Walkthrough of my 180g Setup

[skeets]

The project has definitely not gone wayside!
My cabinets are partly installed, and will get finished up the next few days. Lots of customization, and care is needed to make the cabinetry perfect.

I will have a large update comming up in the next few weeks. I have been very busy with a couple classes and havent had the time lately to write up a good quality update with pics. But It will come I gurantee.
My tank hasnt suffered from my business, just this thread =).
The tank is looking real good.

I think this is the 4th or 5th time ive said... a couple more weeks. Lol, itll come tho I promise.
It encourages to see people care to see them =)
thanks

 

[Zan]

skeets, the medusa controller you use. do you find that your chiller is on more often than not w/ such a small threshold of temp change? 0.5 vs 2.0 degrees? i have the same chiller and am considering a medusa, but figured that it would probably be on a lot more.

 

[skeets]

skeets, the medusa controller you use. do you find that your chiller is on more often than not w/ such a small threshold of temp change? 0.5 vs 2.0 degrees? i have the same chiller and am considering a medusa, but figured that it would probably be on a lot more.

My chiller is ussually on for 20 minutes and off for 20 minutes with the .5degree change.
If you only buy the 2digit medusa controller, you will only be able at minimum to do a 1 degree change. I bought the 3digit controller so I could do a .5 degree change, but the minimum could be .1.
If you want to get a medusa, you can set it to whatever you like. .7 degrees, 1degree, 5 degrees, etc. So the medusa could cause the chiller to kick on more often or less often. Regardless of what temp swing though, the chiller should be on about the same ammount. There will be a slight variation due to the math of bringing temp swings down, but it should be negligable.
Does that make sense?

 

[skeets]

Originally PMed by tri916
Man I wanted to say your tank is Awsome man, hats off to for every element of design.
I'm in the process of doing a 180 gal tank also. I had a question in regards to the overflow in the back if tank. The corners of the overflows are 8" high correct. and the middle section is 3" high. Can you elaborate why you went with this as opposed to having the whole thing being the exactly the same? If you dont mind can you take some more pics of the tank and its overlows in action. I would appreciate alot. I got alot of good plans from this thread and alot of ideas from you thanks.

Tri Nguyen

I wanted to respond to this PM on the thread for others to view.

There are a couple reasons why the middle channel is not as tall as my corner overflows.
1. I didnt want to loose all the space of a larger overflow across the whole back of the tank. It would have hindered my rock scaping. It also would have pushed my dynamic flow outlets way down into the tank, which would have been unnacceptable. I would literally have lost about 10-11'' of height on my tank, because everything would have been needed to be placed below the outlets.
2. The middle channel of the overflow is slightly slanted form the middle to help the water flow into the outlets. I dont think this overflow design would work as well if it was one height. It either would have been a lot noisier with water falling 8'' or the water in the overflow would have to be much higher.

I cannot take pictures of this anymore, as my cabinets are installed and they hide the overflow on the sides. Sorry bud.

 

[skeets]

PICTURE UPDATE
I have taken about half the pictures I need to take for an update. Everything is installed and finished on the cabinetry except for some crown molding on the top. The week after christmas I will spend a day and get the pictures finished up, and an update ready.
If anyone is still waiting for an update, thanks for being patient.

 

[Zan]

skeets, yes that does make sense. One more question for you. What did you end up doing w/ your chiller in terms of location? I know you had it inside, but did you or are you going to move it elsewhere? i am going to be moving my chiller outside, but wasn't sure if the temp probe would reach.

 

[skeets]

skeets, yes that does make sense. One more question for you. What did you end up doing w/ your chiller in terms of location? I know you had it inside, but did you or are you going to move it elsewhere? i am going to be moving my chiller outside, but wasn't sure if the temp probe would reach.

The chiller is built into my cabinet. I will show pics of it when I am do the update.
The chiller temp probe should be inside the chiller itself.
For the medusa, I wouldnt keep that outside... and the temp probe isnt all that long for it, like 5 or 6' maybe?

 

[zenguitar]

Your method of documention is excellent. I just saw this thread for the first time and a few of the things you did are similiar to what I intend to do on my next tank so I'm glad it's working for you. I'll have to comment on that later, don't have much time at the moment.

I'm looking forward to your next update after Christmas and by the way have a Merry Christmas

 

[skeets]

UPDATED THREAD HERE

I really wanted everything together since I have made some changes over the few months my tank has been running. Click the above link to see the new thread of everything, including a huge picture update!

 

[cbl]

awesome job!!!!!!!! I'm sure all of the time and hard work will pay off. I appreciate all of the info and details you provided and passed along to us. I think its great stuff!!!! I'm currently starting to plan out a 96 x 36 x 36 glass tank in my office. planning on viewing it from all 4 sides. was thinking about a center island overflow. all plumbing needs to come from bottom of tank. the equipment room will be downstairs approx 6 feet over and 8 feet down thru cement floor. with your above exp. do you have any ideas on best way to plan/develop circulation in a tank that will be viewed from all four sides? ie. try some closed loop cirs and bring all plumbing thru island or bring some thru bottom of tank ect?????(pretty detailed question) thanks again and look forward to hearing your advice!

 

[cbl]

awesome job!!!!!!!! I'm sure all of the time and hard work will pay off. I appreciate all of the info and details you provided and passed along to us. I think its great stuff!!!! I'm currently starting to plan out a 96 x 36 x 36 glass tank in my office. planning on viewing it from all 4 sides. was thinking about a center island overflow. all plumbing needs to come from bottom of tank. the equipment room will be downstairs approx 6 feet over and 8 feet down thru cement floor. with your above exp. do you have any ideas on best way to plan/develop circulation in a tank that will be viewed from all four sides? ie. try some closed loop cirs and bring all plumbing thru island or bring some thru bottom of tank ect?????(pretty detailed question) thanks again and look forward to hearing your advice!

 

[cbl]

sorry about the double post!