Carlos Danger's new custom Reef tank build!

[carlos danger]

I know its been a while in the making here for this build. I did have a previous tank that I finally broke down and sold after seeing this extraordinary video by Ryan at Bulk Reef Supply. I have to admit, that video was the inspiration to me doing this new tank build and getting the ball rolling. Thank you Ryan at Bulk Reef Supply.:thumbsup: Here's the link if anyone wants to see what inspired me.

So currently I have the tank set up and its cycling. I still am in the process of programming everything and getting it dialed in. I've always enjoyed going through the various tank builds and learning along the way. My hope is that maybe there might be one thing about this build that someone can take with them and use or implement in the future. So with no further a due"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦.. here we go.

I tried to use everyone's feedback and experience with choosing the components of this system. I really like the german made stuff so I tried incorporating as much of that stuff as possible into the build. I know its a little more money but I decided to bite the bullet and pay a little more for the quality of their stuff. For the tank itself I decided to go with the best in the business"¦"¦"¦"¦Reef Savvy. Not just because of there flawless reputation, but because of the attention to detail and love they put into each and every inch of their tanks. I love the strength, integrity, and look that Reef Savvy tanks display. The only thing I wish I would have gotten was a couple of those cool shark Reef Savvy stickers they have. I would of been great on my SUV for shark week on Discovery Channel"¦loll.

I went custom because I needed it to fit the space and I love the more shallow tank. I love how Reef Savvy Tanks give you the maximum ability to look from the top down into the tank. You have to admit, one of the best things about reef tanks is looking at all the corals from the top down. Felix at Reef Savvy builds his stands so that the tank sits perfectly to perfection where it can be viewed from every angle. What a bonus, right!!! I went with a 120 gallon rimless tank. Its 28" wide by 20"tall by 50". Its 1/2 inch glass with beautifully beveled edges. Felix talked me into going with a custom glass overflow. Its nice because it maximizes the space inside the tank. Its so seamless its like looking at a Monet painting. Your eyes just get lost in its beauty.:love2: I'm getting really sappy now so I'll move on.

When I went to pick up my tank from the shipping company I had noticed a hole punched in the side of the plywood box that the tank was packaged in, most definitely from one of the forklifts. Way to go shipping company! :mad2: I was so worried that it had caused some damage to my tank. Thankfully, there was no damage done. There are some pictures attached showing this.
Stay tuned. Many more pictures to come. :fun4:

 

[slief]

That is a very nice setup!

 

[noel754g1]

Congrats on the new tank.. it looks amazing and it has nothing in it yet.. REEF SAVVY is just a couple of miles from my house, i've seen pretty amazing tanks made by them.. i look forward to seen the progress on your tank..

 

[carlos danger]

The equipment and components I am going with are as follows:

1) For the lighting I went with (2) Radion pros with Aquarium Specialty's new acrylic arms. Its the Biotec LED light mounts. I love these things. They mount seamlessly and reach out around 14 inches out over tank giving me perfect symmetry for coverage on the 28" depth. What I like about these mounts are they are beefy, heavy duty, and solid acrylic. They are made of heavy duty black acrylic, solid in every aspect and laminated to this beefy custom look it gives off. Real sharp. It holds the Radions about 14" off the water and 14" from the back of the tank. All I can say is I absolutely love these mounts. I've been waiting for someone to come out with an acrylic arm and Aquarium Specialty nailed it. Just what I was needing. Thanks to Aquarium Specialty!!!! These things are super sleek and beautiful to boot.

2) For my sump I went with Synergy Reef's Shadow box. This sump is awesome. The Synergy Reef Shadow Box is a 36" Long X 16" Wide x 16" High Sump. This sump is built from premium quality USA manufactured cast acrylic.
I love the detail these guys put into their work. The Shadow Box is 3/8" Cast Acrylic. The Shadow Box is built with all smoke colored acrylic. It features laser cut euro braced top, sock holders and adjustable skimmer water level baffle. They designed the euro brace so that Maximum space is available in the sump area, but still provide a rock solid sump with the bulkheads installed and ready to be plumbed. This sump is pure magic!! To top it off it has a cool LED strip that is located on the rear of the sump to allow for easy viewing of the skimmer and pump area. Way to go Synergy Reef!!!:thumbsup: This thing is pure genius and worth every penny! I've had many sumps and this sump beats them all hands down.

