The inwall 380 starfire reborn

[Sparkss]

OK, it has been a while. Long story short I threw my back out a couple of weekends ago and spent half the week laid up in bed (which really sucked). Then I spent the second half of the week putting in 14 hour days trying to play catchup at work (taht sucked even worse... especially since my back was still far from 100% and I wasn't sleeping through the night yet from the pain).

Then I started working 60 hour weeks and through the weekends.. which didn't leave much time for the tank work and even less for RC. but I worked on the tank an hour or so each night, between my day job and sleep.

I am starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel, both from work and the tank setup. The sumps are setup and filling slowly but surely with RO/DI water. 95% of the plumbing is done, the rest I just need to put together. The wall for the fishroom segregation is up and painted. Once I get a little closer (and have had a chance to clean up the construction debris some) I will take some fresh pictures.


Now for a couple of questions :

We will be installing one of Spazz's Volcano skimmers (5' tall beast). The tank will be 100% skimmed (IE: 100% of the tank drain will run through the skimmer before being deposited into the sump). From what I have heard they do a pretty good job of keeping the nitrates down. So my question is do I bother with a remote DSB in the refugium ? or just an SSB for pods, etc (and also for rocks for the macros to get a footing on). I was thinking that would leave more room for the macros to "tumble"

second question is regarding the racks I made for the sumps. They are 24" X 20" X 72" commercial acrylic sumps (from an LFS that was moving and sold off all of their old equipment). I used 3/4" plywood under it (the one on the rack) with 1/2" foam between the tank and plywood. Should I have used thicker foam ? While the sump will hold 150g filled to the brim, as a sump/refugium it will likely never hold more than 100g (give or take). Should I have used thicker foam ? As it is now it does not appear to really be compressing the foam that much, in general. Also, with the front and back supports being 25" apart, should I have used thicker than 3/4" plywood for the base/top of the stand ? (I seemed to recall that Sanjay's stand was a couple of I-beams with plywood for a top. I need to look up the size plywood and distance between the supports on his).


Everything seems solid now, and the top sump is 90%+ filled (to it's est total of 100g). So I guess I will find out tomorrow morning when it will be 100% full and already draining into the bottom tank. But I would like to get some feedback before I add the salt and eventually start tank water flowing through it.

Thanks for all responses.

P.S. The tank went through a mild diatom cycle and is not starting a mild cyano outbreak (that I am stressed could turn into a large cyano outbreak if we are not careful). Our old skimmer (Deltec 902) should be hooked up by the middle of the week, so hopefullly that will help with the cyano (to remove whatever excess is breaking down in the water before it can break down). The little Remora skimmer is holding it's own on the tank, pulling out full cups daily (little bitty cups, of course ), but the tank really needs a full sized skimmer. Hopefully we will have the Volcano by the end of the month (I think that is what he is calling them now).

 

[jnarowe]

So my question is do I bother with a remote DSB in the refugium ?

A RDSB in a refugium is a bit of a pain to maintain. I have one and it would be much easier to have these two functions separated. Pods, IMO, don't really need sand anyway. With a Volcano, it may be more problems that it is worth.

Should I have used thicker foam ?

No. That is fine the way you have it.

 

[Sparkss]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9397519#post9397519 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by jnarowe
With a Volcano, it may be more problems that it is worth.

How so ?

 

[jnarowe]

Tom, that may not have come out the way I meant it. What I meant was, if you have heavy skimming such as with a Volcano, the sand bed may just be extra work with not much added value.

Remote sand beds or sand filters are easy to add if the system is set up with expansion in mind, but may not be needed with that type of skimmer. Since I DIY's my skimmer, I put in the RDSB to give me some extra filtration.

 

[Sparkss]

That was sort of what I was thinking also Jonathan. I actually already have a ton os sand ready to use for an RDSB, but the more I think about it the less I want to put more than an inch or so of mature sand into the 'fuge.

The top sump is full and already an inch or so of RO/DI in the bottom sump. I will try to add some salt mix this afternoon and a mixing pump to circulate teh water between the two tanks. But I doubt I will have enough water until tomorrow evening to be able to actually turn on the return pump/skimmer/calc reactor. I should be able to get some pictuers this evening though, after work.

I am not 100% sure how much I will get to on the tank today, since I had to take one of our dogs to an emergency appt at the vet for surgery this morning to have a 3" moderately deep laceration on her left front shoulder cleaned up and sutured shut. We may need to keep an eye on her once we bring her home this afternoon, due to the after affects of the anisthetic (sp?), so spending the evening in the garage finishing up the tank plumbing loose ends may not be an option. Those vets make a good living... the wife doesn't question the cost of our any more after seeing the vet bill this morning. .

 

[jnarowe]

If I had a Volcano, my fuge would be BB.

 

[Sparkss]

I was thinkking BB, and I may start out that way and add sand later if I change my mind. the only reason for sand at all is a place for the micro-fauna to reproduce, but like you said, they can do so quite well in the macro, or rubble piles (which I will probably have at one end or in the bottom sump).

 

[jnarowe]

My snail propagation/grow-out tank is BB:

Low bio-load though!

 

[clekchau]

jonathon, how much work is a rdsb? my tank will be a moderately to heavily stocked fish tank with some softies and i also have a "volcano" along with planning a large rdsb

does yours have a significant affect on nitrates?

