My new 120
- Thread starter Chrisrush
- Start date
Chrisrush
New member
I finished the plumbing for my MR-2 last night. I drained the sump and figured out the placement for my 2 PCX-55 pumps. The skimmer pump will sit next to the sump and the CL pump will be behind the sump on a small wooden stand. Both pumps will be mounted on carpet to help dampen the vibration.
Anyways, on to the pictures:
Here is a picture of the pump glued and ready to go. I ended up using Oatey Rain R Shine PVC Cement. I talked to a gentleman from that company yesterday and he said that product would work fine on flex PVC. They make a flexible PVC glue, but I couldn't find it locally and I didn't want to wait to have it shipped.
Here is a picture looking from the left side of the tank down through the sump. I put the pump up on 2 small blocks of wood covered by carpet (not pictured) to lessen the vibration. I had to lift the skimmer off the bottom of the sump b/c the sump water level was too high. I built a small eggcrate box to lift it off the sump floor. In this picture you can also see the ca reactor feed plumbed off the return pump. I'm going to try and eliminate all unnecessary pumps by t-ing them off the return pump.
Here is a picture of the skimmer input from the pump. Nothing too special here, just showing the DIY beckett injector housing.
While I was feeling productive, I went ahead and changed out the RO filters and installed a new DI cartridge w/ color changing resin. Pretty neat stuff. I'm now getting 1 ppm tds reading through the RO filter and 0 ppm after the DI filter. Here is a picture of the sediment filter and the 2 carbon blocks that I removed. This system sat around for about 4 months while I moved home before I bought my house. I probably should have installed new filters before this. Pretty nasty stuff, especially the sediment filter, which is supposed to be bright white, not urine yellow.
Here is the new RO/DI filter installed. I took off the final carbon filter b/c it is supposed to add "taste" back into the h2o. Not something I think my fish really need. I do have a question though, should I install a 't' before the DI filter to remove the first couple of minutes of h2o that come out (roughly 50 ppm).
As always, thanks for looking.
Chris
Anyways, on to the pictures:
Here is a picture of the pump glued and ready to go. I ended up using Oatey Rain R Shine PVC Cement. I talked to a gentleman from that company yesterday and he said that product would work fine on flex PVC. They make a flexible PVC glue, but I couldn't find it locally and I didn't want to wait to have it shipped.
Here is a picture looking from the left side of the tank down through the sump. I put the pump up on 2 small blocks of wood covered by carpet (not pictured) to lessen the vibration. I had to lift the skimmer off the bottom of the sump b/c the sump water level was too high. I built a small eggcrate box to lift it off the sump floor. In this picture you can also see the ca reactor feed plumbed off the return pump. I'm going to try and eliminate all unnecessary pumps by t-ing them off the return pump.
Here is a picture of the skimmer input from the pump. Nothing too special here, just showing the DIY beckett injector housing.
While I was feeling productive, I went ahead and changed out the RO filters and installed a new DI cartridge w/ color changing resin. Pretty neat stuff. I'm now getting 1 ppm tds reading through the RO filter and 0 ppm after the DI filter. Here is a picture of the sediment filter and the 2 carbon blocks that I removed. This system sat around for about 4 months while I moved home before I bought my house. I probably should have installed new filters before this. Pretty nasty stuff, especially the sediment filter, which is supposed to be bright white, not urine yellow.
Here is the new RO/DI filter installed. I took off the final carbon filter b/c it is supposed to add "taste" back into the h2o. Not something I think my fish really need. I do have a question though, should I install a 't' before the DI filter to remove the first couple of minutes of h2o that come out (roughly 50 ppm).
As always, thanks for looking.
Chris
JustOneMoreTank
New member
Looking pretty good. I am setting up a 120 currently as well so I will be following along.
I have the same RODI as well. I am not sure if the filter pictured at the left side is "exhausted" yet or not. I have seen other filters that were much more yellow than that one. However it couldnt hurt to change the filter early.
