131g Add-On
 

The new tank is a 131g that I had built by Red Coral Aquariums. Kevin even delivered it to my house, thanks Kevin! It was nice because that option wasn't available with my 150g tank which kinda sucked..

The dimensions are 60Lx18Wx28T. It houses two one inch drain pipes (herbie style) in an overflow box at the back right corner. Only one front pane is viewable so the other three (sides and back) are covered with black vinyl. Eurobraced and polished beveled edges on the front panel and eurobrace. I have to say, I'm quite happy with the tank. It even came with the foam pad underneath so I didn't have to supply my own and the price was quite reasonable in my opinion.

Here she is.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236160

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236184

The stand is just a typical wooden stand built out of 2x4s. Pretty much the same stand plans that everyone else uses I think.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236630

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236201

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236227

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236245

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236273

Here's what the Secondary and Water Change tanks look like.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236837

The plumbing connecting the Water Change tank to the Secondary Sump that you see there has actually changed. I had to drill a third 1" hole to support the flow and so it now looks like this actually.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271236925

Basically, water drains out of the 131g display into the Water Change sump. As that tank fills/overflows it flows into the Secondary sump. The emergency overflow is plumbed directly to the Secondary Sump. The Secondary Sump is connected to the Primary Sump with a 1 1/2" line.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271237034

Water is drawn through and out of the sumps via the return section of the Primary Sump which house two MagDrive pumps. Here's the line (3/4") going to the 131g.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271237128

One of the reasons for this whole exercise is to finally realize my dream of automatic water changes. Here's how it will go down.

1. Feed to the 131g tank is cut (via the controller).
2. Two float switches and one pump will reside in the water change tank. Water is pumped out of this tank until the lower float switch is activated. This pump is plumbed to a drain in the basement. (I cut a hole in the floor to support this).
3. Once the first (lower) float switch is activited that pump-out pump is shut down and the pump-in pump is triggered which pumps in newly mixed salt water from the basement reservoir. This salt water is pumped in until a second float switch at the top of the water change tank is triggered.
4. Once the water change tank is refilled the return pump to the 131g tank is turned back on which pushes the new water through the system.

Still missing a few parts to finish this bit up so stay tuned for a demo once it is all in place.

The light at the end of the tunnel.
 

For lighting I decided to go with an ATI fixture. I originally wanted a Sunpower but my LFS informed me that the supplier was out of those and it would be a few weeks before we could get one in. Instead, he offered a Powermodule at an unbelievable deal so I jumped on that.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238136

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238241

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238259

Here's my hanging rig. Nothing fancy, just a strip of wood run accross the ceiling so that I could anchor it to 3 beams in the ceiling, and punched a couple of holes in the strip to drop down the hanging wires.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238639
http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238591

Lights are:

KZ Coral Light New Gen (14K)
KZ Superblue (22K)
KZ Coral Light (10K)
KZ Fuji Purple
Hamilton Tech Actinic (460nm)
KZ Coral Light New Gen (14K)

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238296

131g Adventures in Aquascaping
 

When I knew that I was going to set up a FOWLR back in January the first thing I did was run out and buy some live rock so that I could start to cook and cure it. Here's my cooking and curing setup.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271238999

By the time I was ready to use the rocks (3 months later) they were nice and clean :-)

Other than the live rock, here's what else I needed to aquascape.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239143

If you've followed this thread from the beginning you may remember that I used acrylic rods and zip ties for my 150g aquascaping. Well, I pretty much did the exact same thing. I had a fairly dynamic structure that I wanted to build so I added the use of epoxy, lots of epoxy..

Here's the main base structure which supports mostly all of the weight. A very very heavy piece of travertine rock anchors the whole thing. A single 3/8" rod rods through the centre of all the rocks to hold them in place.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239351

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239528

Additional structures are similarly held in place by slightly smaller rods and zip ties.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239557

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239693

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239719

Then finally I added this arm structure to the base structure to get something like this.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271239754

Nothing is secured at this point because I actually have to assemble the whole thing inside the tank as the entire structure is way too heavy to lift. There are 3 sections that just hang loose on their joining rods. Once assembled in the tank the they will be secured and joints filled with epoxy..

Here I am assembling the structure in the tank. Photo courtesy of the wifey :biggrin:

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271240052

Here's what the final structure looks like. Epoxy is also used to cover up all the zip ties.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271240229

Fill'er up!
 

Time to fill the tank. It took quite a while to make up enough water but I did use water from the cooking and curing bins as they tested out to be quite good by the time the rocks were ready.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271240489

What better way to wait than to surf canreef on this..

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271240593

I have to say, canreef is great on the iPhone but it is damn sexy on the iPad. :biggrin:

There's more, but let's take a little break and see what Mr. Blue Starfish is up to these days.

Oh look, he seems to have taken up liverock climbing.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271240746

and after a climbing session he likes to crash and chill out on his zoa couch.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/...g?t=1271240796

Looks amazing kien, love the way everything is setup, can't wait to see it in action, looks very cool.

TJ

So hold the phone.... you got a power module for a fowler????

love the set up man, its going to look killer once everything is done

Kien... we need to talk.... You gotta stop setting up reef tanks so the rest of us can have a chance for TOTM. Seriously, Its getting out of hand...


Love the scape, gonna be a beauty for sure:mrgreen:

Why not just have the tanks separate? You have 2 return pumps anyway. Isn't the fowlr just going to increase your nutrients and make it harder to maintain you the levels in your mixed reef? I'm assuming it's mainly to ease you water changes b/c your tank is in the middle of your main floor but why not just implement your sump with water change section on both tanks? I guess you'd also need another skimmer but don't or didn't you already have one?

Don't get me wrong. Love the tank! And you're far better reefer than I'll ever be but just a few things that came to mind