New house so time for a new tank.

[squibley2]

Here is the plan

We are getting our new house late April early May next year. They are building it so that is the reason for the delay. I was planning on doing about a 280g in the family room when my Fience said why don't I just do an inwall between my office and the family room (Not the only reason I am marring her!!! But a good one!). So the new tank plan is to put a tank in the wall between my new office and the family room visable from both sides. The hole is 8' x 4' so the proposed tank is 8' x 3' x 3'. This will only be the main display part of the tank and I estimate about 540Gal. I was planning on having about 1500Gal of sumps/fuges in the basement for all the equipment and to make sure the total water volume is enough for the tangs and angels I want to have in the tank.

Any suggestions or advise would be helpfull. I have never done a tank this large before. I am planning on reinforcing the floor at that point already and then plumbing in the PVC for all the drains and returns down into the basement.

I was planning on running about a 10x turnover rate for the display so about 5000gal per hour through the sumps/fuge. Then supplimenting with additional flow in the tank itself. This will need to be a large pump in order to push 5000gal at about 14' of head pressure.

The lighting is currently scheduled to be 5x 250W MHs and 2x 400W MHs. With 2x 8' VHOs for color.

Sorry for the long post.

 

[chriis716]

Can't wait to see some progress. Have you decided on what skimmer to go with?

 

[FishTruck]

Re: New house so time for a new tank.

I have some suggestions. See next post!

 

[FishTruck]

O.K. I am about a year ahead of you in this type of adventure and will share a few tid bits.

First of all...
Awesome tank dimensions! Make sure you have a plan to get that humid air out of your house! See "HOP's" thread in the reef talk section.

Also, watch out for windows that may goof up the look through tank. These look awesome when a dark room is on the other side. But, I have seen some crappy looking ones when the room is too bright on the other side. Really bright tank lights will help. Make sure your interior decorator is in your corner!

Also, make sure this will fit through a door or window! I had to go down to 28 inches wide or cut a hole in the wall.

Overflows on the ends? In the center? Make sure you plan this carefully. It will determine your options for placing circuation pumps, etc...

5000 gal is probably way too much through the sump. This will be microbubble city. More importantly... unless you have a skimmer that can process 5000 gal of water, you are just wasting lots of electricity. Look at the wattage for a pump that can do this and you might be paying a couple hundred bucks per month just to run the pump. It will be much more efficient to run your sump at say 1000 - 2000 gph, then, use a closed loop or vortechs / tunzes to provide in-tank circulation. Hiding them will require some planning, but with that tank size you have many options.

Or, as a compromise, if you want your return nozzles to do all the work, you can add penductors (eductors) to your returns. These will boost the inwater circulation from your return nozzles without demanding huge flow through the sump, but, will cost you a few feet of head pressure.

The lighting is currently scheduled to be 5x 250W MHs and 2x 400W MHs. With 2x 8' VHOs for color.

Which reflectors? For the 400 watts, people say full sized lumenarcs are good. For the 250 watts, some say that the smaller lumenarcs work better so the light does not get "too spread out".

 

[squibley2]

Not yet I was actually looking for some suggestions on which company to have build the tank and some other suggestions for skimmer and pumps and alike. I was thinking of going with Tunzes for flow in the tank and I was considering a Euro Reef skimmer. I had planned on the large Lumenarc for the 400s and the smaller Lumenarcs for the 250s I was not planning on having reflectors for the VHOs.

I was also thinking of having starfire glass for the front and back of the tank since those are the 2 viewing sides.

I am also going to need some help/advise on how to actually plumb this thing. I was thinking of going with side overflows so the center would be open for large rockwork and some caves and hollows for the fish.

 

[FishTruck]

Check out aquarium obsessed and A.E.G. I used tenecor, but I don't know if they do starfire.

The side overflows are a good idea. I don't think you will be able to use vortechs with that arrangement... which may be fine. You can still add a closed loop or drop in Tunzes from the canopy for circulation.

Some VHOs have internal reflectors which probably work well enough. I think that is fine too.

I used google sketch up and corel draw to help plan it out.

 

[squibley2]

I will probably go with the tunzes.

 

[squibley2]

So recomendations on skimmers and reinforcing the floors and everything else that goes along with these beasts? I have never done a tank this big so I am deffinately looking for some additional help.

 

[FishTruck]

What is the joist structure like under the tank? You will probably want some vertical support to make sure your floor does not sag. I had to double up three joists (sister them) and supported each one with a 4 x 4 jack post.

As far as skimmers, I went with the Reeflo Orca. There is a post about these going that got me interested in this skimmer. Not running yet, but, I bought one.

R

 

[FishTruck]

Oh, one other thing.

Make you you have the top of the tank built to your liking. I have mine eurobraced so there is no center brace to get in my way.

This required 1.25 inch thick acrylic... and... I just realized tonight that the three vortechs I bought will not work with anything thicker than .75 inches. D'OH!

R

 

[squibley2]

I am trying to not have any vertical supports in the basement I was planning on having either lama-board joists or steel joists from the main house support to the foundation wall. I was also planning on going with glass even though it is heavier I don’t like acrylic tanks they scratch to easily and I just don’t like the look. So I was planning on Starfire glass on the front and back and about .75” glass. This has been recommended by all 3 builders that I have contacted so far for the tank. And yes there will be bracing for the tank.