I have a question... why is the hole/bulkhead so high on the sump that is serving to provide water to the intake of the pump? I am not sure what this pump is powering ( I think the skimmer) . It would seem to me to be a better option for the bulkhead/intake to be as low as possible to prevent the chance of the pump running dry some day for some random power outage or after being shut off for a waterchange or whatever.
Let me know what you think.
I have the same RODI as well. I am not sure if the filter pictured at the left side is "exhausted" yet or not. I have seen other filters that were much more yellow than that one. However it couldnt hurt to change the filter early.
I have a question... why is the hole/bulkhead so high on the sump that is serving to provide water to the intake of the pump? I am not sure what this pump is powering ( I think the skimmer) . It would seem to me to be a better option for the bulkhead/intake to be as low as possible to prevent the chance of the pump running dry some day for some random power outage or after being shut off for a waterchange or whatever.
Let me know what you think.
Chrisrush
New member
Justone:
That hole was already drilled in the tank when I bought it used a year or 2 ago. I had that sump tank as my display tank until I tore it down 5 months ago. That hole was originally used as an overflow. I would have liked to have put the bulkhead lower but since I didn't want to drill it again, I used what I had. As you can see, I put a 90 degree street elle down towards the bottom of the sump to help pull h2o out of the bottom of the sump.
Well, I was getting higher tds values than I wanted to and I figured that since the unit had sat stagnant for a couple of months, it was probably better that I changed it now before I ran 160 gallons through it. Plus, I bought it from a guy who said it was new, but I was never really sure if it was.
Chris
That hole was already drilled in the tank when I bought it used a year or 2 ago. I had that sump tank as my display tank until I tore it down 5 months ago. That hole was originally used as an overflow. I would have liked to have put the bulkhead lower but since I didn't want to drill it again, I used what I had. As you can see, I put a 90 degree street elle down towards the bottom of the sump to help pull h2o out of the bottom of the sump.
Well, I was getting higher tds values than I wanted to and I figured that since the unit had sat stagnant for a couple of months, it was probably better that I changed it now before I ran 160 gallons through it. Plus, I bought it from a guy who said it was new, but I was never really sure if it was.
Chris
Chrisrush
New member
Anyways, I started filling the tank this weekend. The sump is full and now I'm working on the rest of the tank. I finished the placement of the CL pump and I'm anxious to fire it up. I guess I'll have to wait until Wed at the rate my ro/di unit is going. Here are a few pictures of the placement of the pumps and Houdini, as always, is given his approval.
Thanks,
Chris
Thanks,
Chris
Chrisrush
New member
Plenty of work was accomplished this weekend, as stated in my last post, I filled the tank, put some base rock in and got the temp, salinity and pH up to par.
On Thursday afternoon, I transfered some LR to start the biological filtration.
On Saturday, the yard was mowed, edged and cleaned, I was able to hang the canopy and put some of the live base rock, LR and corals into the tank:
Sunday I finished the CL, which is a PCX-55 w/ 2 penductors. Let me tell you, those things are quite powerful. There is plenty of flow in the tank now. I took a picture right after it was turned on, and you can see the amount of crud it stirred up.
I'm still working on a full tank shot, since the lighting in the kitchen is a little bright. Here is one from the sink side of the kitchen after most everything was cleaned up.
I still need to re-adjust the canopy to get it to hang better. In that last picture, you can see how it tilts slightly backwards. This is b/c all the cords are in the back of the canopy. I was thinking of adding some weights or something to the front of the canopy to pull it down. It may not be a big factor after the skirt is added though.
I did have one problem yesterday, after I was talking to my wife, I noticed that the bottom of one of the baffles had come loose, fuge side. As I as walking into the kitchen, the baffle broke free from the silicone, splashing a little h2o on the floor. Nothing major, but now I need to figure out if I need to drain the sump and fix it. I did learn one big lesson though, silicon DOES NOT stick to HDPE. Anyone have any ideas?
You can see where the baffle used to be (marked w/ white silicone). It came free of the glass and now has moved a couple of inches to the left, towards the return pump. Not much has been effected by it, although, it does mess up what I was going to do for my auto-top off.
