Dotcommer's Reef - 300 Gallon 10' x 2' x 2' Mixed Reef Build, Scottsdale AZ
- Thread starter dotcommer
- Start date
dca22anderson
New member
Great progress! Looks like you will have room for lots of corals & fish in there if you can convince those five cute kiddos to hop out!
dotcommer
Active member
Thanks, yes now the fun begins.
dotcommer
Active member
It turned out pretty good, once filled with water and running I will let you know if it worked
. I will take some picks and post them in the next fews days.
dotcommer
Active member
Thanks guys. hopefully some day it will look half as good as yours. You two are a great inspiration to the hobby. Keep up the great threads and tanks.
dotcommer
Active member
Latest update.
I have been purchasing equipment for my build and installing some of it on my 90 Gallon since all the livestock will be moving from there into my 300 Gallon. I decided that right now would be a good time to start learning and playing with the new gadgets. I spent about a week learning and programming my APEX controller. What an amazing product, you can spend weeks learning the advanced programming features.
I purchased two MP 40's and the WMX controller. The MP 40's will most likely go along the back wall along with one or two more and I am planning on picking up two MP60's for each side of the tank.
My sump is in the process of being built, I just need to finalize the specs and send them over. Hopefully I can get that done this weekend.
I still need to decide on a lot of things like lighting, canopy design, plumbing rock layout etc..
I've decided to go with two drains in each overflow, one 2" and one 1 1/2" as the backup in each corner.
I decided not to go with a closed loop even though I have all the holes in the bottom of the tank. I am going to purchase some schedule 80 bulk heads to seal up the holes, but still have the ability to add a closed loop later on, if I decide to go that route.
I picked up some dosing pumps from BRS and have the set up on my APEX, which is so nice to have.
I've also been looking at different webcams so I can view my tank from anywhere. I purchased an IP webcam and set up my router to allow me to view it outside the house. Just need to figure out how to get it on my APEX dashboard since the camera doesn't do MJPEG.
I still need to take some pics of my coast to coast with corner overflow design. I will try to get them up within the next week.
There's more, but since it is 2:30am, I will save the rest for later.
Thanks everyone for checking in.
Newbie Aquarist
Reefing is my middle name
I am glad things are going well for you. Keep up the good work.
danfeig
.Registered Member
Latest update.
I have been purchasing equipment for my build and installing some of it on my 90 Gallon since all the livestock will be moving from there into my 300 Gallon. I decided that right now would be a good time to start learning and playing with the new gadgets. I spent about a week learning and programming my APEX controller. What an amazing product, you can spend weeks learning the advanced programming features.
I purchased two MP 40's and the WMX controller. The MP 40's will most likely go along the back wall along with one or two more and I am planning on picking up two MP60's for each side of the tank.
My sump is in the process of being built, I just need to finalize the specs and send them over. Hopefully I can get that done this weekend.
I still need to decide on a lot of things like lighting, canopy design, plumbing rock layout etc..
I've decided to go with two drains in each overflow, one 2" and one 1 1/2" as the backup in each corner.
I decided not to go with a closed loop even though I have all the holes in the bottom of the tank. I am going to purchase some schedule 80 bulk heads to seal up the holes, but still have the ability to add a closed loop later on, if I decide to go that route.
I picked up some dosing pumps from BRS and have the set up on my APEX, which is so nice to have.
I've also been looking at different webcams so I can view my tank from anywhere. I purchased an IP webcam and set up my router to allow me to view it outside the house. Just need to figure out how to get it on my APEX dashboard since the camera doesn't do MJPEG.
I still need to take some pics of my coast to coast with corner overflow design. I will try to get them up within the next week.
There's more, but since it is 2:30am, I will save the rest for later.
Thanks everyone for checking in.
All great equipment Dotcommer!
If you need help with your programming for your Apex, let me know. We have a lot of the same equipment!
