Soulpatch's 150 SC build

Perfect timing for a long weekend (I think you said you took the week to get everything set up anyway).

I'm really interested to see how the kessils+ATI work longer term. And to see the rockwork layout too. And to see the quality from reefcleaners. It looks good on their site.

Are you seeding the tank with anything in particular other than the marinepure from the other tank? Any liverock, livesand, pods, etc from other tanks, vendors?
 
Damn it soulpatch I really want the 150...grrr but I know I cant. i f I had a place to call home I prb. would until then gonna stay with the 3' tanks.

I would make the biocube in to a display macro fuge. call it your daughters tank :)
but thats just me I really like macro tanks.

amazing work on the plumbing BTW!
 
Man this sand made a mess. With the herbie so silent I forgot the pump was on and it got the sand sludge all over the place. Going to have to do a water change after this all settles I assume and clean the sump. My dumb A** fault...

THe water station stand is built but I need to go get some wider screws to mount my casters on so it is mobile. Pump and camber valves came today so will get the casters on tonight then do the plumbing tomorrow while the daughter is napping.

Probably mount the Kessils mounted tonight in the canopy just since I will have the time and need to wait on my remaining rock bits...
 
Well the platform for the water station was built but tonight I added in the pump and lines for the water change. So the pump can suck water into the container from my brute which will be going on the bottom of the stand once I move my RODI system which should happen this weekend sometime. The pump will also mix inside the container and pump water back into my tank.



So in the pic above you can see my valves. TO pull water up from the brute that will be underneath I simply plug that line with the banjo camber outlet into the outlet at the bottom where the hose is currently plugged in. I prime the pump and then turn it on.

To suck water out of the tank I leave the valve on the bulkhead closed and swap out the top union with the one shown in the third pic below which will be connected to a hose line. That will go to my drain.

I simply flip the camber and turn the two bottom valves to refill the tank.



Close up of the camber unions. These are awesome and witht he flip of those two handles I have water tight seal.



This shows the other conection I will swap in when doing water changes.


I wanted the top to be union so I can put the lid on my holding tank. I have yet to decide if I will tap the lid to run the 1" pvc through it or leave it as is and only drill holes in the lid for a heater and power head.

The whole thing is on wheels that support well over the weight this will ever be. I will be putting a power strip on the underside to plug the pump, heater, and powerhead into. I might get fancy and put a small dj unit on it to individually control each plug but that will be in the future as money is going elsewhere right now.
 
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No the lights in my stand are a single multicolor waterproof led strip. I will put up the link soon as I get in Computer to find it again but it is posted on one of the last pages of my nano build thread
 
So not too much was done over the weekend outside of the water change station.

I added a power strip and some brackets to wrap cords around on the change station and used it for a water change on my nano last night.

The large tank was drained most of the way and fresh RODI put in. The sand is still making my water cloudy so probably one more decent water change and should be good to go.

I added some handles to the doors as the SC design forces you to grab from bottom of door to open which I hated.

Finally should be some more items done this week as I am supposed to get my BAO shipment tomorrow for my dosing and ATO containers. I can then dry fit where they will go along with my doser and get those situated. Doing so will also show me the available space for my electrical panel.

By this weekend I will have all of my rock to set up my aquascape and kick off my cycle. Ammonia is standing by and I have some marine pure in my nano to seed it.


I think the biggest thing I am looking forward to is the silence. I had to do a water change on my nano yesterday and it is right next to the large tank which has its pumps running right now. I head nothing save for the slightest trickle of water over the overflow. Taking the nano down and plumbing it into the big tank will save a ton of noise in my room which will be awesome.
 
All of the rock came in and I will shoot some pics tomorrow night as I play around with potential scapes.

My BAO gear came in and WOW. Ben at Building an Obsession does beautiful work. His communication is top notch as well and he worked with me on the location of the ATO float sensor which was not typically included. I might be going to him shortly to replace my biocube with an acrylic frag tank that will be plumbed and potentially have a move robust frag rack system built in.