I'm also dealing w/ some heat issues, I guess those 2 PCX-55 pumps add a few degrees of heat to the tank. I have 2 diff thermometers running, but they don't agree. One says ~ 82 and the other is around ~84. I need to put a fan over the sump when I get that fixed.
Thanks for looking.
Chris
On Thursday afternoon, I transfered some LR to start the biological filtration.
On Saturday, the yard was mowed, edged and cleaned, I was able to hang the canopy and put some of the live base rock, LR and corals into the tank:
Sunday I finished the CL, which is a PCX-55 w/ 2 penductors. Let me tell you, those things are quite powerful. There is plenty of flow in the tank now. I took a picture right after it was turned on, and you can see the amount of crud it stirred up.
I'm still working on a full tank shot, since the lighting in the kitchen is a little bright. Here is one from the sink side of the kitchen after most everything was cleaned up.
I still need to re-adjust the canopy to get it to hang better. In that last picture, you can see how it tilts slightly backwards. This is b/c all the cords are in the back of the canopy. I was thinking of adding some weights or something to the front of the canopy to pull it down. It may not be a big factor after the skirt is added though.
I did have one problem yesterday, after I was talking to my wife, I noticed that the bottom of one of the baffles had come loose, fuge side. As I as walking into the kitchen, the baffle broke free from the silicone, splashing a little h2o on the floor. Nothing major, but now I need to figure out if I need to drain the sump and fix it. I did learn one big lesson though, silicon DOES NOT stick to HDPE. Anyone have any ideas?
You can see where the baffle used to be (marked w/ white silicone). It came free of the glass and now has moved a couple of inches to the left, towards the return pump. Not much has been effected by it, although, it does mess up what I was going to do for my auto-top off.
I'm also dealing w/ some heat issues, I guess those 2 PCX-55 pumps add a few degrees of heat to the tank. I have 2 diff thermometers running, but they don't agree. One says ~ 82 and the other is around ~84. I need to put a fan over the sump when I get that fixed.
Thanks for looking.
Chris
If you get time could you take a picture of the sump with the power off to the pumps? Perhaps it's just my eyes but it seems the level of the sump is high. Being I will be setting up a 120 w/sump soon I am still trying to get over the "flood" shock. Thanks and tank looks good.
:dance:
:dance:
Chrisrush
New member
Well, I fixed my sump over the weekend since the fuge baffle decided to give. I think that it was the pressure (4-5" height difference) b/w the fuge and the return section that utimately did it. What I did to fix this problem was to drill 7-8 holes in the fuge wall to help with the pressure until I can get me autotop off running. I reinstalled the baffle, after siliconing the heck out of it, and it seems to be holding w/o any bowing. I also took out the 3rd baffle as I'm not running that much flow through the sump as it is and that baffle was bowing considerable as well. I'm getting a few microbubbles in the tank, but that will be an easy fix when I get around to it.
Before:
After:
The wife wasn't supposed to come home until Sun AM. She was in for a little surprise when she walked into the kitchen:
I also fixed the skimmer pump inlet/outlet to incorporate a ball valve.
When I fired up the return pump again, I was getting quite a bit of noise and the wife wasn't too pleased. I rigged up a quick fix until I can research on how to quiet the noise a bit more. You can see how I ran a "t" under the water and ran a vertical pump above the water to help with the air dissipation.
Thanks for looking,
Chris
Before:
After:
The wife wasn't supposed to come home until Sun AM. She was in for a little surprise when she walked into the kitchen:
I also fixed the skimmer pump inlet/outlet to incorporate a ball valve.
When I fired up the return pump again, I was getting quite a bit of noise and the wife wasn't too pleased. I rigged up a quick fix until I can research on how to quiet the noise a bit more. You can see how I ran a "t" under the water and ran a vertical pump above the water to help with the air dissipation.
Thanks for looking,
Chris
Chrisrush
New member
Puffers,
Here is a picture or two of what you requested last week. Sorry it took so long for me to update.
Display level in power failure mode:
Sump level in power failure mode:
I have the returns pretty far out of the water so that when the power does go out or when I feed, not too much h2o drains out of the display tank.
HTH,
Chris
Here is a picture or two of what you requested last week. Sorry it took so long for me to update.
