45g custom cube journal (latest pics: Jun 4)
 

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...-07/new45g.jpg

24x24x18H. Sump will stick out the back of the stand about 6" giving a total water volume of about 70 gallons when the sump's skimmer section is full.

I'm still waiting on the stand and I've gotta find some 1.5" bulkheads and some 1" spaflex but I'm still real excited about my 45g tank.

It has an overflow box, herbie overflow, dual 1" returns. I'm probably going to only have about 150gph through the sump to prevent microbubbles. I will get a gate valve from my mom's work for the herbie to make tuning it easy. I'm debating whether to upgrade my 150w coralife fixture to a 6 bulb teklight retrofit or a single 250W MH. I'm leaning towards the teklight because of heat issues in the summer and the full control of colour. Plus it'll prevent the shadow areas that are prevailent when using only a single MH bulb.

Nice, man. Looking forward to seeing it up.

Nice!

Where did you get your tank?

.

Really nice...make sure you document everything, cause we wanna see it.

Mmmmm nice. Gads I wish I had perservered in my request for an external overflow. Good call on your part .. Should be an awesome build, can't wait to see it going.

Unless your sump bubbles are caused by a skimmer...you won't have any bubbles in your sump because the Herbie overflow won't allow it.

My current skimmer (remora HOB) outputs lots of microbubbles so I want to try to eliminate as many as possible in the first place. that's why I was thinking of a slower flow rate. But i will be using filter socks as well which are supposed to help with microbubbles. I'm kinda iffy about the extra work of changing filter socks but if they'll keep the water clear and help with microbubbles than I'll probably like them.

if I can have like 500 gph going through the sump without microbubbles then the better. it'd help make sure the tank water's kept warm from the sump heaters and oxygenated by the skimmer.

stand's on order finally. the tank will be off the floor in a week.

oh yeah tank's starfire glass

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquarium/reactor.JPG

got my new zeo reactor :)

my DIY reactor was starting to fall apart and it was turning into a pain to pump.

stand should be ready any day too

Look forward to the build Sean. Same size as mine, except mines 18 front to back & 24 high instead. Wish I had gone with the external also. Good job on yours.

Sean, could you post more pictures of your sump. I really need to get a new one built and am looking or ideas.

here are some pictures of my sump:
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/sump/fullsump.jpg
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/sump/skimmercontrol.jpg
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/sump/sumpsocks.jpg

I'm going to try a sqwd for my return and see how that goes. It will use filter (3rd picture. sumps not in the picture yet).

Albert designed the "adjustable water level" chamber for the skimmer. I don't know how often it will have to be tuned. If it's often I'll just run it at maximum level (fully closed). (2nd picture).

The sump will stick out the back of the stand by 6". I wanted as much water volume in it as possible because 45g of tank water isn't much room for chemistry. The sump will hold 30g if kept completely full to the top of the middle divider.

I'm going to try running the sump with my mag 7. The filter socks are supposed to help with microbubbles. I don't know the maximum water flow through the 1.5" overflow pipe. I'd like to run a higher flow pump for the sqwd.

I picked up the majority of my lights today. 250W galexy ballast and a lumenmax 3 reflector. No bulb yet. I'm thinking of running it with a geisseman 13k bulb. I actually like that "shallow water" look. I'm thinking of painting the back white and running a very shallow sand bed *gasp sand!* lol.

I've grown into really liking the look of white glass from working at the store. It makes it much easier to clean because you see everything right away and it'll help keep the temperature down (vs black glass getting hot under the lights).

I think my current 150W aquaconnect is a little too blue for my tastes. I had a 150W geisseman before and man was it bright!

If I need to I can add t5 actinics down the road but I'd have plenty of par from a 250W 10k even if it's an electronic ballast.

so yeah, 250W halide for an 18" tall tank woot! :mrgreen:

I have the stand finally. Now I just need some 3/4" plywood (for under the tank and sump) and the plumbing then it's a tank! I'm starting to lean towards and xm 10k bulb because of the PAR. If I want more colour I can add actinic T5's down the road. I'm going for growth initially.

oh yah and I gotta paint the back and bottom. so many things to do before it's done.

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquarium/onstand.jpg
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquarium/light.jpg

i like your dimensions,,,and starfire glass too, nice tank sean

so my temporary 33g tank has had some pretty serious neglect because I didn't plan on the new system taking this long to get together and I didn't plan on school getting so busy.

