Chad's Simultaneous 225 SPS & 180 FOWLR Office Build

[Reefer Brian]

Any updates....

 

[Hargitai]

second that.

 

[Mr. Brooks]

Thanks for all the kind words guys! I really appreciate it.

Ask and you shall receive...

Most of my time has gone towards work and my other hobby, motocross. I've been waiting on some orders from several different online vendors. A couple things have come in and I finally made some progress over the weekend.

I've got a lot of points to go over:

1. When I first filled the 225 I was bummed to see the front panel bowing out. I'd posted a thread on the reef discussion forum asking for advice. A couple people told me not to worry, once the rock was in, the bow would go away. They were right. The bow has gone down considerably. With the rock in there's less water putting pressure on the sides. It's still there but not near as bad.

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2. I made a lot of changes to my original rock work. Here's some before and after shots for comparisson. I wish the pictures showed the depth. It looks a lot better in 3D.

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3. The Deltec continues to amaze. I shot the nozzles at the rock to kick up some detritus that had settled. The next day I see a cup full of gunk.

I have some of the leftover rock in the refugium chamber. This is just temporary.

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4. Here's where I'm keeping the rest of the rock. This thing is jam packed to the top.

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5. I have some rock in the QT with mushrooms and green star polyps growning on them. There's also a ball of cheato, two Yellow Tangs (one's in the refugium bellow), a Maroon Clown, a wrasse and a Blue Tang. I sold my Passer Angel last week =(

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6. I've been going back and forth on the sand issue. Bare bottom or shallow bed. I think I'm going to go shallow bed. The "foam under the acrylic" idea didn't pan out too well. It just doesn't look right. I should've put some plastic white board down before I put the rock in. What's done is done, I'm not going to change it now.

I began comparing sand prices. My LFS actually ended up being cheaper than the online vendors I checked out. Freight is a killer on this stuff. So far I like Aragamax Select the best. I bought a bag of Fiji Pink to compare. I had to order it from Marinedepot. They were the only ones that carried it in a dry bag. Fiji Pink normally comes in water and is advertised as "live". A couple local fish stores tried to sell me on it. I'd rather save some money and spend the extra time cleaning it. I think "live" packaged sand is just a gimmick.

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Fiji Pink is on the left, Aragamax Select on the right.

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[Mr. Brooks]

I ran some tests on the chiller. The temperature normally hovers around 79 degrees. I turned the closed loop pump and Ehiem skimmer pump off individually to see if it would lower the temp at all. It had no effect. This tells me that the ambient room temperature is the main contributing factor to the water's temperature.

I wanted to see if my JBJ 1/4 HP chiller could lower the temperature at all.

After about 5 minutes it lowered the temp .1 of a degree. Then the temp went back up .1 of a degree. Then it started getting extremely hot in my office. The water temperature didn't change at all. I think the only reason the water temp didn't go up is because I had the air conditioner on. The chiller was working just fine, cool water was coming out. I believe the massive amount of hot air coming out of the chiller was canceling itself out.

I repositioned the chiller so that it pulled air from the back of the tank and exhausted hot air out the side. As opposed to pulling air from the front and exhausting hot air onto the wall. I believe hot air was bouncing off the wall and entering the stand with the old position.

After a while the chiller gained some momentum and lowered the temperature a full degree. The chiller has proven that it can lower the temp. It has also shown that it will act like a massive space heater in an already poorly ventilated office. Without the air conditioner on, I could see the ambient room temperature shooting up well over 100 degrees.

I think an exhaust fan in the ceiling is a must. If the air conditioner is not on then my office gets super hot as it is, not to mention 1,200 watts of metal halides.

The room just isn't designed very well. It's the largest office and yet it only has one A/C vent. It has the largest window facing the sun (greenhouse effect), and is the furthest from the air conditioning unit. Add all this up and you've got some offices that are freezing cold and my office which is burning up.

I'm going to buy a vent fan connected to a temperature switch. This should even out the temperature throughout the building. Hopefully this will increase the effectiveness of the cooling fans I plan on using. Moist hot air out, cool dry air in.

