on the sump side of the drain lines.



Location of the drain exit under the surface. This pic is with everything running. There are no micro bubbles going down into the sump any more.