I wasn't running the DIY zeovit reactor and I wasn't dosing calcium, only doing 5% water changes weekly. I decided to put the new 1.5L reactor directly in the 33g tank and when I rearranged the rock to do so TONS of sediment was stirred up. The 20 fairy crabs have been doing an awesome job keeping hair algae off the rock but man I've never seen that much sediment in such a small tank.

My calcium fell all the way down to 340ppm. Also I was only running a koralia 1 and a single MJ1200 for the tank (again because I thought it was only going to be like 2 weeks). I hooked up the other 3 maxijets along with the wavemaker. Dosed 250 mL of randy's 2 part. Got out a new calendar and marked my zeovit schedule for the next month.

Word from experience now: don't put a tank on the floor in a corner you don't frequent often. I ended up neglecting it because it wasn't really a part of my daily ritual any more.

painted the tank today. and I'm posting a picture of the "temp" tank. i took the light off the temp tank for the picture. plumbing parts are on the way. speares gate valve for the herbie and the skimmer level control along with speares unions and speares everything else. my mom works at a plumbing wholesaler :biggrin:

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquarium/paintedback.jpg
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquarium/temptank.jpg

Looks really good love your dimensions and overflow first class all the way but I have to ask it might just be me but are you sure you got Starphire glass it just does not look like that in the pictures. Starphire glass has a real blue tint to it as opposed to the green tint. I don't mean to cause anything or offend you it might be your pictures. I just want to make sure you got what you paid for. Either way it looks great.

I'm not sure if it's starfire myself. I got much more than what I paid for so don't worry ;).

looking at the tank with my own eyes it has a slight green tinge to it. It's 6mm glass though so it doesn't really NEED to be starfire at that thickness. There's good quality non-starfire glass out there anyways. My 120g frequently had people asking "wow is that starfire!?" then I surprised them when i told them it wasn't.

and yeah I like the overflow too. problem I've found is just trying to FIND krylon fusion so I can paint inside the overflow box so that it's hidden from sight.

I got the light hung on a stud. I'm using a pair of sunlight supply light hangers that let you adjust the light quite easily. I like them actually. And the sunlight supply lumenmax 3 gives REAL nice light distribution. it's absolutely perfect for the 2'x2' area and you still get some real nice glitter lines. Very stunning reflector; it's a satisfying product.

It's an xm 10k bulb. I just filled it part way as a leak test. I get the plumbing tomorrow or saturday (including the speares gate valves woot!)

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquarium/lighthung.jpg
that overflow is going to be a ***** to clean I just know it. I'm not looking forward to it

wow looks beautiful, is that a maxi??? dont use a maxi use a kor, better water flow. and nicer looking.

That white background looks really good.

i know :)

it was just to get some glitter lines for the picture. I'm leaning towards a vortech actually. Or a tunze turbelle with a controller. I'm seriously contemplating some sort of a wavemaker that's scalable as the SPS grow in volume.

What makes you think the overflow will be so hard to clean?

getting my hands in there with a razor blade and having to get around any piping that might be in there. coraline's going to develop in there eventually and ruin the "white" background.

Sean, the white background looks awesome!!!!! I wish I had done that to my tank (I just use a background but I dont think anyone makes white ones... hmm thinking outload I bet I could get a piece of white vinyl from fabricland.. :)


I was alos thinking.. if you want to make a few bucks on the side buy a few extra gate valves and sell them out of your car for cash when guys come in to pick up herbie style tanks :) (PS... you now have to split the profit with me :p)

WIPAL doesn't stock gatevalves I found out today unfortunately. It's using a standard ball valve now.

I'm almost done all the plumbing. Return's all done. I need a few 45 degree pieces for the dual overflow that I'll pick up after work tomorrow. I accidentally glued the 1.5" 45's into sweep instead of zig zags like I needed. doh...

She's all going to be operational within 48 hours (pending there aren't any leaks).

what do people think about a vortech for water flow? overkill? I want something that'll do wave making and that I won't have to upgrade as the tank fills with sps. I'm thinking the vortech is the best choice for size and features.

As long as you have the dough...I haven't heard of too many people unhappy with Vortechs.

the tank is running!
 

IT'S UP AND RUNNING NOW! WOOT!

so the tank's set up now and I've been playing with my new toy. I broke down and picked up a vortech wireless wavemaker. Quite pleased with it.

