Randrew's 5-year Tank Build (125 gallon)

[Randrew215]

Hello, URS! Thank you all for all of the valuable threads and advice that have enabled me to learn about reef aquaria the last few years. Here it is: my first attempt at starting my own aquarium from scratch. Since summer of 2010, I've maintained a 90 gallon tank that I purchased off a URS member at a great price, and it feels like I've made nearly every mistake I could make in learning the ropes of reefkeeping. Failure is very underrated- it's an excellent teacher! For the last year I've thought of my 90 gallon tank as a frag tank that would someday seed a tank of my own design. And here we find ourselves! A shot of the old tank:

I call this new tank my 5 year tank because in 5 years I'll (hopefully) have completed my residency, and at that point I'll either be out of this hobby or ready to upgrade. From now until then I'm a renter (not a home owner) so it was especially important that everything I created had very limited potential to damage/destroy a home. Nothing I've tried is particularly new to reefcentral, but I'll try to be helpful in pointing out my mistakes so that others can build on what I've done.

THE TANK
The Tank is a Marineland 125 gallon tank that came with a plastic centerbrace. I didn't like this for two reasons. First, I believe that all cheap plastic braces exposed to salt spray and halide lighting will, over time, fail. No thank you! Second, the light I purchased second (third?) hand off a URS member has 3 MH bulbs and one would sit directly over the brace. So the brace had to go.

 

[Randrew215]

I made small chips in the top portion of the glass at several points being overzealous. This process is very tedious and best accomplished with a beer and good music on hand. Once I had the brace off I used razors, acetone, and 0000 steel wool to remove the remaining silicone. It's very important to go all the way down to glass to get a good surface for adherence. I'll try to show the difference in these two pictures below.

Now I need to talk about the top of my tank and my plumbing ideas simultanesously, since they affect oneanother. My original plan was to do a complete eurobrace with an internal weir stretching coast to coast and draining to an overflow box on the posterior of the tank. The more I thought about it, however, the more this idea unraveled. First- how do you access an internal weir for cleaning with a eurobrace sitting over the top of it? Second, I didn't like the idea of an external overflow box siliconed to the back of the tank. I feared the weight of the plumbing and water would torque against the glass and slowly pry the overflow box off the back of the tank. I decided to give up the tank real estate and create an internal overflow. The immediate implication of this was that I couldn't have a full perimeter eurobrace. The more I thought about that flimsy plastic frame and poured through threads on reefcentral, however, the more comfortable I became with not having a full perimiter eurobrace.
TLDR: Eurobrace, internal overflow
I ordered the glass through twin city glass and used the wait time to drill the tank. I obtained my diamond circular bit through bulk reef supply and chose the 48mm diameter because I wanted schedule 80 bulkheads. Here's how I did it

Drilling is not difficult. Three things that I think greatly facilitate drilling glass are:
1. Taking it outside and running the hose over the drill site keeps the bit cool and is one less thing to worry about.
2. Even if you tilt the bit and create a groove and slowly work the bit perpindicular, it's stil going to jump around you. Just make a template. Use plywood or whatever is lying around, but if it's your first time doing this you don't need the anxiety of wondering if you've just scratched your new tank up with an errant diamond drill bit.
3. Tape the underside so that the glass circle you've just cut out doesn't fall once you drill through.

 

[Randy15]

So what are you going to use a support now that the brace is gone?

 

[Randy15]

Sry. I posted before you put the rest up lol. Looks good so far!

 

[Randrew215]

Now to the overflow and eurobracing. I searched the internet extensively for what thickness and dimensions I needed to safely eurobrace the top of the tank and came up shy. It's generally recommended to use glass the same thickness as the tank is constructed of, which for me is 3/8". I will concede that I wasn't sure if this would be strong enough when I first ordered the glass, but having it set up now with no bowing I realize that I'm probably overbuilt, and I'm content with that. Here's a picture of the finished product

The anterior and lateral pieces are 3" wide, with the anterior piece spanning the full 72". The two middle braces are 3.5" and the two posterior strips are only 2" because they function more as a splash guard than as structural support. All of this sits atop the original glass rim of the tank, not within the upper glass rim. It is silconed in place with RTV silcone and has an additional layer of sealant silcone along the inside border to further protect the integrity of the silicone. The overflow box sits in the upper left third of the tank and is 19" long, 3" deep, and 5" high, with the front pane being only 4" high so as to allow the tank water to drain over into the overflow box.

