Enterance hall reef

[robs.mark]

My name is Mark, I live in safety bay, westerm Australia and have been reefing for a few years now. My current tank is a 3x2x2 that has been set up for 2 years. Recently I started to work in mining in my trade as a diesel mechanic, I have a pretty good 8on/7off 7/6 day swing. During my time away my very understanding wife has then pleasure of maintaining the tank, she does a great job but has a couple of issues, mainly the noise! I have dosing pumps, vortech pump and a few other gadgets that whine a bit! Since the arrival of our twin girls she has been falling asleep in the living room a bit where the tank is situated, and it's getting on her nerves. Naturally I have used this as an excuse for an upgrade!I will be documenting them build in this thread, you input and ideas along the way will be much appreciated. I'm not looking to have the system up and running tomorrow, I will be throwing a few dollars at this one, and want it to be right.

Here is what I have come up with so far..

The tank will sit in the entrance hall of our home, this room measures 4x2 meters and the tank will be built into the corner, with a floor to ceiling canopy. All the plumbing and filtration equipment will be run through the wall into the garage. I want space and quiet! A lot of equipment will be carried over from my existing tank, below is a list of the gear I have so far, and a wish list for stuff I am yet to purchase.

Tank: 60" long x 30" wide x 24"deep - 187g (currently being built by Frank from Vebas, cheers guys!).
It has a single 200mm centre brace, euro bracing, and will be running a herbie style overflow box. The visible edges will be polished and have black silicone, and the tank will be constructed from 12mm glass. I'm pretty excited over these dimensions, good scape and the ability to keep a couple of Tangs!

Sump - my current 30"x 20" 3 section acrylic sump will be used.

Fuge - a 15g tank I have in the shed will be drilled with a 50mm hole and connected to the sump.

LIghting - I have purchased 2 x 400w electronic ballasts with large salamander reflectors running 20k xm globes.
Instead of T5's I have purchased a pair of aqua beam 600 ultra LED lights with 3 blue and 2 white LED's each.

Controller - my existing GHL Profilux 2 will be used. it has a couple of upgrades, and will be looking after the lighting, the dimming of the led sups, water movement, ph and temp monitoring, fresh water top offs, and storms via a simu LED set
up.

Water movement - I currently have 2x tunze 6055's, a 6045 and an mp10. I intend on adding a pair of 6100's (I know they are old school but they move a lot of water and are bomb proof). This will give me around 65x turnover. I probably should have mentioned that I'm an sps junkie so strong alternating flow is a must.

Skimmer - I recently bought a skimz sk181 so I will be giving it a try to see if it keeps up.
I will also be carrying over a phosban reactor.

Element addition - I will be using my bubble magus dosing pumps for cal alk and mag. The fact that the sump is in the garage means I can use 25l drums, giving me a month or two between mixes.

Temp control - I will be using my current hailea 300a skimmer and a couple of fans in the summer over the sump. I haven't yet decided on what heaters to use?

probably forgotten some stuff but will post pics as soon as the tank arrives.

 

[robs.mark]

Just swapped this with a local reefer for my skimz 181..

Heiny boottle for scale!!

 

[zaheda]

Thats a monster skimmer Reef Octopus TDNW 300 External running with 3 Octopus 2000 pumps. I sadly had to sell mine as me we went down to a smaller 450L reeftank. I will tagging alosng to see your setup.

 

[robs.mark]

Sorry to hear that, how did you find the skimmer operationally?

 

[zaheda]

Dont be sorry as me like my current tank much better. All I can say this skimmer beast and sure will fit your system well. Few people in South Africa uses them as well as the whole range up to the big Tdnw 400. Hook it and play around with asnd see if it works for you.

 

[dave.m]

First question that occurs to me is why the front entrance hall? Does anyone actually sit in the front entrance hall? How would you be able to spend hours at a time viewing the tank if it's not in a comfortable location in your home where you actually live? Perhaps a nice painting for the front hall and a more user-friendly location for the new tank.

