My 270 built for under $1K

[panic]

I have collected so much junk over the years of reefkeeping that I was actually able to get this reef up and running with buying only a skimmer, the tank, and plumbing - for under a grand.

I sold a tank and stand I picked up for free, traded old buckets of sand, misfit fish, sold a skimmer traded for frags, etc, etc...

I have a 180 display on a 475 gallon total system that is packed full of my favorite stonies and LPS. It has too much flow for acans, open brains, big leathers, ricordia, and other nice lps. I don't want any magnificas in there since they would slay my stonies, and I can't just put them in the frag lagoon anymore.

Here's the existing 180:

The lagoon:

 

[panic]

So the thread of the month about the 30 percs and all of those awesome nems inspired me to get this mixed reef going out of a leaky 20 year old All Glass aquarium and oak stand I picked up for $100. One day a local reef geek needed some help moving it as he bought the whole tear-down from the previous owner. He didn't want the tank since it leaked, but he had to get it out of the house as part of the deal - it weighs about 800lbs. So it ended up in my basement. My wife was SO excited...

The tank before the move. Nice eh?:

 

[panic]

It leaked around the bottom. A tube worm bored it's way through the silicone on the bottom front edge. Fiberglass angle was cut to fit all the way around the bottom inside edge. Gobs of silicone were smashed between the angle and corners for a nice seal. 2x4s weighed down with huge bags of cocaine kept it solid.

 

[panic]

There were already 4 holes along the top with 4 ugly internal overflows. I drilled the rest of the holes with a little jig I made out of some 2x6. Water drains down into an angled hole onto the drill bit through some IV line.

Nice thickness:

 

[panic]

I planned for a coast to coast overflow to be made from black acrylic. I want it to be as incognito as possible, so the back of the tank needs to be black, but I like the blue look too. So I made a fade with some rattle can black.

I rolled the blue on:

And it stayed this way for months while I thought about what to do with the rest of it... I started with replacing the seals on a leaky Dart that was collecting dust and requisitioning plumbing parts.

 

[panic]

So a fall comes and goes, and about a month ago I jacked the tank up on a home-made dolly and rolled it into the next room for the next phase of productivity.

I scraped old glue for a day and my daughter helped:

I had this old sump I recieved forever ago from a friend that wanted it out of his garage. I brought to work and spend 8 hours or so removing the baffles (2 with a hammer), scraping, cleaning, cutting glass, and regluing.

 

[panic]

The stand is solid on the front and sides. The old guy that had it before had access from the fish room behind it. I'm going to cut the front piece in half and make sliders for it to open. So I flipped the stand around with my super-human strength to work on the guts. This is a simple build - all components have to fit under the stand very much unlike my other reef that takes up a side of 2 stories of my house.

Primed, caulked, and exterior painted the inside of the stand.

 

[panic]

I closed up 2 of the 4 existing holes in the top that were previously used as drain holes. I used the inside 2 to drain separately to the sump. 2 closed loop holes for the Dart CL intake, and 4 1" holes for the return. The return holes are placed close to the bottom to push water to the top of the tank. I have this concept in my BB reef, now to try it with 1" of sand. (Ugh, sand, but it's good for the creatures I guess).

The drains drop into a chamber with floss-topped eggcrate, made for ease of removal and disposal. There is a space to the right for overflow if the floss gets full. The bubbles stay in that side of the chamber - redundancy is key

 

[panic]

The skimmer will eventually drain through the hole on the right side of the sump.

I had an Iwaki 70 that I picked up for $75 a year ago. These things are serious machines that run on baby seal skins and atomic accelerators, but I found that this one has barbed fittings under the plumbing that was left on it when I bought it. Salt-creep in the future there, but I'll deal with it.

The sump minus the Dart CL:

This runs up to the return, bifurcating into a 1" section in the middle to move the middle surface of the water to displace captured heat from the surface of the water, and another section with an OM Squirt that I had sitting around from my very first reef.

I painted the plumbing for the OM return with some plastic fusion rattle can black. Looks pretty ninja I think.

 

[panic]

I had 3 different leaks on the wet test - no 4 - kept my cool and tried to remember that it's the journey, not the destination... 1,2,3,4...

This is all the rock that I took out of my 180 when I moved 1 year ago. This is the tank I picked up for free - sold it to some folks in the reef club and paid for the plumbing and necessary adult beverages to patiently correct leaks.

The wet test was a success, so I began the rock towers. I used tile mastic and rubble as filler to cement the pieces together. My wife helped with some decorating - it's always good for your spouse to be apart of your additions, right?

 

[panic]

My Inky box in place. It's 50", so not quite a coast to coast. I want to drop some Streams in on the ends - not making the $1000 cut. Black eggcrate is cut to fit in a shelf made on the top of the box.

 

[panic]

So I needed a big skimmer since I will be using 30 of the 50 gallon water change I take out of the other reef. Piping it though the ceiling is in the future - bringing it in buckets reality for now. Reef Specialty has a ssssssssssmokin deal on these right now.

The pieces

Me throwing the directions in the trash since I am a man and this is what we men do to directions:

Me stomping them into the trash after I pulled them out to peek at them to see how I should solve this quantum physics puzzle only to find that they are make as much sense as Chinese subtitles in the original Godzilla vs. Mothra

 

[panic]

My daughter put it together and them jammed a princess into the intake since that is obviously where it goes.

Barely fitting into the space

The Dart in place for the CL

Rock in, with water

 

[Black Z]

wow very cool...i get everything for cost and still and its hard to imagine a tank that size set up for under a grand. keep us posted!

 

[panic]

Keep in mind everything is quite used, so most was either free, traded with frags, or very cheap - except for the skimmer. It was 2/3 of the budget

After the sand settled down a bit - it took about 3 days.

 

[panic]

I hung a single 250hgi and 2x t5 in the Maristar pendant - traded a rifle that was collecting dust for that one. I have 2 other Hamilton 250 pendants I could add, but I enjoy the low energy consumption and no heat issues for now.

 

[chasekwe]

Awesome job, I wish I had your skills. Did you mention the dimensions someplace? I didn't see them.

Btw you mentioned the clownfish packed tank from last months ThreadOTM. Are you planning something similar with this tank?

 

[panic]

The tank is 72x24x36 tall. I love the movement in that tank with all of the nems. Not much movement in my sps tank unless you are close enough to see the polyps. There is a local guy, Jay from Homegrown Clowns, that I can buy a fry of 30 clowns. I want to wait until my RBTA splits before I get them.

 

[panic]

I have installed the ASD calcium reactor, phosban container with carbon, a set of 6100s on a 7095, several acans and random sps, an aussie scoly, and some fish:
Achilles Tang
Pair of black percs
flame hawk
gsm clown and a RBTA
LMB
bonsaii cardinalfish
foxface
10 yellow tangs are on order

My Achilles has a bit of ich or something, so I am feeding him every couple of hours and he is acting healthy. All the other fish are good

 

[stunreefer]

WOW, awesome job man, that's very impressive... especially the budget!

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14506926#post14506926 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by panic
My daughter put it together and them jammed a princess into the intake since that is obviously where it goes.

:lol:

I took one look at the directions that came with my friends and said "good luck"

What kind of cement did you use for the rocks? Is it from ACE or just the bucket?