Gobie74's wide peninsula 200

[Gobie74]

what are your plans for flow? peninsulas present some interesting challenges i've found.

I have two Vortech MP40Ws that I'm going to move from the 150 over to this tank. They will both be on the back wall on opposite sides, probably in anti-sync mode.

I hope to control them with the Profilux as soon as they make their controller available.

Speaking of the Profilux, I noticed that GHL-Direct had the AquaIllumination cables in stock so I ordered one, along with another 6 plug power bar and a combined redox and conductivity module. No probes for those yet. Just thinking ahead for the future.

Impressive, can't wait to see you start moving the corals from the 150g tank. I would like to ask a question though, as I am thinking of having a tank built like yours. On page two of your build, Porthios asked a question about flow being a problem with Peninsula type tanks. Is this something you are concerned about?

Strout, I talked about it a little later on in page 2, but I plan on using my two Vortech MP40Ws ( one currently upgraded to ES ) on the tank. They'll be mounted against the back wall.

Currently I've been using a MJ1200 to move the water around, its doing a decent job. I have to stop it to allow the fish to eat.

I'm not worried about the flow, but I'll let you know how things work out in the next week or two.

I'll update more tomorrow. Got some good stuff to talk about, a bit tired now tho

 

[Gobie74]

So like I said the tank looks so much better without all the equipment in the tank. Since the sump is online, I moved it all down below. Here's a few shots of the tank now.

While I was planning out the new arrangement for the return piping, I decided to mount the new BRS GFO or Carbon reactor I won at our club conference a few weeks ago.

I like this design so much better than the Two Little Fishes design. Just the fact that I can mount it up in the overhead of the cabinet is a big win. I think that cleaning this thing will be so much easier too. The internal canister allows me to flush out the media without having to resort to all the craziness I had to before. I'm ready to get another one for GFO as soon as BRS has them back in stock. I can't say enough good things about them.

Right now the reactor is plumbed to an MJ1200 but hopefully in the next few days I'll have it running off of the return pump.

I was trying to order the valves I need to build the additional plumbing I need but the web site I was ordering from would never update my cart. Hopefully they have that all sorted out by now. I have to order them online because there aren't any local places to get PVC gate valves.

 

[fragboy94]

sweet thread

 

[Carriegiesler]

great thread will definetly be following along

 

[Gobie74]

sweet thread

great thread will definetly be following along

Thanks guys

 

[Bigjoe2531]

Do i see some fish in the tank?...

 

[Marchingbandjs]

following along...

 

[Gobie74]

Do i see some fish in the tank?...

Yes, actually I mentioned them a few pages back. Right now there are 2 yellow tailed damsels ( no I didn't cycle with them ) and one yellow cowfish. I'll try to take some better pictures of them.

The damsels I got because I like them, my taste in fish is pretty simple. The cowfish I got at the CMAC show a few weeks ago because my GF has been asking for one since we saw one in a tank up at the Boston Aquarium. He really is pretty cool tho, he seems so curious, and he's already eating from Traci's (GF) hand

So I'm hoping that the big day will be this coming Saturday, depends on when the valves arrive and the plumbing work is complete.

 

[Gobie74]

So the valves for the recirc line came yesterday. I've started building up the piping and painting what I can before I stop the pump and cut the outlet piping.

I'm also considering some modifications to the overflow. Right now the overflow teeth are 1" wide and 1" deep, so they don't exactly serve any purpose when it comes to keeping stuff out of the overflow. And all the water gets channeled into those 1" gaps and pours into the overflow fairly quickly and makes quite a bit of noise. The same amount of flow travels through the sump and over the bubble trap wall and it forms a nice thin sheet that silently flows over the wall into the return section. I'm thinking I have to remove the teeth and make more surface are for the water to flow over into the sump.

That probably doesn't make much sense without pictures. I'll try to get some tonight and post them to get some feedback.

 

[Marchingbandjs]

It will definitly add more drainage, but it will also make it easier for fish and what not to get in the overflow chamber. Then to get them out you will have to reach back there. Just hope that you dont have snails and aiptasia that will sting and cut you. Not to mention the other contless things that live in overflow boxes taht can harm you. If you decide to cut the teeth off it will make it quiter but you must watch out, and make sure you dont hurt youself. Shine a light in there to make sure there is nothing bad when retrieveing a fish.

 

[Chris_SG]

I think your water level is very high in the tank that will a really PITA when you clean up the panels or put the hands in

other then that your setup is really nice

 

[Gobie74]

It will definitly add more drainage, but it will also make it easier for fish and what not to get in the overflow chamber. Then to get them out you will have to reach back there. Just hope that you dont have snails and aiptasia that will sting and cut you. Not to mention the other contless things that live in overflow boxes taht can harm you. If you decide to cut the teeth off it will make it quiter but you must watch out, and make sure you dont hurt youself. Shine a light in there to make sure there is nothing bad when retrieveing a fish.