Dave.M

 

[robs.mark]

First question that occurs to me is why the front entrance hall? Does anyone actually sit in the front entrance hall? How would you be able to spend hours at a time viewing the tank if it's not in a comfortable location in your home where you actually live? Perhaps a nice painting for the front hall and a more user-friendly location for the new tank.

Dave.M

It's a large area that backs onto my garage, so i can run an equipment room. The hall runs side onto my living room so the tank will be visible from there too, through a double length open doorway. It's a great spot trust me I'm on site for a week but when I return home I will post some pics of where the tank will sit.

On a side note, I managed to get a pair of Tunze 6100's and a multi controller for a good price, should be here for when I return home.

 

[prop-frags]

drawings will help for sure.
Are you thinking external overflow box or in the tank?
What about closed loop? Seems like an excellent opportunity to have a great setup.

 

[robs.mark]

drawings will help for sure.
Are you thinking external overflow box or in the tank?
What about closed loop? Seems like an excellent opportunity to have a great setup.

The tank has a glass internal overflow box, it will have black acrylic toothed cover attached to it and the tanks back and non viewable side will be painted black. I did it this was because i want the fit the tank closer into the corner than a external overflow box would allow. The tank is 30" wide so im not that bothered about loosing that space internally.

The tank is not closed loop, though it has two drilling for return towards the top of the tank that will be directed for surface aggitation. I did think about a fully closed system but to be honest to get the flow pattern i want, i dont think it would be any better asphetiacally that having wave makers. I will have all 4 tunzes on the left hand side of the tank, and that will hopefully give me enough flow, also giving me the ability to easily adjust the flow as required..

 

[robs.mark]

As promised here are some pics of where i am up too so far. I have had about 3 weeks solid on the project now, i have removed small brick cupboard, built that stand and hood, repainted the room and fitted new skirting boards. Im back on sit now so i cant do any more for another week.
To finish i need to fit a couple more mouldings to the corners of the stand and hood, and once the tank is in position i will be fitting a deep picture frame around it, im thinking oak but havent fully decided yet.

I have also had an electrician in who has wired 12 sockets up, 8 inside the house and 4 in the garage on there own seperate breaker for the tank. I have 4 more in the garage on yet another circuit that i shall run a return pump off incase the dedicated one trips out for whatever reason.

Anyway enough babble! Pics!!

The st is the room before, and the last are from where im up to. The shots are from different viewing angles of the tank from different rooms..

 

[robs.mark]

From the dining kitchen room

 

[flounderfish]

I got that skimmer....I like it! Total beast in size (as you very well know)

 

[robs.mark]

i was shocked what he brought it over! what size tank you got? how big of a bioload? and how much skimate do you pull?

 

[robs.mark]

Hey everyone, quiet a bit of progress over the past 9 months on this build, ive been taking it slow as ive had other commitments and diddnt want to rush it just to finish. Ive had a small portion of my garage bricked in to create a small fishroom, i would have liked to have a larger one, but to be honest i need the garage space and this room will more than serve the purpose. I have a little more work to do in there, another shelf, and a couple of other bits of plumbing etc, but its almost finished. I have the 'canopy' finished, i hyphonate this beacuse its kind of in the middle of inwall and canopy style! ill let you all judge. I finished it in Tazmanian oak. I decided to got with 2x250w halides over the 400w just to save a bit of power (im on an energy saving power trip atm!), the fact that the tank is only 60" long i think it will be fine. I actually added a skylight between the two reflectors as the sun we get here in WA is amazing so i decided to utalize it. I hung the lighting on a DIY aluminium rack. All the electronic gizmos are wired in and ready for action. I added a 4 bank GHL fan set up to run through my Profilux to save the chiller working as hard during the summer. I also decided to use my old 3x2x2 90g as a refugium. This will contain a super DSB and caulupera. I set up an ATO using a very small acrylic tank and float valve from my RODI unit, from the small tank i use a Tunze oslomator. I have started to fill the tank with water today and are hoping to have it cycling by the end of the week. Enough talk here are some pics, terrible quality from my iphone a my camera recently broke on me! feel free to comment either way and im happy to answer any questions you my have!

Inside the house from different areas and inside the hood.

 

[robs.mark]

Equipement room..

Many thanks, Mark.