Where can I find info on large scale coral farming?

Also im planning on making 3" concrete tables w/ radiant floor heating coils inside & placing the concrete tanks ontop.Heat would be supplied via a 1000btu home heating unit capable of easily heating the water to 120 deg. in a single pass.My feeling is that the radiant heated concrete will use way less gas than trying to heat the air with the concrete acting as a heat sink.Any input would greatly be appreciated.

Thanks,Jrod
 
Tigger I'd make a mockup of that configuration and try it, I am skeptical , you may well be ahead to have just two instead of more for working ease. Something else to keep in mind, an 18" deep tank is VERY heavy.

Pond liners are far cheaper then epoxy/fiberglass, the bigger the useage the cheaper it is. Else ponds would be lined with fiberglass. Thats also why ornamental home ponds are now almost all liners instead of the fiberglass they used to be.

If you are set on the fiberglass then do a search on some of the boat building sites and scope out the materials there. Thats probably the most cost effective you will find.

Re the concrete, that is a good heating method, my question would be how are you going to handle night drops in temp ? Are you covering the tanks at night? I think that is most certainly going to be needed. How are you going to get 10 of those into a 500 sq ft GH ? Not much room to walk around is there ? I think that you are going to need a lot more heating capability dec through march. Its doable, I only question if its cost effective.
 
stoney,yes i paid for the mould, but i didnt have to i just wanted to so if he makes any for anyone else i get a cut. they are 7'x3'x16" and have worked well for 2 years . jrod softies grow very well im my gh exspecially leathers. also that radient heat might work. i never had to heat mine due to how well it is insulated ,with all the equipment running that is enough heat as well as the water volume,but you are from way up north so heating will be an issue for you tigger240 I ran the costs of making my own and the boat builder was by far the cheapest way,these vats look like what dr mac has and i asure you thay arent flimzy and cost me less than a dollar a gal. plus they are white gel coat and provide maximum light reflection. there is no way you could do it cheaper than a pro that has the spray equipment stoney pm me if you cant find a decent fiberglass guy ,and i mean one that has the means and equipment to spray on the resin and fiber onto a mould
 
Redox, these are under $ 200 each ? Not bad. Not bad at all. I think the wood and liner would come out very close, with more work in the building. Depending on cost of the liner, I havent bought any heavy ones lately.

Do you have any set up with pics yet? Are you using any substrate ? Plumbing ? I'd like to hear more.

I totally agree, not having the spray and molding capability is a major negative for individuals, plus, even with the hiring it done I dont think an individual could buy the materials for less to do it yourself. Some years ago I helped a friend build a boat mold, and then helped on the first two, its nothing I want to repeat as far as the spraying goes. I'd rather take a beating from Tito Ortiz.
 
Hey Redox
I just did some googling, interesting,
1/2" marine ply in 10' lengths around $24 a sheet, 28 for 10',needs 3 sheets for a 2' or 4' deep vat, I'd go 2' or 30" sides. If 30" then it needs another side 2 by for bracing.

I've been looking at both 10' by 4' by 2' high vats, and 8' long ones,

several pond liner companys I looked at have 16 mil liners of 12' by 18' which is what is needed for a 10' vat/pond, at $ 69-84,

8' 2bys, clear at around $3.50 for the good stuff, need 6, so around $21, at least 5 lbs of 2" brass screws ~ $8,

this comes out around $ 185 ea. Local prices on the wood will vary up or down. The liner price was for a 10' vat so an 8' one would be less.

So, your vats are competitive for sure with wood and liners. Lacking your source though I think I'd probably go with the wood and pond liners.

Of course this doesnt include any racking/tabling material. I'd probably consider cinder blocks with some sheeting on top and the vat on that to bring it up to a good working height. One block will raise a 24" deep vat about waist high. A 30" one could sit on the floor. I'd go with the 4' width for economy of material and working ease.
 
redox, im sure your fiberglass vats are awesome, however i just wanted to warn others to make sure they know what there getting before they purchase, because of the trouble that another member went through that was all.
 
If any of you are in the central to north Florida area looking for fiberglass tanks, PM me; my fiberglass builder is someone you will want to talk to.
 
One thing to consider with wooden vats, especially in a GH, is to seal them on both sides. The greenhouse will be so humid that in ~2 yrs the wood will start to rot. I have been thinking alot lately about humidity and what its effects are in a GH and I would say that fact has almost certainly ruled out wooden vats. Even under normal circumstances if the price is similar I would think you will get a longer lifetime from fiberglass than from wood/liner.

LOL on the beating from Tito...
 
After looking at prices of wood I believe that I will be sticking with either fiberglass of polyethlene tanks. I can get a good deal and I think they will last a great deal longer. I was thinking about sinking an above ground pool in the ground outside of the greenhouse for extra water capacity, stability, and more room in the greenhouse. Pretty much a remote sump. The top of the pool can be heavily shaded and fanned for evap cooling. A deep, heavily shaded pool should provide a good source for cool water and keep the greenhouse water temps down. There will be alot of top off but I am hoping to have a well on my property to draw from.
 
