Build Thread for 50 Gallon display

L

Lionel

Premium Member
OK, I've been ordering stuff, building stuff, and waiting on stuff in the mail for about five weeks now, and I've decided it's time to start posting about it! This system wil consist of a 50 gallon main display tank, with a sump / refugium of the same size. I am running the following hardware, some of which has not yet arrived.

Reef Octopus NW-150 Skimmer, Mesh wheel and venturi modified.
Two 250 Watt DE Phoenix 14K bulbs in PFO style reflectors, driven by Icecap Ballasts.
Eheim 500 series canister running Seachem De-Nitrate and Matrix, as well as chemi pure elite.
Phosban 150 reactor running Phosban ( of course!) and possibly high quality granular carbon.
Two Maxi-Jet 1200's with the Algae Free sureflow upgrades, both of which are using the 2100gph props.
DIY Kalk reactor, Maxi-Jet 400 for kalk stirring.
CPR CS90 Overflow
Mag 5 return pump, might move up to a Mag 7.
75GPD RO/DI From Bulkreefsupply.com


The chemi pure elite contains granular ferric oxide, as well as high quality carbon. I am going to experiment with running the chemi pure as well as the phosban reactor. Also, depending on how the Phoenix 14K bulbs work out, I may go with the Icecap 10K bulbs, and use two 36'' URI Actinic VHO's for supplementation.

I am going to use Kalk and TLF C-Balance for calcium supplementation, and the Prodibio products for all other elements. I want to see if I can drastically improve the coloration of corals collected locally, using a low nutrient system similar to zeovit.

Don't worry, pictures will be forthcoming :-)

Lionel
 
what kind of color are you going to run? Also what color, if you are going to run mailnly green, blue, and dark purple the phoenix will show if not then you might want to think about adding some t-5's. From my study they will show especially dark purple and green. I have been running the phoenix's for 6 months I am bout to run the reeflux 12k on sps. I am tryin to stablilize the salinity in my tank. Other than that I am runnin close to sws. Everything else is pretty balanced. I have had a rash of coral bleaching the last 24 hrs. I don't know if it is due to the high salinity. I have abeen running it for a while. Good luck. I have been running close to a zeovit system the last week and still things seem to be dying faster. If you arent dosing potassium then you need to and also some of the others on the zeovit sys like sponge power.
 
hey lionel, do you have a pic of you kalk reactor, what did you use to make it/ where did you get the stuff to build? Interested b/c i am tired of manually doing it myself! It is getting old. I am about ready to start automating the whole tank so I can just enjoy it!!!!! See what the wife says about it. I got her to bend on getting a custom 12 ft long tank when I get to the states, well not when we get back but.....you get what I am saying? So how is the family? Interested in seeing your tank. I have a couple new pics of my tank.
 
I just posted a reply about your RO unit on your thread. I've got some hookup stuff you can have if you need it, just give me a call or stop by the house after 1700. my number is 090-8290-6443 if you need it.

The Kalk reactor I put together was actually really simple to make, I used the grey PVC pipe to build the body, then just basically copied the design of a Precision Marine reactor. I am using a MJ 400 to stir the kalk. I'll get a pic and show you what I mean. We can build you one in just a couple hours, If you are interested. We'll need to get a couple things from makeman, but I've still got some pvc left over so all we need are some fittings.
 
This thing was really simple to make, it only took a few hours really, and that includes letting some pieces dry.

The input for the loop is just 1/2'' PVC. It's a straight piece that sticks about halfway into the reactor. The output comes in and has a 90 d egree elbow that points down to the bottom of the reactor. I have it sitting about half an inch from the bottom. When the pump comes on, it mixes all of the kalk powder that has settled to the bottom of the reactor. The input / output for the RO / Kalkwasser liquid is standard airline size tubing. I drilled two small holes in the screw on lid, and pushed the fittings through. I had to silicone around one of them because it was a bit loose. I am going to use an aqua lifter pump to dose through this thing. I've tested it, and it works great. When the aqua lifter starts pushing fresh RO water into the reactor, the kalk mix comes right out of the other tube, it dosent take much pressure at all. I have the input and output airline tubing set to different lengths so that it wont just pull RO in one side, and out the other. The RO input tube reaches almost to the bottom of the reactor, while the kalk output is about one third down.


EDIT: I forgot to mention something about the pump. You need to use a powerhead that completely seals up, like a Maxi-Jet. The MJ pumps have an O-Ring seal that prevents any water from leaking outside of the unit. I tried one of the penguin 660's from the PX, but the damn things arent sealed at all. If you dont want to wait to get one in the mail, upper river sells MJ powerheads, although they are a little bit pricey.




KalkReactor1.jpg
 
heck yea I need one of those man! Job well done! Sorry I didn't call ya tonight I passed out man. My daughter was going nuts laughing so i had to enjoy that time playing with her! Dude you got to see her! Oh tell your wife my wife says hi!
 
are you talking about using the tom aqautics aqualifter? How are you planning on controlling the rate of kalk and when you have reached your top off line? Are you running some kind of solenoid to cut it power?
 
I am going to use one of these:
http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/Auto-.../DIY-Top-it-Off-Kit-Premium/product_info.html

Also, do you have any old 250W bulbs? I should have received my premium aquatics order already, so I gave them a call. It seems someone dropped the ball and my order never got shipped out on the 17th like it should have. So I am now waiting for bulbs (and some other non essential goodies) in order to finish this and get the tank up and running.
 
I just got a pretty nice deal on a broken MRC CR-6 Reactor. Gonna hafta do some miracle work with Weld-On to get it up to par, but it should be nearly good as new.

I think it's a bit too big for my tank though :-)
 
If you need any ideas, click my little red house... I'm currently building a 56 gallon in-wall tank. Can't wait to see your build get going.

-Scott
 
My order from Premium Aquatics, that was placed on the 17th of this month, never shipped. Something was out of stock, so I received a call the evening I placed the order, asking me if i wanted to wait and ship it all at once, or just go ahead and ship what they have, then ship the backordered stuff when it comes in. I told them to go ahead and ship what they had, since it contained my phoenix 14k bulbs... well guess what happened?

Someone dropped the ball. The order never shipped out. The chemi pure elite that was out of stock came in a few days after i placed the order, and it still never shipped. ten days later when I call asking whats up, I get all of this info. What can they do? My shipping only cost $15, so they refund that... but now I'm waiting another week before I'll get the last package I need to get up and running.
 
I just had the same problwem with them. It took almost two months for them to get my skimmer out ...I just got it in last week. I use to order from them because of their excellent mailing time...I thought I was the only one having problems...Seems their speed-of-service has deteriorated...
 
I feel the same way. I don't mind peoplebeing honest from the get-go...hey man we dropped the ball or something like that, but all I got excuses and still it was postponed...sigh...
 
Well, I just finished rebuilding the sump I got from Luis (thanks again man!) I cracked the glass pretty bad when I was moving it, so I decided to just go ahead and redo the whole thing, since I had a tank the same size sitting around. I pulled all the baffles out and cleaned them up, then re-siliconed everything into place. I also went ahead and got the tank running, I am using a power compact light setup from my old FW planted tank to light everything untill my MH bulbs get here (damn you premium aquatics.)

I'll post pics this evening when I get back from poker tourney.
 
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