The inwall 380 starfire reborn

[Sparkss]

Well, I picked up a 150g commercial fuge over the weekend and a tek light to keep over top of it (both used) and have a second 150g to use as a sump that I hope to be picking up next weekend (if it is ready for pickup by then). These two will make up the bulk of our filtration, coupled with the Spazz skimmer being gravity fed. I am still mapping out where the heck everything is going to sit in our "fish room", partly due to the height restrictions on the sumps and the floor space available for us to use. I am also considering sectioning the fuge to double as our prop tank, but right now just can't make my mind up about how it all would work out and if it is even feasible.

Other than that I have not gotten a whole lot done this weekend, due o having been under the weather and having little to no usable energy

so I will post some pictures from Marco Rocks of them boxing up our rocks for shipment . There was some sort of a snafu with the shipping company and the rocks still have not yet left their factility in Mass., even though Marc, from Marco Rocks went out of his way to personally deliver the pallet to the shipping company, versus waiting for them to stop by for a pickup. That was last Friday, late morning. *sigh*.

Here are the rocks being boxed up :

and here they are in the back of his truck, ready for transport to the shipping company (lotta good that did us )

Their estimated delivery time to the local shipping facility is next Monday, Jan 22 *uugghh*

 

[jnarowe]

wow! I would totally do business with Marc. He really does a nice job.

I am glad you and others are posting about the Vortechs as it seemed for a long time that I was the only one doing so or having problems with them. Eco_tech has told me more than once that I am the customer with the most failures so it hasn't been a good feeling on that regard.

I am dying tio see what your commercial fuge looks like. That is an area I really think I need to improve.

 

[strittmatter]

wow the rock look great. can't wait to see the pic of it in the tank.

So what's the secret to get Marco to return the e-mails? I have sent 2 e-mails asking about rocks.

 

[Sparkss]

Johnathan
You are definitely not alone with regards to issues with the Vortecs. And I am not one known to be quiet about things. I post just as much good as I do bad, or at least all experiences equally. Marco rocks so far having been in the good column

EDIT : The commercial fuge is nothing all that impressive, IMO. I am happy with it mainly because I got it for pennies on the dollar . I believe it is an Aquatic Eco brand fuge from a couple of years ago (not that I can find it on their web site now). It is very well built, and heavy as heck (even empty). It measures 72" X 24" X 20" and is basically a 3 section sump with accomodations for the center to be used as a fuge. I can take some pictures tomorrow, but it really needs to be cleaned up... alot. And the store that used it before we bought it had cut out one of the corss supports to make room for a skimmer they had in sump. I also need to patch up a couple of bulkhead holes and what not, but that is all easy stuff (it is acrylic). And yes, I got both from a store that was moving and setting up the new location different and all new, and basically just blowing out all of their old equipment .


strittmatter
I am not sure, I had no problems getting Marc to answer my Emails, but then again I think it is also all about timing. Most of last week he was tied up with some custom setups and of course this past weekend was a 3 day weekend with today being a federal holiday, so I am unsure how responsive he would be after 5 PM EST Friday and before 8 AM EST tomorrow. Are you sending Emails through his web site ? Maybe he is having hosting issues. I also called him and left a VM and later followed up to talk to him in person.

 

[raddogz]

Tom - how many sumps did you pick up from Mermaid anyway?

 

[Sparkss]

paid for 2, picked one up last weekend and plan to pick up the second as soon as they have it torn down, so this weekend or the next. One will be used as a full fledged refugium, w/ the tek light over it and the second will be a sump for overflow/capacity/etc (IE: so that the system will pass the "power failure test" and not flood the garage . I am torn about the prop setup. I originally wanted to incorporate it into the sump/fuge, but now am unsure how best to achieve that with the design ideas I have in mind. I may play around with the configuration quite a bit before I settle on the final setup. Worst case scenario I have several tanks that we can choose from to set up a separate prop tank, it just would cost a little bit more $$ to run then ($30 per month, give or take, by my calculations). But either way we have pretty much all of the hardware we will need for whatever configuration we settle on . So basically look for alot more FS threads from us once we get this design all worked out and running

EDIT: Those FS threads will also include our previous 60g custom sump/fuge (built by a company down in So Cal somewhere), our current 100g custom sump/fuge (see my sump build thread listed towards the begining of this thread) and a 110g acrylic tank that was originally slated to be the next custom sump/fuge . Along with at least 2 prop tanks FS (2'X2', 3'X3' and/or 2'X2.5', all 12" deep)

 

[GreshamH]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8993520#post8993520 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Sparkss


EDIT : The commercial fuge is nothing all that impressive, IMO. I am happy with it mainly because I got it for pennies on the dollar . I believe it is an Aquatic Eco brand fuge from a couple of years ago

You heard part of it right, Eco :lol: It's a custom EcoSystem fuge Tom. You do not want to know the price he paid for it

http://www.ecosystemaquarium.com/

 

[Sparkss]

yea Gresh, I know.. they are monster expensive... and I did not mean to make light of the quality, what I meant was that the design was nothing earth shattering or ground breaking, just a basic fuge design.. but the over all build quality is definitely top notch and impressive. I should have been more specific in my statements

 

[mrcrab]

Ha...Guess who got his rail sytem today?

