Mike's 300 Double-D

[BennyFrank]

I've been watching for awhile, great build! At first I was thinking that you should have gone with the lighter stone due to the white cabinetry but seeing it I think you made the right choice with the darker one. It just works seemlessly with the black background of the DD and draws your eye to the tank. Once again, beautiful work on the entire presentation!

 

[prop-frags]

RICHK Thanks a lot, Rich. It is exciting to see it getting close to the "wetness" stage!

BennyFrank Thanks BF! We really did wrestle with the quartz choice. We were even asking folks who were dropping by the house which they preferred, and much like the opinions on here, it went both ways. I agree with you though, that the contrast is really nice.

Some progress tonight.
The big box from EZTube came today. The kit was very well packaged. Most of the parts were wrapped up individually, or with packing paper in-between. And each bundle was strapped. Here's the parts all laid out after un-boxing:



The assembly was a snap. It just takes a while to piece everything together. I made a few mistakes and had to pull some stuff apart and make corrections. But I think we're looking good so far. The Lumenmax Elites fit into the frame like a glove!! :bigeyes:



You can see we've got 4 pieces missing - the "top of the rectangle". I dropped an email to our sales rep and expect he'll ship those out tomorrow. Mark Warner over there is great to deal with - and the products are very precisely manufactured. Highly recommended!

 

[fireiko]

Mike- The build looks awesome! I am looking to buy my light rack from EZ tube and was going to buy the tube and cut it myself. After seeing how yours came ready to assemble I am curious if there is a big upcharge for that? That sure beats cutting and filing down the edges, etc..!!

 

[prop-frags]

Mike- The build looks awesome! I am looking to buy my light rack from EZ tube and was going to buy the tube and cut it myself. After seeing how yours came ready to assemble I am curious if there is a big upcharge for that? That sure beats cutting and filing down the edges, etc..!!

THANKS!
No - in fact they charged less than $40 for the cuts, deburring, and packaging... And get this, they sent out the missing parts yesterday at no cost!! Now that is what I call AWESOME CUSTOMER SERVICE!!

 

[prop-frags]

Mark and the guys from EZTube sent us our missing parts next day air. Sweet. A few minutes unpacking and tapping in, and voila!



Tomorrow, there are a few things on tap. Mount the light rack into the canopy, work on the CL plumbing and maybe start on the rock work... we really want to get some water flowing into this thing!

:bounce1:

 

[crvz]

When you lift it, does the middle section holding the lights bend at all? I've heard from others with similar setups that they had to reinforce them to keep these pendants from bowing down. In any case, this looks awesome!

 

[prop-frags]

When you lift it, does the middle section holding the lights bend at all? I've heard from others with similar setups that they had to reinforce them to keep these pendants from bowing down. In any case, this looks awesome!

No flexing that we can tell, Chris. The 3-D rectangle (cube? polygon? What the heck do you call that?) adds a lot of strength, particularly the pieces with the fins on them.

 

[crvz]

I'm still waiting to see how drummereef's setup plays out, but he used estoconnectors (which uses shorter interconnects) and says he had some bending. I may end up with ez tube just for that reason.

 

[drummereef]

I'm still waiting to see how drummereef's setup plays out, but he used estoconnectors (which uses shorter interconnects) and says he had some bending. I may end up with ez tube just for that reason.

I think it's subject to the weight of the pendants. The Lumen Max reflectors are lighter than the Lumen Bright pendants I'm using. I don't think it would matter either way if you went with EZ or Esto in this case.

Amazing build Mike!!!

 

[prop-frags]

I think it's subject to the weight of the pendants. The Lumen Max reflectors are lighter than the Lumen Bright pendants I'm using. I don't think it would matter either way if you went with EZ or Esto in this case.

Amazing build Mike!!!

Thanks Brett - from you that is a helluva compliment!
The thing that really makes our light rack strong is the outside rails that dont have any of the connectors except at the corners. We're hoping to figure out how to mount VHOs in space between the outside rails and inner structure.

 

[NasotheHutt]

Have there been any issues with using landscape brick?

 

[dwhanc00]

Amazing set up! Any chance you have a copy of the design you used for the lighting so I could duplicate it with EZtube? I feel like I am copying homework! Also interested in how you fit the VHO's in there. Are you planning to go with two 60" in the front and back?

 

[dwhanc00]

NEVER Mind!!! Sorry, did not realize the picture on the other page had the dimensions! Guess I am getting caught cheating! lol

 

[mlb75]

Not to answer for him but the pic being referenced is from Sanjay's setup and was used as an example. If you've seen any of Sanjay's recent pic's I'd say there's no problem what so ever with using them, I'd just make sure they're clean and it might not hurt to let them soak for awhile to "cure" before dumping them in a new or established system just to be sure.

 

[mlb75]

BTW the build is really looking good and I can't wait to see it with water in it and then with all your existing corals. It's going to be sweet and like others I'm watching closely to get ideas for a similar upgrade in my future.

When the time comes if you don't mind I'll probably give you a shout to get the cabinet builders contact info since I'm in the VB area and it looks like he does good work.

 

[lhcorals]

Come on Mike, lets see some more pics.:bounce1::bounce2::bounce3:

 

[blumoon reefers]

Come on Mike, lets see some more pics.:bounce1::bounce2::bounce3:

+1

I agree completely.....that thing should have water in it by now.......:celeb1:

 

[prop-frags]

BTW the build is really looking good and I can't wait to see it with water in it and then with all your existing corals. It's going to be sweet and like others I'm watching closely to get ideas for a similar upgrade in my future.

When the time comes if you don't mind I'll probably give you a shout to get the cabinet builders contact info since I'm in the VB area and it looks like he does good work.

Thanks Mike! We appreciate the kind words and are really glad that some of you find the thread useful. It's a lot of work to document all the activity, but feel like it is the least we can do given how much we've learned from all the other folks who have taken the time before us to post their designs, what they do, and how they solve problems.

Feel free to give us a shout about any of the subs or companies we've used.

 

[prop-frags]

Come on Mike, lets see some more pics.:bounce1::bounce2::bounce3:

+1

I agree completely.....that thing should have water in it by now.......:celeb1:

No one is more anxious than we are you guys! And can't wait to have all our RRC buddies over once we get it up and running! YEEEE HAAAAAH!!! :beachbum:

 

[prop-frags]

OK, we've got some progress to show you guys.

The humongous 3.25" diamond hole saw finally arrived. Big Joe from FW came by last night to drill our CL intake hole. That went without a hitch, and we now have the "Sea World" bulkhead installed



Here's a shot of what the CL pump with the OM4 and the intake plumbing is going to look like.



This 2" plumbing stuff is huge. Seems like overkill, but we're very interested to see how this Dart performs with a full 2" intake and the OM4 going... the CL should really be generating some massive flow!

:fish1: :fish1:

Switching gears - let's talk about the light rack. We experimented with several designs before we landed on this one. Recall that the original canopy design had a board mounted on sliding rails that were affixed horizontally.


So of course, we designed the light rack to have a board mount flush in the top of it and slide right into the existing rails. So off to Lowes, pick up some 1/2" plywood, sand it, apply three coats of white enamel, mount the rail inserts on there (after careful measurements), and voila!



Problem is, the board added a lot of weight to the rack - and we do mean a LOT. So much in fact that the rails would no longer hold the rack, seeing as how they are mounted rather "non traditionally".

Hermione the project inspector was not amused:


So as is often the case with these projects, it was back to the drawing board...