Here's a shot of how I have the chiller positioned. I'm going to re-do the manifold to allow me to place the chiller fully behind the tank. I'll probably put a fan behind the tank, connected to the controller, shooting air over the return pump and through the chiller. This should act as a radiator and help cool the water even when the chiller is off. The chiller will be set to turn on only in an emergency. It will be my last line of defense against heat.

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[Mr. Brooks]

I noticed a leak on my closed loop Dart. I’ve got some wet salt creep collecting below the 2” input. I need to take it out and see what’s causing it.

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I’m still waiting on the new drum from Oceans Motions. I have the Dart cranked down to about two thirds of the normal output. If I go any higher the drum gets stuck and starts clicking.

I ordered a new Dart to be used as the return pump on the 180. I planned out the space perfectly, not an inch to spare. I was surprised to see my new Dart when it came in. It was much bigger than I expected. Apparently they’re now using Baldor motors on their Darts. It looks just like the motor on my old Barracuda, but is MUCH quieter. Here’s a comparison:

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The new Dart will not fit inside the stand of the 180. I’m going to use the new Dart as the return for the 225. I’ll then swap the existing return Dart with the closed loop Dart. The return Dart is slightly quieter than the current closed loop Dart. I’m hoping this will quiet everything down a bit more. I’ll then fix the leak on the closed loop Dart and use it as the return on the 180. I’m really glad I decided to go with one make and model for all my external pump needs. They’re almost all interchangeable. Very convenient.

 

[Mr. Brooks]

On to the Lee Mar 180!

So I plugged the holes and filled it up with vinegar water about a week ago. Friday afternoon I wiped it down with a sponge. I don’t know what I would’ve done if I didn’t know about the vinegar water trick. There was SO much coralline stuck to the glass. It just wiped away after a soak in vinegar water. I scraped the coralline that wasn’t under water with a razor blade.

The overflow is acrylic and was badly scratched. I decided to try my hand at scratch removal. I did a wet sand with a super fine grit sand paper. Then I used a polishing wheel hooked up to a power drill and some rubbing compound. I gotta say, I’m pretty happy with how it turned out. I got all but the deepest scratches. Which you won’t even notice once it’s all set up. I should’ve taken some before pics. I was just anxious to get started.

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Here’s some shots of the tank after a good cleaning.

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[Mr. Brooks]

I then got to work on the stand.

The stand was not designed for a center overflow. There was a support going right down the middle.

I used a jig saw to cut a square hole to accomodate the drain and return plumbing.

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I cut two pieces of 2 x 4. These will act as supports on either side of the old support, which is now useless. I need to buy a special bracket before I can put them in.

Here's a shot of the sump/refugium that will be going in the stand.

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As you can see, they're two seperate tanks. I still haven't quite figured out how I'm going to plumb them. I don't have a lot of space and I don't want to use a check valve. This is going to be a balancing act for sure.

I can either run the refugium slightly higher then the sump. Water would gravity feed back down to the sump. This allows me the maximum leftover space inside the stand but also reduces the backflow capacity in the sump.

Or, I could run them side by side. Holes are already drilled to do this, I bought them used. This offers more backflow capacity but also takes up more real estate under the stand.

I also need to decide if I want to use the existing baffles or pull them out and place new baffles next to the sock chamber, thus reversing the intended direction of flow. This would give me more room in the skimmer chamber and allow for more/better baffles. Meaning less chance of micro bubbles in the tank. I would have to run some kind of "hang on sump" sock holder. This may be the best use of some very limited space.

It's all going to depend on how much space I need in the sump for backflow.

I almost forgot! I ordered the lights for the 225! I must've somehow given Mike at Reefspecialty the wrong address. Fedex has had them in another city since Thursday. I called and gave them the right address yesterday, the said they'd deliver everything on Tuesday. Not gonna lie, I'm pretty stoked to get them installed.

Ok, I think that's it. Night everyone!