Raaden you watch UFC too huh ? He is an awesome fighter.

Re: the wood for vats, marine is the only way to go, it will last a long time, I dont know how old Dick Perin's are but more then a dozen years old anyhow. That is basically his design in the Tony Calfo article on Bob Fenners site. Fiberglass tanks the size of Dicks' would be prohibitive in cost.

Stoney check out Ctenophore's builder, you're right in the neighborhood.
 
Something I should have thought of long ago for this thread,

for those of you in the Gulf Coast , Fla and Txs areas,

years ago, for my thesis project I did intensive culture of Tilapia in a recirculating system, I had 3 replications, all donated above ground swimming pools, 5000-6000 gal sizes. Filtration was sand filters in 55 gal barrels and one bio wheel per pool. This was BEFORE Organic Gardening/Rodale started advertising their version. I always thought they got the idea from my project. Anyhow, no reason why it wouldnt work in the south for corals.

Sorry didnt think of it sooner. You could grow the corals on tables or just not fill the pool as deep. But in the south a 4' depth may well be just what is needed. Put the frags in some kind of plastic basket. 5,000 gallons of water should grow a lot of corals. Fish too.

Stoneys mention of sinking a pool jogged the memory.

Anyone wants to use the idea you can pm me for where to send the royalties.
 
There is a place around here where you can buy used AG pools. I have a friend that bought 12 earlier this year for spawning his koi. I believe he paid $200-$300 ea and got a price break for buying 12. I never really thought of only filling them up half way.....You could walk in between rows of eggcrate. You could also adjust the water level depending on the conditions for more or less light. I think I would make layered shelves within the pool so the SPS/high light corals would be on top and zoos/softies could be underneath. You could make pull out shelves within the pool which would make harvesting easy. Even if you did something like Anthelia on the bottom, it would be like a bumper crop for whenever your running short on your main corals. Awesome idea, and definately a good price looking at $/gal. It just might be a little tricky to work in.
 
Just to toss out another idea... for a 1000 gallon system skimmer

The top an collection cup
A simple cone of clear plastic with a 3 to 4 inch hole at the top. The cone would have a clear plastic ring about 10 inches high placed over it about half way from the center that would be glued over the cone thus acting as the collection cup.
"sorry I dont have a drawing"
The water foam input area
Basicly copy a Bubble king central riser tube witha turbulance plate.

Output water
Again copya bubble king design and have the return water collect under the central riser.

Main tube for skimmer
32 Gallon Rubbermaid Brute garbage can.
The collection cup would simply sit on the ring on the inside of the garbage can. Just lift it off for maintanence.

It would be simple to make this a recirculating design with a 2 minute contact time and a flow through rate of 16 GPM. As far as the foam goes you could use one of the Sequance pumps with a pin wheel. Another option is to use a blower and about 20 limewood airstones, much cheaper to operate.

I am seriously thinking of this becouse of the cost of some of these big skimmers is prohibitive.

On the issue of big central skimmer on multi tank systems, has anyone dedicated the skimmer output to just one tank? I was thinking of doing this and haveing SPS in that tank while a mixed reef in all the other tanks. Would the water quality in that dedicated skimmer output tank be that much better?

Thanks
 
skimmer as only filter

skimmer as only filter

i run an rk2 on one vat and yes the water is clean .no other means of filtration other than that . I had that idea also about using a rubbermaid 40 gal trash can,just mount a collection throat to the lid. that is how i cycled the last shipment of live rock:)
 
I made fiberglass bodies for my skimmers to save money; they're better suited for GH applications since they're white (less heatgain) and more durable than even a brute trashcan. Here's a photo of one I made for a friend in town to test the Dart needlewheel:
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=942792

"Sputnik" performs on par with a Deltec AP1004, I know this because I have the Deltec and this skimmer right next to each other on the same system. Sputnik pulls out maybe a bit more than the Deltec. I haven't put the bubbleplate in yet; John has one in his. I wanted to compare efficiency between the two, so far there doesn't seem to be much difference. They both draw about 180 watts between the Dart and the Alita.

As for the single skimmer and multiple tanks; our main systems are (4) 16x4 tanks plumbed together. The 7' version of this fiberglass skimmer dumps into one. I don't think it makes a difference because it's fed from all 4 tanks' surface water equally. One tank might have a bit more of the "cleaner" water, but it's relative since the water is pretty clean to begin with.
 
Lots of good info lately y'all, thanks for all the links and stuff. :) I have been reading along but not posting because I am up to my eyeballs in figuring out the not-fun business stuff like break-even and cash-flow analysis and marketing and pricing and profit margins, gah! I know it's going to help me in the long run but it's so very tedious. I'm taking a "REAL Entrepreneurship" class through a local community college, the focus is to get you through ten weeks of once a week 3 hour sessions with a good start on all aspects of a business plan. If anyone else is in the business plan writing stage I highly recommend the class if it's offered in your area. And now back to number crunching...

-Sonja
 
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