Before I move on, I have to plug the folks at Twin City Glass who were courteous and had excellent customer service. I recommend them for anyone in the Buffalo area who needs glass cut.

 

[Randrew215]

THE STAND
I wanted a taller stand both for better viewing astethics as well as for greater access room underneath. Also, I wanted a stand that exceeded the width of my tank to accommodate my plumbing and to allow me to more easily utilize a 40 gallon breeder sump. I used a modified RocketEngineer stand I found on a reefcentral thread:
(I can't find the link. I'll dig it up later).
Here's what I came up with:

I used multiple coats of blond combined stain/polyurethane to seal it. Then I taped off around the base and up the first few inches of the side and applied silicone. The base will hold about three gallons with the sump in place to stave off a minor disaster. What I learned from this is that a circular saw is not an instrument of precision, and I wasted many pieces of wood being just off in my cuts. To fit the base I used a router with a cutting jig to remove sections from the plywood. Eventually I'll finish the exterior of the stand to furniture grade, but I suspect that project is still about a year out. I enjoy woodworking and look forward to the project when time allows. I should also mention that there are points along the front and back of the stand with gaps of 1/16-1/8" but the corners are all well supported and the sides are as well. The consensus on reefcentral indicates that this is nonproblematic. If I were a better woodworker I probably could have planed everything out to completely flush.

THE PLUMBING
I highly recommend the Beananimal overflow. As soon as you understand the simple mechanics, you realize how brillirant the design is. I went with 2" inch plumbing. Each tube can accomdate the entire turnover of the tank independently. One drain is limited by a gatevalve, which simulateneosuly dictates the flow in the second drain to eliminate gurgle/noise. The third drain acts as an emergency drain. Once the air drains from the system, it runs silently and provides excellent peace of mind. I ran the two main drainlines down into a filter sock and the emergency drain separately straight down into the sump.

 

[Randrew215]

I'm extremely pleased that I used 2" drains. I will say, however, that I regret using schedule 80 pvc from BRS. I recommend it for the bulkheads and it looks sleek and uniform, but it was really $$, and I don't see schedule 40 pvc failing. Plus, every time you realize you need a different piece and need to order it, the project is put on hold and the shipping costs are high (unless you hit $175). Save the money and just cover in krylon fusion if you want a uniform look. I did cement all joints together and used Vaseline around the bulkeads to prevent drip/saltcreep.
For a return I'm running a mag 12 with a disconnect that runs to 2"flexitube and then to solid 2" piping that T's pff to two return lines. I bought locline to run as two branching sections from each bulkhead, but the look was very intrusive and I opted for pvc oulets that would encourage circular flow. You'll notice that they sit higher than the level of the bulkhead to prevent back-siphoning when the return pump is off/power goes out.
~I haven't photo-documented my return plumbing yet.
I didn't fit the baffles into my sump until I freshwater-tested the system. This worked out well because I didn't realize how much depth my mag 12 return needed to not create a tiny whirpool and sucking noise (>6"). Also, I couldn't find online how wide to cut baffles for a 40 gallon breeder sump and I had them cut too long. Twin City Glass corrected them free of charge (thank you!). My first section of the sump is 10", second section w/ protein skimmer is 9", and return pump section is 8". To elevate the skimmer I made a pvc frame and used egg crate for fluorescent lighting as a platform. Once I elevated the platform I noticed two things: I have much better control over the skimmer and the skimmer outlet is very noisy. I have to figure out how to deal with this. If you have a solution that doesn't hinder resistance control, please share.
Eventually, I'm going to plumb a 20 gallon high tank in as a refugium to provide a haven for copepods.