That said here are some pics:







I will use the sensors and tie it into my apex so I can kill my ATO or doser if I get low so as to not have anything run dry. The doser has its own warning built in but that is reliant on me entering the amount I fill in the containers. So these floats are backups to remind me to make more as needed.

I pick up my ATI fixture tomorrow night as it is being held at the UPS center till I have time to get there. They wouldn't drop it at the house as it requires 21+ signature (weird I know).

Items for this weekend:

Mount light fixtures in canopy
Get rock scape finalized and get it in tank
Water change to remove any residual cloudiness I kick up putting rock in
Mount doser and put the BAO containers where I want them
Paint electrical panel
Move apex to the large tank (I think my one aquabus cable is long enough to reach the EB8 in the biocube)
Cut vent hole and install fan unit in the stand.
 
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Tarheel Reefer said:
Been following your builds Soulpatch, I get all my best ideas from you:beer:
Click to expand...

Its like trickle down aquariums then. I get a lot of ideas from others on here like D2Mini. He is the reason I have at least the life reef skimmer and knew of Ben at BAO.

Though I do think my electrical panel will be fairly unique. I am really hoping I can install it but still have room for my apex gear in the cube stand. I might need to order in a longer aquabus cable to do it temporarily till I can take down the biocube completely and run it fully offline.
 
I added in my fans and hung the basket for the doser. Got my ati fixture in but need to get tip home depot after the blizzard to build some l brackets for the canopy.
0f6097db736c725bd8259c56b00f00d0.jpg
 
Amazon and they can either be turned on at certain temp or on all the time. Need to see how I want to set it up when fully running
 
soulpatch said:
Items for this weekend:

Mount light fixtures in canopy
Get rock scape finalized and get it in tank
Water change to remove any residual cloudiness I kick up putting rock in
Mount doser and put the BAO containers where I want them
Paint electrical panel
Move apex to the large tank (I think my one aquabus cable is long enough to reach the EB8 in the biocube)
Cut vent hole and install fan unit in the stand.
Click to expand...

So this was my list but with the blizzard it was not all done. I did not do the light fixtures in the canopy or move the apex. THat said I get everything else done between shoveling the 30+ inches of snow in front of my house.

Electrical panel is at least painted:


Here is the server rack I am using to tidy up electrical wires and look nice. Will have more on the panel to keep things organized:





Rock scape for now. Might change it up a bit more and I might add some more rock as well. Still undecided:



left side:


right side:


Sorry about cloudy water. I took these after I added the rock. The tank was then drained and is currently refilling with salt water from my change station so I can add ammonia tomorrow night and kick off the cycle.
 
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Lookin good. Are the rocks on the sides too close to the wall to clean the sides of the tank? Looks a bit tight.

I'm helping a guy here in NYC setting up his Red Sea Reefer, and he went with the two pillars, and I'll be honest, it's growing on me. And since everyone is using marinepure blocks these days, no harm from less rock.

Still, lookin good though. Don't be afraid to smash a few rocks to make large-size frag/coral mounts that you can move around the tank.
 
Yes a piece on the one rock is a bit close and I will rectify that later. I think the angle of the camera made it seem as if they are almost touching but that is not the case. THe piece of rock that is close is not in that pic.
 
So I have been thinking about the canopy light mounting. The Kessils are easy as I bought some articulating mounts for them. The ATI fixture is a bit more difficult since I want it in canopy (top center of the canopy is cut out so plenty of air exchange) but with the top as is mounting it will be a pain. I also need access to the bulbs for obvious reasons.

All that in mind I am thinking of spending this weekend to build a slide out for it. The hiccup I need to look over is the power cord. Since it comes out the top that impacts the ability for sliding or I need to lower it more to compensate.

That said I think I can use drawer sliders with 100lb weight limit to handle the light. I would glue and screw in some wood cross beams to mount the slider to. On the light side I would put a small piece of wood again with corner braces on it for the light fixture to rest in on the one side and a few L braces on the other so I can have access to the splash shield.

Thoughts or any issues you see with this?
 
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