So It Begins: Reefteck's 120 Reef Build Thread

oh i would definately get 2 of the same ballasts though

Yeah I intend to sometime in the future, preferably dimmable ones.

umm how close are those reflectors going to be??? i had a lumenarc and it was about 6-9 inches tall. my lights right now are about 12-14 inches off the water surface and i'm still getting burn spots on my birdsnest with really crappy home built reflector setup. i think those lights are going to be super super close. just my though on initial observation, but picture could be deceiving and canopy could be taller than i think

I'm not too worried about it, but the reflectors will be just 2.5" from the water, everything will be placed very low in the tank. It will be a minimallist aquascape with just a couple of 6" tall rock stacks for corals to grow from and lots of open space for fish. We'll see how it goes, wish me luck with that huh? lol
 
Trashed the old canopy? I have it, your right the canopy itself is wasted but i'm going to pull the t5s out to us in my canopy.
-Bill
 
Well I've actually got alot accomplished in the past couple of days working on the tank. I got the canopy painted, and put a face on the front of the tank, and tonight I finished crafting and painting the doors for the stand;

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It looks bigger from this angle (that's what I say all the time) lol.

Snowman, I also took your advice and raised the height of the canopy up by 3.5" which will give me the option of keeping the halides 8.5" above the water. The Lumenarcs will be secured to a board that runs across the length of the canopy, and on the sides of the canopy there are two tiers which I can slide the mounting board onto, that way I can adjust them if needed.

As you can see the tank is holding water just fine, which means my left hand drain patch with the acrylic plate worked! Dry as a bone, and looks acceptable too, especially once I get more rock and a little more sand in there. I'm just making up new salt water and putting it into the 75 and taking water from the 75 and putting it in the 120.

I got some holes drilled in the wall for feeding electrical into the utility room and it may possibly be all the larger I need for running PVC through to my chiller.

Got shipping confirmation from Aquacave today on my order. Hopefully lights are here by early next week! I'm totally freaking stoked bout these lights!

Cya guys soon,
Andy
 
I "caved" in at AquaCave and ordered a GenX external pump for the new system pump. I'm not going to run that damn Mag1200 externally. I've used them at the store for years and while they're reliable submerged, the impeller housing seems too flimsy to trust externally. Plus I don't want all that extra heat from the motor going directly into my water.

Up for sale Mag1200 for 75 bucks for Iowa Reefers only. You'll have to come get it.
 
dang boy its looking good! may i have it back??

Yeah, but only if you hoist it up on your shoulders and carry it out by yourself, with water in it.....it would totally be worth the 1400 bucks I've got stashed into this project at this point.
 
So I've solidified my additions list:

Corals to add:
-Sunset Montipora
-Aussie Lord Acans
-Superman Montipora
-Red Planet Acro
-Roscoes Blue Acro
-Hyacynth Bridsnest
-Blue Millepora
-Marshall Islands Blue Bottle Brush
-Purple Acropora Formosa
-Pink Pocillapora

Coral "maybe" List:
-Turquoise Acro
-Tenuose
-Hawkins Blue Acro
-Borealis Acro
-Meteor Shower
-Plum Crazy

Fish to add:
5x Chromis
3x Disbar Anthias
Purple Tang
Flameback Angel

Also a few hardware upgrades add ons to complete within the next couple of months:
-A booster fan for exhaust in my utility room where the chiller will be
-LED's
And down the road:
-new electronic ballasts for my 400's
 
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I got you covered on:
Sunset monti
Superman monti
Pink pocillapora
Meteor shower
Already fraged and in the frag tank as we speak. Let me know when you want them. I'll give you a sweet deal, so sweet i dare not post it!
-Bill
 
I got you covered on:
Sunset monti
Superman monti
Pink pocillapora
Meteor shower
Already fraged and in the frag tank as we speak. Let me know when you want them. I'll give you a sweet deal, so sweet i dare not post it!
-Bill

Lol Kick *** Bill! Yeah I'll give you a hollar here in the next week or so, probably by next weekend I will either be getting moved over into the new tank, or I will make some temporary real estate in the 75 for some new frags! Thanks dude!
 
Picked up a purple tang from a buddy of mine, he's gorgeous and good size too pix will follow. Thanks Marco! and I scored Jeffy's Copper Band (who actually eats and is doing quite well) Jeff was taking some stuff including a Yellow Belly Blue Tang up to Hong's (Sea of Marvels) and I decided I had to have her, so as I've been filling the 120 with cultured water, oxygenating with a pump, and nuking it with SeaChem Stability all week, I decided to make shift a set up for the beauty. She's toughing it out in the 10" of water in the 120. She's a big fish (like 6") she can take it, and seems to be eating well and doing quite fine, still a little upset from the move (a little shy). The rest of the mob will join her this weekend I am planning!

Tomorrow, or actually later today (it's midnight after all) the Lumenarcs come!!! and new bulbs!!!! I probably won't sleep at all tonight. I've been working out the circuit load and figuring how I'm going to wire this all up and here's what I've got so far:

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Looks like things should work out just fine with enough allowance for the TV and speaker system in the living room, and even one of my energy saving power compact light bulbs that the entire house is outfitted in! ;) it's something huh? :worried2: (it's not for the earth, the earth is screwed anyways, its for my pocket book).