Neptune Systems has a great forum on Reef Central with tons of helpful information. Check out their new Flood Detectors too! They may save your marriage!
dotcommer
Active member
Thank, I may be taking you up on the offer. I just posted a question about Sync and Antisyncing the pumps on the Neptune sight.
dotcommer
Active member
Its been a while since I updated the thread mainly because I have been focusing on getting my 90 Gallon reef dialed in. I am using it to grow out corals and to test out some equipment that I will be using on my 300 Gallon like programming the Apex, Setting up and adjusting dosing pumps, really spending the time on my husbandry skills, keeping nitrates and phosphates at zero etc... I have been growing some wild Acros and having some nice success with them.
I was finally able to come up with a sump design that I liked with the help of a good friend CoralreefDoc and was able to get nice size refugium in there.
I picked up the sump a few days ago and started working on the design of having a pull out or slide out sump. That's right, I want to make life easier by creating a pull out sump.
After talking with my office and home jack of all trade handy man and looking at his design ideas along with the hefty cost of building something that would work. I scrapped the idea and came up with a very inexpensive way to do it.
I decided to go with several pieces of PVC pipe to place below the board the sump will be sitting on. The PVC pipe is about 1/4' taller the the bottom tubular steel which the board sitting on top will need to pass.
At first we tested it will a bunch of PVC pipe but when the PVC pipe touched one another it stopped the sump from being pulled out. So we decided to put PVC pipe through the existing PVC pipe (see photo) It worked like a charm. The important thing to do is to leave enough room for the pipe to roll. Whats nice is once the PVC pipe hits the bottom tubular steel, it stops rolling. So depending on where you set it under the sump is how far the sump will pull out.
This is how it started out.
Then we needed to make sure there the PVC pipe didn't touch the other pipe, so we came up with this idea. The first and last PVC pipe goes all the way through the first and last tube while the others are shorter and just keep the tubes in place.
Once in place this is what it looks like
So for right now, until I can come up with a better idea. I will just put an additional removable PVC pipe on the floor when I need to pull out the sump. (as seen previous photo above). This works great. What is amazing to me, is how easily the sump pulls out when filled with water.
This is what is looks like with the sump pulled out and filled with water.
I was finally able to come up with a sump design that I liked with the help of a good friend CoralreefDoc and was able to get nice size refugium in there.
I picked up the sump a few days ago and started working on the design of having a pull out or slide out sump. That's right, I want to make life easier by creating a pull out sump.
After talking with my office and home jack of all trade handy man and looking at his design ideas along with the hefty cost of building something that would work. I scrapped the idea and came up with a very inexpensive way to do it.
I decided to go with several pieces of PVC pipe to place below the board the sump will be sitting on. The PVC pipe is about 1/4' taller the the bottom tubular steel which the board sitting on top will need to pass.
At first we tested it will a bunch of PVC pipe but when the PVC pipe touched one another it stopped the sump from being pulled out. So we decided to put PVC pipe through the existing PVC pipe (see photo) It worked like a charm. The important thing to do is to leave enough room for the pipe to roll. Whats nice is once the PVC pipe hits the bottom tubular steel, it stops rolling. So depending on where you set it under the sump is how far the sump will pull out.
This is how it started out.
Then we needed to make sure there the PVC pipe didn't touch the other pipe, so we came up with this idea. The first and last PVC pipe goes all the way through the first and last tube while the others are shorter and just keep the tubes in place.
Once in place this is what it looks like
So for right now, until I can come up with a better idea. I will just put an additional removable PVC pipe on the floor when I need to pull out the sump. (as seen previous photo above). This works great. What is amazing to me, is how easily the sump pulls out when filled with water.
This is what is looks like with the sump pulled out and filled with water.
dotcommer
Active member
Here is quick video of the pull out sump in action. The nice thing besides it costing less than $100 is that it took less then an hour to put together.
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/7bptIIeMeR8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/7bptIIeMeR8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Newbie Aquarist
Reefing is my middle name
That was my same thought at the beginning of my build. I had my stand build that way without the center brace for that reason. But I or no one could come up with that idea so I scrapped it. Great, simple, and inexpensive idea. Glad it worked out. Good to see an update also.
dotcommer
Active member
Once we started adding all the things up to build the roll out sump, it added up quickly and it was going to take several days to build and steel work. This was a very inexpensive way to try it out. I wasn't sure how it would work, but it ended up working out better than we had thought.
I am now working on the canopy which will have rotating MH lights to simulate cloud coverage. Should be Fun!!!
