My first tank build :-)

arthurdent510

arthurdent510

New member
So I started my first salt water tank the other day! I picked up a used 40 gallon tank with pretty much all the equipment and started to clean it up. Replaced all the hinges on the cabinet and lid and did some sanding and painting on the interior of the cabinet to fix some water damage. Next on my list is to redo the wiring for the lights. Also have to replace one of the endcaps as it melted down somehow... And along the way I put together a makeshift muffler for the skimmer. Just need some rock and sand in it now!

tank.png


cleaning1.png


cleaning2.png


water.png


muffler.png
 
And since my post finally got approved... updates! I picked up some rock the other day and got it all in. Started getting some sand in as well. Lights all wired up, but my latest issue is a seal on the skimmer is shot and needs to be replaced.

The lights were in pretty rough shape... I had to replace one of the end caps as it had a melt down. Redid the wiring as well.

lights.jpg


Got rock in and had a couple hitchhikers come with the rock. So far they're still alive...

crab.jpg


anemone.jpg


And a shot of the tank (before I added sand... need to get a new picture of it tonight...)

tank2.jpg
 
A good start! It cleaned up well.

Looking forward to the progression.

And welcome aboard!
 
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Welcome to FRAG.

The tank cleaned up nicely and is a great size to start the addiction.
I have the same ASM skimmer and think i'll make the same muffler :lol2:

Don't know if you have sand already but i have a bucket of black/white sand you can have, just needs cleaning.

Looking forward to you progress. :thumbsup:
 
Thanks for the offer! :-) Still have some posts waiting for approval, but I did post pictures with some rock and sand in the tank. I'm pretty much done adding the rock and sand at this point, just waiting for everything to level out and I'll start getting some more invertebrates in there... I want to put together a set of led's as well to replace the t5's that I'm currently running. I have a chiller as well, but I think all the Freon has left it so it doesn't cool currently. The compressor kicks on ok, but it had no affect on the tank. So I need to find someone that might be able to service it...
 
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It is a g3 skimmer. I found last night that the seal for the elbow going into the body is shot, so that may be contributing to the noise. But it's loud enough that it's waking the kids up at night, so I need to figure out something. It's getting there though, it's better then when I first turned it on. My next thought was to get some foam board insulation and make a cover for the back, hopefully that will cut down on some of the noise as well.

Ok, since it's not approving my earlier post but it is now... I'll just cut and paste ;)

And since my post finally got approved... updates! I picked up some rock the other day and got it all in. Started getting some sand in as well. Lights all wired up, but my latest issue is a seal on the skimmer is shot and needs to be replaced.

The lights were in pretty rough shape... I had to replace one of the end caps as it had a melt down. Redid the wiring as well.

lights.jpg


Got rock in and had a couple hitchhikers come with the rock. So far they're still alive...

crab.jpg


anemone.jpg


And a shot of the tank (before I added sand... need to get a new picture of it tonight...)

tank2.jpg
 
Hmm, ok, it's acting funny on what it will let me post, I'm guessing since I don't have many posts yet.... but to answer your question, it is a g3. Only thing that has been changed is that is now directly feed from the return line from the tank.
 
Looks like it cleaned up nice. Welcome to AZ FRAG.

My only suggestion would be to change the wall socket to a GFCI socket. It is so close to the sump area, you don't want to risk an electrical fire.

As for the chiller, try running some vinegar water threw it for a day in a separate 5 gallon bucket. Chillers tend to get mineral built up in the wet side over the years and it can act as an insulator. While you have the chiller disconnected from the tank, take it out side and hit the insides up with compressed air. Get all the dust out that might prevent air moving threw it. These are maintenances that must be done every year to a chiller.
 
Ah, good call on the gfi outlet... I'll have to swap that out this weekend. On the chiller, is there typically an designated input and output port? None of the documentation I can find on it says and there are no markings on the case.
 
Nice first tank, I like that canopy/stand combo!
Welcome to the group, you are in good company here!

If you go LED, you should not need a noisy, room warming, electricity sucking chiller.
Are you thinking of DIY LED or production made? DIY isn't too difficult if you know how to solder AND with DIY, you can make exactly what you want.

I know a lot of people use GFCI with no problems, but I had one randomly trip while I was at work and almost lost my tank as a lot of people have with GFCI. If you do use GFCI, be sure to not place all life support pumps and other equepiment on the same circuit in case it trips while you are away.

Instead, I have become a drip line freak, no electrical cords on the floor and cover my electrical wall outlets with weather proof covers pictured below and available at Homedepo. Also, other than my Reef Keeper PC4 power control strips, I do not use any plastic housed power strips/surge protectors - they are a fire hazard!!
2lsw1nt.jpg


It still amazes me all the electric cords we run to/from our tanks! For safty and simplicity sake, I always work to keep them clean and organized WITH drip lines and use over rated (thick) extension cords where needed.
Saltwater and electricity don't mix! ha

If you need anything; help, info etc, post up and ask. We have some really good people here! The only stupid question is the one not asked...
Keep us posted on your build and keep the pictures coming - it feeds our aquarium porn addiction! :lol2:
 
Ah, thanks for the suggestions! I'll have to look into a box like that.

As for led's, I am pretty good with that type of stuff, so I was looking at a diy project. Ultimately, I'd love to wire in an arduino to start automating my tank, and it'd be easy to use it to control the led's. I just need to pick up a mega and start playing with it...

Surprisingly, my cat completely ignores the fish tank... I have a small freshwater tank and I'm babysitting some turtles right now, she could care less about all of them. I think it's kind of funny...
 
Everything looks like it's cleaning up really nice! My cat also completely ignores fishtanks (similar to the way she ignores computer monitors and TVs)

@Bugs, you would probably have a heartattack if you saw my rat's nest of wiring / electrical-fire-waiting-to-happen
 
So it looks like more pictures got approved! And a question I had... my skimmer is making a lot of noise, and I think I've narrowed it down to the outlet port. It's been modified to have a gate valve, but the pvc pipe goes up quite a ways before it hits the valve. Is there a specific reason for the high height? Or could I cut down the height on the pipe to try to quiet the water falling back into the sump? Here's a pic of what I'm talking about...

9385655116_742964d438.jpg
 
The height of that valve does seem odd. You could cut it down to where the tee is about 1 1/2" above the water line, should be much quieter then.
 
Hah! So I think I figured it out! What was happening was at the output T after the gate valve, the water was forming into a vortex and making a ton of slurping and sucking noise, even with the muffler on to of it. So I had some extra plastic tubing laying around that I stuffed down the T and it broke the vortex up and now it's pretty quiet.

So the follow up question... do you really need the T there? I understand it's to break up a siphon, but with the loop there anyways and just pulling from the skimmer, is that really something that you need to worry about? I wonder if I could just replace it with an elbow...
 
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