Started some plumbing but the Gen X PCX 40 (1190gph pressure rated 3/4" mpt fitted) return pump won't come till Thursday. Just as well, that will keep me from trying to move this thing any sooner like when I have exams mid week :thumbsup:

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Chiller is in the utility closet adjacent to the tank (where those pipes are disappearing into the wall): I'm sure this against some sort of code but screw em! as long as I can keep water from bursting and running throughout the room the sockets and equipment should remain safe. Its not like things are old and ready to give out, it's new construction.......which is probably why all the appliance plumbing and fixutres are more likely to give out.....:rolleye1:

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Finally an updated shot of the crappy cabinet doors I quickly fashioned (I'm redoing the skin entirely this summer canopy and stand) I've been busy and all systems are go. We have 8' doors so the tank always looks small in this house made for giant people. It's really stupid construction! The wall behind the tank isn't even a straight line, its bows out by a couple of degrees.

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Tomorrow afternoon Lumenarcs baby! Pix will be up of those right as soon as I get em in and cranking out!

PEACE!
Andy
 
andy you might be able to get bye without a chiller, i dont use one at all on my 120 with dual 400's but i do run open top and my sump sits on concrete. but fans can be your friend :) and are better for your pocket book :)
 
andy you might be able to get bye without a chiller, i dont use one at all on my 120 with dual 400's but i do run open top and my sump sits on concrete. but fans can be your friend :) and are better for your pocket book :)

My sump will sit on concrete, well....vinyl tile between them but the ground is still very cold, so hopefully that helps too. I am going to add some fans in the canopy, I'm borrowing my friends 4" hole saw tomorrow to make a couple of holes.

But man! those bulbs are still freaking HOTTT I put my hand in front of them where the water is going to be and it's like sitting in front of a space heater!

All right without further ado, my moment of zenith:
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I have a Nikon D90 so I can adjust the exposure in all sorts of ways to get a legible picture. However that last picture was probably the best, most accurate snapshot of the actual intensity and color balance shown by these bulbs and Lumenarc Mini III reflectors.

Pump comes Thursday, I got all the final little pieces of PVC that I needed this afternoon. Last big hurtle is going to be drilling my sump to fit in some bulkheads to run my skimmer externally.

Rockon!
Andy
 
Looks sweet! What bulbs are you running? Aqua cave screwed me on my new skimmer it's on back order for 2 weeks that sucks! Got my mp40s yesterday and they kick some serious a$$! I leak tested my new tank and the pumps at the same time. I filled the tank up to about 6 in from the top and mounted the pumps on eather end of the tank. And set them up on slave anti sink mode. Then tuned in the pulse rate and dam the wave started up at about 2in then kept building it got clear to the rim about 5in!
-Bill
 
Looks sweet! What bulbs are you running?

Got XM 20K's! I think they're going to be great! I'm not going to install the IceCap 660 ballast for supplemental transitioning night to day. The intensity put off by these Lumenarcs with these 400's is so uniform and bright, so much more than my other tank.

The great thing is that it's only 150 watts more than I'm running on my 75! I haven't got a PAR meter, but I've seen some 2D and 3D PAR maps from Advanced Aquarist Online Magazine.

Aqua cave screwed me on my new skimmer it's on back order for 2 weeks that sucks!

Yeah it totally sucks when that happens. Seems like they keep to little on hand inventory if they're doing so much business. I hope your at least using the 5% off Reef Central discount. Promo code RC5.

Oh yeah, MP40's rock faces!!!
 
What the hell 5% off? No one told me about that! Man i just spent close to a grand at aqua cave that discount would have been nice. Well I guss I know now.
-Bill
 
What the hell 5% off? No one told me about that! Man i just spent close to a grand at aqua cave that discount would have been nice. Well I guss I know now.
-Bill

Dude that sucks!

Well I haven't posted in a couple of days now I'm sure you've all been wondering how things are developing, and I'm pleased to say that I've been busy making the migration and last night I brought everything to an end.

Wednesday I started and moved the water, fish, coral, rock, sand over and got all the power heads going to hold them over for a few days. Thursday night I got my leaky bulkheads fixed, got my new Gen X PCX 40 (aka Mak4) and got the wet/dry filter back on line. This was a big relief to get super oxygenation and tons of nitrifying bacteria back to doing their work in the wet/dry filter. I was running zeolite and phoslock in the reactors hanging off the tank up till this point to handle everything. Been hitting it with Seachem Stability and ZeoBak (microbacter 7)

I got all my leaky bulkheads fixed up in the sump, skimmer back on line just last night, got most of my electrical ran and organized yesterday too. Also plumbed in my PO4 rxr, got my CA rxr, and Kalk rxr all plumbed in and everything except the skimmer is running off the PCX40. I'll be watching my water parameters for the next two weeks pretty closely, everything seems fine so far!

A few full tank shots:
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A few fish shots;
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A few coral shots;
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Things are really starting to clear up and look nice!

cya,
andy
 
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