Good points. As it is right now, I don't think the teeth will stop a fish from going into the overflow anyway. A picture would make that more obvious but I got busy last night. What I was thinking of doing if I were to remove the teeth is to make a grate out of black egg crate and either fit it into the new bigger hole, or mount it in the tank covering the hole. I already have the egg crate, so should be easy enough to make something.

I think your water level is very high in the tank that will a really PITA when you clean up the panels or put the hands in

other then that your setup is really nice

True, that is another reason I was thinking of cutting down a bit more into the overflow area, to lower the water level just a bit.

 

[Marchingbandjs]

ya that water is very high, i would def make it lowers... let us know what you decide

 

[Gobie74]

So in keeping with the Navy tradition, here's the Plumbing Mark 1 Mod 1. The red portion is the new addition. It tees off from the main return line and goes through the true union, to two taps for the carbon/gfo reactors ( online have carbon atm ) and finally exits back into the skimmer chamber to form a recirculation line.

This portion of the plumbing is working fine. The blue return line, however is not. I had to cut a portion out of the old return line to add the tee, also added a gate valve. It seems I didn't do a good enough job gluing everything back together, there are leaks. I spent all day tracking them down and trying to fix them to no avail. I'm going to blame the old glue. So looks like I'll be buying more fittings, valves, and pvc cement tomorrow.

On a positive note, I modified the overflow and its so much better. It's probably hard to see what's going on in the pictures since they're kinda dark, but this first one shows the overflows when they had the teeth. Its almost like the teeth formed spigots or something, the water was making a lot of noise as if went over the overflow wall channeled between the teeth. It didn't stick to the wall, it sometimes could get a good inch or so away from the wall as it went over.

So I cut all the teeth out and sanded and beveled the overflow lip and now it is completely silent. It did make one hell of a mess unfortunately, but it cleaned up easy enough and everything is back to normal now, just much, much more quiet. I'll work on getting the black egg crate screen in place during the week. Another benefit of doing this is it dropped the water level down between 1/4 and 1/2 inch, so I'm not as concerned about how high it was.

Other than rebuilding that one plumbing part, looks like I'm pretty much ready for the big move to happen next weekend. I tried a few times to talk some of the fish into a net so I could move them now, but they wanted nothing to do with it. Time to build some traps.

 

[Gobie74]

Tomorrow (5/22) is going to be the big moving day. I'll try to take pictures and have them posted along the way. Probably on breaks when I'm frustrated from having to catch the fish

 

[Marchingbandjs]

Cant wait, ill be checking in tonight

 

[Gobie74]

Ok, so I've spent the entire day moving things. First, the before shot, this is how things started in the morning.

First step, take the lights off the 150, clean them up a bit, and hang them above the new tank. Getting ready to clean them up:

And hung:

Flash didn't go off in that picture and the camera really picks up the blue in the AI lights. I really have to learn how to compensate for that. The cords still need a bit of work, and I won't have the controller hanging down like that once the Profilux is hooked up.

When I moved the corals I tried to frag some of them up, remove any dead pieces, get rid of any algae, gave them a 10 minute lugols dip, etc before moving them over. Here's a partially completed view.

I believe this next one is when I was pretty much done moving everything, I know I see the sailfin tang in the shot so pretty much near the end. Flash on this picture.

And a slightly closer shot

As far as how things went, mostly ok. I didn't move over all the rock from the old tank. So that I could catch the fish, I moved some of the rock into a temporary bin and moved the fish I could catch. Then I noticed that my six line wrasse was flopping around in the bin. Snatched him up and put him right in the new tank. I haven't seen him out and about yet, hope he's ok.

My yellow coris wrasse went into the sand in the 150 and I haven't seen him since. I'm going to need to build a trap for him I think. The 150 is now a mess, I want to get him out of there as soon as possible.

When I was catching the Flame Angel, he jumped out of the net and ended up in the 150s overflow. I thought it was going to be insanely hard to get him out, turned out to not be that bad.

The royal gramma put up a bit of a fight and went right into the rocks when I got him in the new tank, haven't seen him yet either. Hope he's going ok.

The yellow tailed damsel from the 150 and the 2 in the new tank found each other pretty quickly and seem to be getting along with each other. ( for now? )

Clam island is populated with the clams I got at the CMAC conference. Probably will need a few more ( Joe if you're reading save me some good ones )

I moved the Vortechs over, set them up and they do a good job keeping the flow in the tank pretty high. I know some people were thinking there might be some flow issues, but the Vortechs are doing a good job. My second EcoSmart driver should arrive sometime this week.

I have a ton of cleaning up still left to do. I'll update more later and try to post some better pictures too.

 

[strout]

Thanks for posting the pics for us, been waiting all day for these lol. Kinda looks like you need a bigger tank already. Pardon the dumb question: what is the glass on top of the tank going from one side to the other, tank brace?

 

[Marchingbandjs]

wow nice looks like you need a bigger tank lol

 

[Bigjoe2531]

Looking great....Love the led's, did some research on the aquailluminations...really nice and not cheap either....Can't wait to see the progress..