TANK LAYOUT
I wish I had taken more pictures here. I purchased my rock from BRS and cycled it in my basement for about 5 months before it went in the tank. One of my biggest complaints with my old tank is that the rock stack was actually just a jumlbled mountain leaning against the back wall. This time around, I wanted a scape that would allow for circular flow and could maintain open space while achieving height. I purchased ½ "œ acrylic rods to make columns. This was by far the most underestimated task of the build. First off, I did this on a tarp in my living room and my cordless drill repeatedly died throughout the project. Second, the drill bit I used was exactly ½" and I should have gone a size up because working the rods into the holes was horrendous. Because of this, I snapped all of the acrylic rods from the acryclic bases I had mounted them to. Oh well. I was so frusterated by this task that I finally had to walk away from it. When I returned, I was actually pretty satisfied with the way I had left it.

I have a lot of extra rock. The reason I went with dry rock is because after fighting aiptasia, mojanos, protopalythoa, and green hairy mushrooms, I wanted a pest-free environment so I could at least start with a fighting chance.
For sand I used caribsea livesand. I think that this was probably a mistake and I should have used special grade. The truth is that I knew this, but I bought the other because it was in stock at ARC. I think the vortechs are going to whip this sand all around. I'll have to see after I install them, but my lone koralia 4 is already looking like excessive flow for the grain size.

THE GEAR
Lights: 72" 3x250 watt double-ended MH w/ 2x60" VHO supplementation. I need to replace one ballast. Halides are expensive to run in terms of electricity and bulb replacement and generate a lot of heat, but they look beautiful! I plan on keeping this lighting fixture for at least 1-2 years before I switch to LEDs. Due to the fact that I removed the top brace, the feet for the light no longer worked, so I affixed them to a strip of wood that sits on my tank.
Flow: Mag 12 return as described above, 2x MP40w ES. I'm not sure exactly how it will make sense to run these. I'm not sure if I can achieve a reversible gyre. I intend to do a little trial and error
Skimmer: SRO-3000 internal. Overkill, for sure. I purposely went overkill because I want to be capabale of handling carbon dosing.
Reactors: 2x TLF reactors set in series. One for carbon, one for GFO.
Dosing: Bubble Magus dosing pump for Ca, Alk, and Mag. I plan on manually dosing mag and using the third line for vodka/vinegar. This is an excellent piece of equipment.
ATO: Tunze Osmolator. Another excellent product. These pumps are great. Inexpensive and reliable.


Okay, that's all I've got for now. I'll continue to update as progress is made. Feel free to ask questions, provide commentary, or give feedback.

 

[redreef85]

Looks great! Where did you get the acrylic rods and how did you mount them to the base?

 

[Randrew215]

Looks great! Where did you get the acrylic rods and how did you mount them to the base?

I ordered them very cheaply through USplastic.com and used weld-on 3 (acrylic solvent) to mount them to the bases. I actually found the bases to be unnecessary.

 

[roblk]

Looks great, I am also using a bean animal with a coast to coast works great.

 

[Randrew215]

Update w/ livestock moved over

Update w/ livestock moved over

Got the livestock moved over and wanted to update. I lost a lot of corals, mostly due to an alkalinity swing and not securing them in place properly. I'm happy to report that I am totally free of aiptasia, majano anemones, and protopalythoa. The tank looks very bare to me and I'm just starting to see recovery/growth in the corals. I really need to bite the bullet and buy all new bulbs- you can see that the left side of the tank has a 10K and the middle and right are 14K. I prefer the latter.

 

[redreef85]

Looks good!

 

[Flanders]

Awesome. Very nice setup.

 

[tent boy]

Thats a real nice set up.

 

[solRNY]

nice build, very interesting... did u find the glass under the trim to be square all around?

 

[Randrew215]

Thank you all for the compliments. The glass under the trim was square all around, and I think I would have been in a bit of a pickle if it wasn't.

 

[cardiffgiant]

Wow, awesome build! Thanks for sharing.

 

[Henry Colf]

Very Nice, like the aquascape!!!!