Display level in power failure mode:
Sump level in power failure mode:
I have the returns pretty far out of the water so that when the power does go out or when I feed, not too much h2o drains out of the display tank.
HTH,
Chris
JustOneMoreTank
New member
Looks good. My wife would never let me near her kitchen with my tank or any of my stuff. 
Stinky Live Rock and Shop Vacs Ha! I am sure that she was thrilled when she got home to see that.
Stinky Live Rock and Shop Vacs Ha! I am sure that she was thrilled when she got home to see that.
Chrisrush
New member
Justone:
I think that I got the skimmer out of the sink before she came home and I was in the process of cleaning up everything before she came home, but you are right, if she would have seen the mess that I made before that, she would have killed me. Of course, this is just a ploy to get my own fish room in the future.
Noschwag,
So far they haven't been too loud. You basically hear the fans, which isn't too bad. The water splashing sounds in the sump are louder than the pcx's. They do seem to add a bit of heat to the tank though.
Chris
I think that I got the skimmer out of the sink before she came home and I was in the process of cleaning up everything before she came home, but you are right, if she would have seen the mess that I made before that, she would have killed me. Of course, this is just a ploy to get my own fish room in the future.
Noschwag,
So far they haven't been too loud. You basically hear the fans, which isn't too bad. The water splashing sounds in the sump are louder than the pcx's. They do seem to add a bit of heat to the tank though.
Chris
Chrisrush
New member
Well, I made some pretty good progress today on the top-off and kalk reactor. I straightened up the crud to the right of the tank as well since my wife's grandparents will be coming into town this week. I started off by aquascaping some since I had originally just thrown everything into the tank. Sorry for the hazy pictures, the skimmer hadn't cleaned up the h2o yet.
I wanted to have 2 islands with a zoa garden in the middle. I ended up with 2 islands with one ended behind the other with a sort of pass through. I'm not sure if you can see this from the pictures, but I think that it looks pretty good. I'm going to keep the left island to sps and lps and the right for softies to start. Once the tank matures, I'll sell off the softies in favor of more sps.
Left side:
Right side:
Canyon view?
Here's an updated view of the crud to the right of the tank. I'm still looking for a small cabinet, but this will work for right now. It was an old iron stand for a 10 gallon, which is perfect for the 10 gallon h2o resevoir.
For the top-off, I wanted to use a float valve gravity based system. Once the kalk reactor is finished, I'll install it inline b/w the resevoir and the float valve.
Here are 2 pictures of the float valve holders. I think that I found this idea from someone online, basically, I can move the float valve up and down if I want to change the h2o height in the sump.
Here is a close up of the 10 gallon resevoir tank. I put an acrylic top on it and installed a float valve and a second valve that the h2o flows to the tank to.
Chris
I wanted to have 2 islands with a zoa garden in the middle. I ended up with 2 islands with one ended behind the other with a sort of pass through. I'm not sure if you can see this from the pictures, but I think that it looks pretty good. I'm going to keep the left island to sps and lps and the right for softies to start. Once the tank matures, I'll sell off the softies in favor of more sps.
Left side:
Right side:
Canyon view?
Here's an updated view of the crud to the right of the tank. I'm still looking for a small cabinet, but this will work for right now. It was an old iron stand for a 10 gallon, which is perfect for the 10 gallon h2o resevoir.
For the top-off, I wanted to use a float valve gravity based system. Once the kalk reactor is finished, I'll install it inline b/w the resevoir and the float valve.
Here are 2 pictures of the float valve holders. I think that I found this idea from someone online, basically, I can move the float valve up and down if I want to change the h2o height in the sump.
Here is a close up of the 10 gallon resevoir tank. I put an acrylic top on it and installed a float valve and a second valve that the h2o flows to the tank to.
Chris
mcdonaldtj
New member
Excellent job on the tank, the only thing I would caution about is the electrics ballast etc under you 10 gal tank. if there was a leak or anything it would drip right down on top of all that electric stuff and that could cause a fire. All it would take is that float valve to malfuntion and there it goes.
V/Tim
V/Tim