 

[Bax]

Nice Chad, your progress always leaves me feeling very ... lazy

 

[Mr. Brooks]

Lol Bax.

 

[Mr. Brooks]

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Let there be light!!
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[Mr. Brooks]

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Sliding light rack in action
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[PaulieWalnuts]

very cool....i bet that thing is bright!!! sure does look that way...and love the sliding light!!

 

[Hargitai]

Very neat!

 

[Bax]

Great Chad!

Love the reflectors, probably the only ones I'd trade my LA IIIs or minis for in SE applications. Nice!

 

[Mr. Brooks]

Faced with the prospect of rinsing sand in the rain, I decided to take back two bags of the Aragamax Select and buy Fiji Pink live sand. I'm going to use the remaining two bags for a deep sand bed in the fuge.

I was getting a bunch of sand storms with what little sand was in the tank already. The Fiji pink has a more uniform grain size than the Aragamax Select and is slightly larger.

I felt the larger grain size and not having to rinse justified the extra cost. I didn't care about it being "live" which I still don't believe to be entirely true.

I installed my Vortech MP40 on the right side of tank. I love that thing. I'll be buying another for the other side soon.

The tank looks a lot better with sand in it. I'll post pics after the holiday weekend.

 

[PaulieWalnuts]

fiji pink is really nice good call...and 2 of those mp40 will be nice...thats 6400gph right there!

 

[Mr. Brooks]

I'd been having some noise issues with my closed loop. I had the Dart sitting on a shelf attached to the stand. I dampened the sound with some rubber mat from mcmastercarr.com. It helped but the vibrations were still being amplified by the stand.

I ordered more rubber mat and tried to install it between the shelf and the stand. It didn't work as well as I'd hoped. The screws I had on hand weren't really long enough to span the distance. As soon as I put some weight on it it fell apart. I decided to go home and try again later.

So today I extended the plumbing and placed the pump on the floor. It's totally silent now.

I hope some of you can learn from my mistake. It's not a good idea to place a Dart on a shelf attached to a wooden stand. Unless you don't care about noise.

Also, I hate to say this because Paul at Oceans Motions is such a great guy, but I'm really begining to wish I'd gone with all Vortechs instead of my closed loop with an OM 4-way. It was just such a pain to work on the plumbing. I found myself repeatedly cursing my closed loop.

I have a Vortech and it puts out more flow and is easier to work with and install. Oh well, live and learn.

 

[xXReefXx]

nice setup!!

 

[PaulieWalnuts]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13849993#post13849993 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by thechad21
I'd been having some noise issues with my closed loop. I had the Dart sitting on a shelf attached to the stand. I dampened the sound with some rubber mat from mcmastercarr.com. It helped but the vibrations were still being amplified by the stand.

I ordered more rubber mat and tried to install it between the shelf and the stand. It didn't work as well as I'd hoped. The screws I had on hand weren't really long enough to span the distance. As soon as I put some weight on it it fell apart. I decided to go home and try again later.

So today I extended the plumbing and placed the pump on the floor. It's totally silent now.

I hope some of you can learn from my mistake. It's not a good idea to place a Dart on a shelf attached to a wooden stand. Unless you don't care about noise.

Also, I hate to say this because Paul at Oceans Motions is such a great guy, but I'm really begining to wish I'd gone with all Vortechs instead of my closed loop with an OM 4-way. It was just such a pain to work on the plumbing. I found myself repeatedly cursing my closed loop.

I have a Vortech and it puts out more flow and is easier to work with and install. Oh well, live and learn.

have you seen my dart on my stand...its quiet....i mis measure the shelf i needed so i use a piece of foam and some cabinet rubber stuff and about 4 or 5 bills lol that i did not feel like paying....jk and it quiet...but i would have just put it on the floor if i had room...and i was swearing when i plumbed my tank and i don't even have om4way....i would have had such a hard time with it....looking good can't wait for another update!!!

 

[Harley-J]

Right on Chad keep it coming...tank is looking sweeeettt..