Thanks for the link.

 

[Sparkss]

sweet... will there be an update soon (with pictures) to your tank thread ? . Once you udate it you should post the links here, I don't need you to, since I am already subscribed to your thread . But others following along here might want a link to other implementations using those rails.

 

[mrcrab]

Yeah I know I've been slack. I've really got a fair bit done. Lights are the last then I can start moving the corals.

Couple of things I'm waiting on upgrades is a CA reactor that I bought from a fellow RCer end of November and she's having problems getting her new one. Arrived broke and is awaiting replacement and Greg at Reefgeek is waiting on a shipment of BubbleMaster 250's that should be arriving any day.

Believe me I want to get this thing done just so I can sell off the old equipmet and start recouping some funds! Plus I'm getting tired of looking after 2 tanks.

 

[Sparkss]

I hear you on both counts... it all feels like we are hemorrhaging money . Just as soon as we can shut down the old tank (and stop paying to maintain it) and to finally start selling off alot of that equipment, the happier we will be

 

[Sparkss]

WooHoo !!!! Our rock arrived at the shipping terminal late last night, I am leaving out for SacTown here shortly to go pick it all up, so it looks like we will have some rock to play with over the weekend .

I also went ahead and started working on the trim last night. I have it cut and ready to install, just waiting to determine the tank water height for the door bottom. I have a rough idea, and need to translate that into cut wood this afternoon so that I can install the trim and see how it looks. My initial take on it is the trim I picked out is too thin, but I won't really know until I clean the wall up and repaint everything.

Once we get the rock the only things we will be waiting on are the new skimmer and the second sump. We are also awaiting some of the skimmer specs so that we can build the sump racks. Since we don't have the outlet pipe height information yet, I don't know the exact dimensions that we can use for the racks to hold the sumps (don't want to make them too tall). Since we are stacking the twp 150g sumps, the output pipe height will play a huge role in the shelving/rack design. It is going to be close, but I think it will work out .

Hopefully look for some pictures later this evening

 

[joshuasamuels]

I can't wait to that awesome rock in your new tank...

 

[Sparkss]

You and me both... . Just got back a short bit ago, but need to get back to working my day job (gotta pay for all of this somehow ).

We had pictures (of the rocks), and they even included rulers and objects (for perspective) for comparison against for size, but unpacking that crate was a whole different expereince . Some of those pieces are unbelievably huge. I Am trying to track down our little electric pressure washer to rinse them off as best I can. I am afraid to use our full sized washer, especially since I am unsure where I put the low pressure nozzle, and I don't want to be blasting these awesome shapes into rubble

Oh, and I got the tracking # for our replacement Vortec... it looks like it won't get here until next Tuesday.

Well, updates w/ pitcures later on this evening, if everything goes as planned (or at least close to as planned ).

 

[Sparkss]

Ok, I couldn't resist so I took a short break and washed down a handful (figuratively speaking) of the rocks and took a picture. Yes, th0se are the 160g Reef Crystals buckets, for comparison. These represent a bit over half of the larger pieces. There are also about a half dozen medium to smaller pieces that I will get to later . If I can, I am going to try to get these into the tank (so that I can make room for the rest of the rock in the space behind the tank).

I am just stoked that the tank is finally going to start looking like a reef tank

 

[mrcrab]

My God man...those aren't rocks they're boulders!

 

[Sparkss]

yea, and the pictures do not do them justice for how pourous and "laced" that they are. And alot of the neat shapes comes out as a flat surface in the pictures too. I already put 3 of them into the tank.. *sigh*... I think I may have too much rock, at least for the open aquascape plan that we had planned . One that I ws going to use as the base for a cave/"table" reaches to within a couple of inches from the water line.. so there is no room for anything to go on top of it.. hehehe.. This is going to be FUN !!!!!!

 

[jnarowe]

I wish I had some that large!

 

[Sparkss]

ok, here are some pictures of the last of the big ones :

and here are the "smaller" ones that were thrown in, at a lesser price point, to round out the weight for us (they are pretty sweet also ) :

When I put them in the tank they started bubbling like crazy.. I'll bet they weight a ton now that they are wet and carrying water