 

[dew2loud1]

pretty sweet

 

[Sparkss]

clekchau
I think Jonathan is just saying that both are good methods of controlling nitrates, but that the skimmer will "outstrip" the RDSB, literally, since the skimmer works to take out the organics before they can become nitrates and the RDSB converts them to nitrogen after they become nitrates. At least that is how I understand it all, but then again, I could be mistaken . Also the "work" is keeping it stable and operational, which should be easier with an RDSB versus an in tank one, but I have read about needing to replace a portion of the sand on a yearly schedule, and other such maintenance. But for everyone that advocates that there are jsut as many that say nothing is needed at all to be done to it. What are the specs on your tank ? Sounds like it is still in the planning stages ? got a thread started yet ? Share !!!!

dew2loud1
Thanks . Will be even sweeter (to me) once I get these sumps and filtration online .

 

[clekchau]

i already had a 150 gallon rubbermaid stock tank planned to be plumbed from my custom skimmer built by spazz, i have used a rdsb in a 200 gallon fowlr and it lowered nitrates from 40 ppm to 5 ppm in 3 weeks. the tank is a little bigger than yours but will also contain alot more fish hence why it was planned on the new system. no build thread it is more of a work in progress but coming together pretty fast lately .

 

[Sparkss]

how big was your RDSB ? IE: how much surface area and how deep ?

As for it coming together pretty fast... I hate you already ..


j/k.. I get ugly when I get jealous

 

[orientalexpress]

pictures,more pictures Tom

 

[Sparkss]

Hehehe.. ok, I am going to see if I can slip out there for some updated shots... you guys are not going to recognize the area behind the tank... seriously

 

[jnarowe]

clekchau: Essentially what Tom writes above is how I feel. I definitely believe that there is a capacity to the sand that can be reached. The work involved is dealing with swapping out sand as needed. I recommend 1/3 every six months or so. That is not based on anything scientific, just how I do it.

As far as affect on nitrates, I don't know because nitrates have never been above zero in my tank. I think your example is a much better barometer in this case. When building my system, I had done a lot of research and liked the idea of sand filtration, but not having a DSB display. You can put 400 to 500 lbs. of sand in a 150g Rubbermaid and have a nice RDSB.

 

[Sparkss]

Here is a shot behind the tank. I have a fiberglass sink that will go against the far wall, where the RO unit is leaning now (I have an RO/DI unit that will hang on that wall over the sink). You can see the shlwving supports on the wall behind the sumps. That whole wall will be shelving.

Here is more of a close up on the sumps

The skimmer is sitting down to the left, between the tank and the far wall. I have an 8 light Tek T-5 light that will sit over the top sump. It has 2 cords/switches. One set of lights will be for a prop section that will run along the front of the sump, approx 6" wide. the second set of lights will be for the macro algae sections. I am going to try to grow some different types, possibly sectioning off the sump with egg crate setup veritcally. Doing it this way the electrical expense of keeping a prop tank will be minimized as we will run the fuge and prop in a reverse lighting cycle with the tank, so the macro's will benefit from the prop tank lights, and vice versa, and they will end up being less than the 250W MH was that we had over our old prop tank. Plus with approx 2k - 3k worth of flow through the sump, at most a small power head or two should be all we need for the propagation section (hopefully), otherwise utilizing the return pump/drain for the flow within that section.

The skimmer will also be gravity fed, thereby further reducing our electrical expense. And the calcium reactor will be fed off of the smae return pump.

Once I get futher along I will clean up everything, put the sink in, run the drain and water lines for it, get the skimmer hooked up and get everything running (and take some updated pictures). Right now it is more than a bit messy.. like an active construction site.. (mainly becuase it is ).

One other this in the that new wall that I put up (behind the sumps) is still open on the back side. I have some rolled insulation that was left over from an older home project. I plan to fill the wall with that before I hang the backside sheetrock. That will hopefully happen this weekend. I am trying to insulate and contain that corner of the garage, so that I can try to stabilize the water temp, and cost to heat/cool as well as a venting system to try to keep the humidity lower in the rest of the garage.

Stay tuned for updates

P.S. Tank shots once the skimmer has had a chance to run and clean the tank out a bit

 

[jnarowe]

Really looking good Tom. It's so much fun to see this stuff coming together! What is that racking over the tank? It looks like a garage storage rack. I am running out of room in my tank room and trying to figure out how to get more storage space...

And to your many fans , Tom is done with the suction cups so anyone setting up a tank can contact me to make arrangements to borrow them. These suction cup handles have been all around the country to various reefers setting up tanks and I would like to keep them in circulation as needed.

 

[Sparkss]

Yea, those are garage racks.. they were there before the tank went in.. and I just left them up. They are over about 40% of the back of the tank. If they become a problem (rust, etc) I can easily tank them down, even with the tank there, but they appear to be coated well enough that I have not seen any signs of a problem yet (but it has only been a couple of months... ask me again in a year ).

And as for the suction cups, yea, they worked great.. and are ready to head to their next tank move/setup

 

[jnarowe]

Very cool. I wish I had more storage in my tank room, and I am currently considering my next annexation!