3) Skimmer: I'm sticking with the german geniuses with skimmers. I outfitted it with a Bubble King 180. Its works flawlessly and is a work horse that never stops. Plus its dead quiet.

4) Flow: For flow I have 3 MP40's. Im hoping to add one of those Maxspect Riptides when they come out here in the next month.

5) Controller: Of course to control everything I'm sticking with The apex because it does everything and has never let me down.

6) Return Pump: For my return pump I'm using the waveline gen 2 10000 with Apex control ports. This unit gives me the right flow and is super quiet. It's actually as quiet as the Bubble King. I have a lot of flow but will go into the overflow in my posts to come.

7) Reactors: I have 2 vertex reactors for carbon and Rowa. I also have a zeolite reactor.

8)A.T.O: For the auto top off I decided to go with the Tunze ozmolator. This thing has always done me right. I love how it has the high water alarm and just again love the german stuff. For the A.T.O itself I have a custom 10 gallon Synergy Reef container. Its made with Nuclear Green cast acrylic and I love the attention to detail again that they pay to their products.

9) Heaters: I have 2 Cobalt Neotherm 200 watt heaters.

10) For the sand I went with Tropic Eden's 2:1 mix of Reef flakes to Mini flakes. I love this stuff and how clean it is.

11) For the rock I went with 75 pounds of live Tonga Branch rock. I mixed that with about 75 pounds of Tukani. I love how porous this stuff is and the amount of holes and crevices for critters to hide in.

Well thats about everything for equipment. Here's a couple more pictures of the tank with the Synergy sump and built in led strip.

 

[carlos danger]

Sorry about that. I don't know happened but I tried to post some pictures and it gave me the website is down page.:headwally: Didn't even know it had posted. Here I go again. I'll try to do a few more pictures.

 

[carlos danger]

Thanks you guys. Its coming along slowly but surely. I'll post more pictures tomorrow and go through the plumbing with you and let you know what I decided to go with. Lots more pictures to come.:lolspin:

 

[vitodog]

Very nice build, quality equipment. I will be tagging along for this build.

 

[moondoggy4]

5 dollar bet

5 dollar bet

Maybe the forklift driver was trying to hit one of the fragile stickers and missed.:headwally: Sorry I cannot read some of highlighted post in yellow not color blind. Love the tank Reef Savvy makes some real nice tanks.

Are you going to have the Cobalts heaters connected to your Apex?

Looking forward to more pictures.

 

[carlos danger]

I know. Right! How hard is it to load two boxes on a pallet with fragile stickers posted on every square inch. Wow! It blows me away sometimes. Luckily Felix knows all about this and sends these tanks with $5,000 of insurance.

Anyways I just wanted to let you know how the plumbing is and my goal. I think I may have went overkill but it still works well. I have about 60/40 SPS to LPS. So I went with 1 1/2 plumbing for max flow. I know 1 inch would of been more than enough but needless to say here I am.

I originally went to home depot and did all the plumbing in white schedule 40 and plumbed it. But then I changed my mind and ripped it all out. I spent this much money on this tank I might as well make the plumbing look good. Not to say that there's anything wrong with the white schedule 40. The overflow box is about 22" long by 5" by 8" inches deep I think. The tank is blacked out in the back and when I installed the white schedule 40 it just didn't look good with all that red writing on the side. So long story short, I ordered the black schedule 40 with no writing with corresponding Spears plumbing.

I went with the bean animal set up. Its dead silent! The only thing I hear is the water trickling into the socks. I highly recommend anybody doing the bean animal. From there I have a Spears gate valve with flexible vinyl tubing. I am running the wavelike 10,000 at the 4th setting. It's probably about 2,000 gallons an hour. But with the added pumps probably more. Here's pictures of the plumbing and how I did it.

 

[carlos danger]

O.k I probably should show you the overflow plumbing. Here it is. I ordered the schedule 40 black pvc pipe from Bulk Reef Supply. The Sears schedule 40 in black was from flexpvc.com. Both of these companies were great. Even though they shipped out some wrong fittings and pipe, both companies immediately sent out replacements overnight. Thanks for the awesome customer service Bulk Reef Supply and Flexpvc.com! Hands down, stellar service!!! AAAAAAAA++++++++!!!!!:thumbsup:

 

[carlos danger]

Can you smell the ROCK Cookin!!!!!!!!

Can you smell the ROCK Cookin!!!!!!!!

