Ryan009's 250G build thread

[Ryan009]

I wish I could take credit for it!

I like to dabble with woodworking, but when it came to project this size, my wife insisted I let the professionals take care of it.

That's why she's the brains in the family.

My local cabinet maker did it. It's cherry and will match the style and color of the other cabinet you see in the background of install pictures - they did that one too.

 

[Fats71]

That is a beautiful skin. Where did you have it done at ? Nice job on moving it in overkill makes for a happy back.

 

[Ryan009]

The skin was custom built by Wood Specialties in Menominee Falls.
http://www.woodspecialtiesinc.com/

I'll be honest - they're not cheap, but they do AWESOME work.

Here's todays update:

Here's some of the supplies - before I ran to Menards to pick up a bunch more pieces:

Now that I have the valves in upstairs, I'm just praying there are no leaks!!!!

My plan is the use one of the 1.5" lines for a siphon drain. This line should handle 95-00% of the volume. The other durso is in a 1" line and would just be used to handle the trickle that the 1.5" couldn't. The return line is on a 1" supply and the last 1.5" line is just an emergency drain.

 

[rob1991]

wow its really coming along!

 

[Ryan009]

Still a long way to go, but I'm excited to at least have (some) water!

Here's the new sump system (I still have to do baffles yet). I'm worried about the bulkheads being on a slightly curved part of the poly tank. I'm sure they'll seal OK, but the outlet won't end up with a perfect lineup to the output from the glass tank. Any ideas?

 

[Chrisrush]

Skin looks great. How easy is it to get into the tank?

Not sure about the poly tank. What type of bulkhead did you use? Did you look into a uniseal for the poly tank?

 

[Ryan009]

It's not terribly convenient to get into it from the living room. The door do open, but you have to reach over that front curved piece before you get to the water.

In the hall way, it's much more convenient. There, the tops tip up and open down to the top of the tank.

Someone else mentioned uni-seals too. I don't know much about them. They are suppose to be more flexible right? If anyone has experience with them, good or bad, please let me know.

 

[RayAllen]

Amazing already ever without livestock. Great craftsmanship!

 

[spsfreak]

Very nice, I am subscribed.

 

[Fats71]

Beautiful

 

[SaraB]

Ryan - we need updates!

 

[Ryan009]

Now that the holidays are over, I finally have some time for new photos!

The new sump isn't done yet. I had it all ready to go with cell cast acrylic baffles in a 120 AGA tank. Then I had our reef clubs holiday party at my house and a couple of people warned me the acrylic could swell and break the glass tank. Tonight I cut one of the baffles out, measured it, and threw it in the existing sump. I'll measure it again tomorrow and see if it grew at all.

This leaves the fish room an Rube Goldberg award winner right now, but it's functional.

Now that it is functional, it was time to do some damage at the LFS. There really aren't any decent ones in the Milwaukee so I headed south the Paul Law's, Bill Davis (Midwest Saltwater), and the typical Chicago stops.

I found some killer pieces! I would of had 1 more Acan colony at Bills - an awesome Purple/Red rainbow- but he had already promised to frag it for someone named Sara. Hummm? I wonder who that could be? :hammer: :lol:

Anyway, on to the new pics!

 

[TandN]

tank looks great

 

[mpoletti]

Very nice tank and presentation

 

[SaraB]

The tank is looking great Ryan! I can't believe you have fish and corals in there already ... I'm jealous!

And don't be touching my Acan!!! :smokin:

 

[Ryan009]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14090849#post14090849 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by SaraB
The tank is looking great Ryan! I can't believe you have fish and corals in there already ... I'm jealous!

And don't be touching my Acan!!! :smokin:

Yeah, I have a problem with this patience thing. Not that I'm the right hobby given my lack of patience, but hey - what's a guy to do.

Thankfully everything is doing really well. I felt I could be a little aggressive with stocking given that I was tying this in with my existing 210 so it really wasn't starting a whole new system from scratch.

That Acan is super cool. Although I couldn't get the colony, I had him save a frag for me.

So far so good on the acrylic experiment. I'm going to give it a few more days, but after 1 day in the sump it had not swelled at all!

 

[SaraB]

Agreed, tying it in with an existing system sure helps. All my liverock is cured and after 3 weeks, I have 0 for Nitrate, Nitrite and Ammonia. I just now have to get the rest of my work done on the system so I can start moving over some livestock.

Glad to hear you will be getting a frag of that Acan, it was sweet looking! Congrats!

 

[Ryan009]

Slightly off-topic (and shameless promotion) - Part of the delay in posting updates was due to setting up a new webpage/forum for our local reef club. Stop by and check it out!
www.wireefsociety.com

 

[stunreefer]

Looks awesome Ryan, congrats! :thumbsup:

I've "heard" about acrylic swelling in a glass sump before because my old sump was glass with acrylic baffles (I got told it was going to fail all the time - being stubborn I never changed it). It was set-up over two years without an issue at all. Now I have "heard" about this in more than one case, so it might be best to use glass on glass or acrylic on acrylic, but I figuired I'll share my first hand experience about going against the grain. The only thing I can say negatively about this IME was that it seemed tough to get acrylic to seal to glass with silicone.

 

[Ryan009]

I really appreciate that feedback.

My biggest concern was the glass sump failing and finding a couple hundred gallons of water on the floor! It's very encouraging to hear first hand experience.

It's strange because I've heard opinions in both directions from people I really trust. Thus my experiment.

The more research I do, the more I think I'll be OK. Supposedly, the cell cast acrylic doesn't have near the same issue as other acrylic's. Also, when I have heard of issues, it's normally on 40G or smaller tanks with much thinner glass. Between the thicker glass and cell acrylic I'm hoping it'll work.

FWIW, when I put the baffles in, I used two different sealers - one black and one clear. Why? It's just what I had on hand.
When I cut the panel out, it was the one that had black silicone on it and clear silicone on it. While the panel was being held firmly in place all the way around, once I got it out, the black silicone peeled off the acrylic with no problem at all. I had to work at the clear with a razor blade to get that off.

When it goes back in, it'll definetly be with clear silicone.