Now for the ROCK.:lmao: I originally ordered this tank in March so it gave me plenty of time to prepare. I mean, come on man, with the best tank builder in the business, you can't expect it to happen overnight. But how does the saying go? Good things come to those who wait. Well I waited"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦..and finally the Pièce de résistance!!!!!

But anyway, while I was waiting, the Island of Tonga had a huge hurricane/tropical storm that ripped through, tearing up a lot of their reefs. I think this was in late March-early April 2014. Well the government of Tonga decided to open up the reef for cleaning and clearing out the damaged rock. They sold this stuff to all the vendors wanting a piece of the pie. I was lucky enough to get 150 pounds of nice looking Tonga branch for $2.50 a pound. So I did this tank Im building now and one other rimless tank I did a couple months ago.

I like this rock as an accent but not for the only rock in a tank. I ended up mixing this Tonga Branch ( about 60 pounds) with about 70 pounds of Tukani. I love the Tukani because its so porous and has lots of holes and caves to hide in. I like this combo because to me it reeks and oozes authentic barrier reef.

The other nice thing is that with my extra time waiting for the tank I was able to cycle all this rock, feed it, caress it, stroke it, and give it love for six months.:love1:

I set this rock up in 100 gallon rubbermaid tank. I think you know the tanks I'm talking about. You can get them at D&B supply, etc. I ran a few maxi jet 1200's with a 300 watt heater and a short 3-4 hour (fresh) new KZ T5 light.

But what really made this live rock explode and cure like a mo fo was when I started feeding it that BlackPowder by Marc Weiss. WOW!! This stuff rocks!!! This stuff did a number on this live rock. For whatever reason, the rock loved this stuff. I actually enjoyed feeding this rock and watching it grow. Kinda like my Chia Pet when I was 5 lolol:lol2:. Here's the pictures of the rock and set up I had while waiting.

 

[Indymann99]

Nice looking tank.

FWIW, I would not rely on the check valves on your returns... If you leave them you should make sure your sump can handle the back flow if they fail (which they will after a year or so).

 

[vitodog]

Nice looking tank.

FWIW, I would not rely on the check valves on your returns... If you leave them you should make sure your sump can handle the back flow if they fail (which they will after a year or so).

I'm not a fan of check valves either. However, I do have the same check valves the OP does (did not want them, but have them, long story). IMO, if your going to have check valves, these (Spears) are the safest on the market. You have to clean them every few weeks or so to make sure they don't stick on you when you turn off your pump and these valves allow you to do so. Again, I'm not an advocate for check valves but in my case I did not have a choice. So, since I have them I'm glad its this brand.

 

[carlos danger]

Yeah, you definitely are right about that Indymann99. They're definitely a false sense of security. These two I have on here are the Georg Fischer wye's. Have you heard of these? I hear pretty good things about them. I like the fact that they're swiss made. They're a little more money than the Spears and such but why take a chance. I plan on cleaning them about every month. Hopefully it helps keep them functional. But you never know when they may fail. Just for back up I like to keep the returns on the surface. Hopefully if they fail the water syphon will be broken once it sucks the air in. I think this sump can hold about 42 gallons or so full and it's a little less than half full.

 

[carlos danger]

If and when these George fischer check valves I have take a dump on me I'm giving those Spears a go. Hopefully by cleaning them regularly it won't happen too quickly but if it does thanks for the heads up on those Spears.

 

[carlos danger]

What do you guys think about these pumps? Garbage?

What do you guys think about these pumps? Garbage?

I ended up going with this pump. Its not as quiet as the dc red dragon but for the price point its massive flow. I think I only run it on the fourth speed with 2 to spare. I think with these gen 2's they've worked a lot of the bugs out"¦"¦"¦"¦"¦.hopefully. We'll see. I have a mag drive 18 on back up which is a bit louder but is a workhorse. Very reliable. What do you guys think about the Red Dragon 3 Speedy Pump 80 Watt. Worth the money? I love them but they're a pretty penny. I guess you get what you pay for, right?:fish2:

 

[carlos danger]

I'll update tomorrow with lots more pics.

 

[Snarkys]

Glad I could be of inspiration. Nice plumbing! I love my reef savvy tank as well : )

Ryan,

 

[UMass14]

Looks good Danger!

 

[fatboy40]

dude this build is looking really sharp man , love your choices in equipment great start to a great tank man ......im subscribe