I decided on it because of the cost of similar wavemakers. A tunze multicontroller is $300 just for the controller PLUS the stream or nano pumps. A couple korallia 4's would run me a $150ish and they don't support any randomization of flow. Seio's wavemaker is $150 on it's own plus $70-80 for each pump. This unit has the wavemaker included for $400 and it does 3000gph. The added bonus is it takes up VERY little space in the already small tank. Right now I'm running it on reef crest random at about 3/4 because my fiance complains about the sound of the manual pulse mode.

I prefer the manual pulse mode so far because I can fine tune it and really get things stirred up. Unfortunately the tank only has 6mm sides which is just fine for standing water but I don't think it can withstand 1" waves on a longterm basis. I have a video of me playing around with the unit getting waves circling around the cube tank but unfortunately my wireless ISP's being a pain. They're not letting me upload the video to youtube. I'll try again later.

I'm still deciding on the final layout of the rockwork. I want it viewable from 3 sides. So far the left and right side look good but the front doesn't.

Oh and the filtersocks are already removing TONS of garbage. I'm using 200 micron socks atm because my rock's pretty dirty.

But yah the system's running and here are the specs ATM:

45g 24x24x18H custom tank. external herbie overflow eurobraced. dual 1" returns
custom sump. ~18g equipment section ~18g top off resevoir. dual 200 micron filter socks.
vortech wireless wave driver
1.5L zeovit reactor
maxijet 7 return pump
aqua c remora skimmer
JBJ auto top off
500VA UPS
aprox 40 lbs liverock

spent the day today cleaning through all the gear I've collected over the time. As the organization process went on I ended up scattering all my stuff across a 15'x15' area because I had so much. I didn't know THAT much stuff fit in 3 boxes and 2 rubbermaid bins. I ended up reducing it down to about half because most of it was garbage anyways from various DIY projects that didn't work or stuff I just pack-ratted.

I'm now using a second rather large rubbermaid drawer thingie to sort my stuff. I had one big open box that I would rummage through every week looking for various things and now the stuff's sorted in drawers so there'll be no more rummaging :)

as for an update on the tank I'm using my little JBJ wavemaker on a couple maxijets in the sump. I'm really liking these 200 micron filter socks and it's amazing all the stuff they're pulling out. I'm keeping all the sediment stirred up in the sump and display tank and the theory is in a day or two the tank will be crystal clear with no more crap on the rocks.

I've spent the day today blowing off the rock with a turkey baster every hour. It's getting noticeably better and the water's still getting clearer. After experimenting with the vortech more throughout the day I have come to actually prefer the reefcrest random mode. It's not as "cool" looking as the pulsing I was getting but it's doing the best job of making sure stuff doesn't settle on the bottom.

wow I really like your set up, simple and very clean! it reminds me of the first days i set up my cube :) Just gotta keep the algae off the glass and your set! Good luck in the future for the tank. Also I want to thank you for being helpful, I got the RS100 instead, and it was the last one from golds too. Lucky me!

thanks :). Yeah I've found when the detritus is kept under control lots of problems are solved. I kept all 4 sides open too so that I can get all the way around with a magnet cleaner, even the back. Tomorrow I'm going to see how it goes siphoning detritus from the bottom into a filter sock. I think it'll work well and will allow me to do it without changing any water. Just don't know how to hang the sock on the bucket :)

Yeah I probably won't have cash on hand to buy an RS80 before they're gone unfortunately.

pictures:
full shot:
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...g/fullshot.jpg

front:
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...ning/front.jpg

left:
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...nning/left.jpg

right:
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...ning/right.jpg

and the rats' nest of cables :D
http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...g/ratsnest.jpg

[quote=kwirky;316360]thanks :). Yeah I've found when the detritus is kept under control lots of problems are solved. I kept all 4 sides open too so that I can get all the way around with a magnet cleaner, even the back. Tomorrow I'm going to see how it goes siphoning detritus from the bottom into a filter sock. I think it'll work well and will allow me to do it without changing any water. Just don't know how to hang the sock on the bucket :)


Yup thats one heck of a cube, thats exactly what I did to mine, i keep all four sides for the magnet to go at and once a week get into the corners, that way its rare to have tougher algae growing, however I do have a bit of trouble cleaning the bottom on my tank, I think i need a razor blade for that one :p. But wow that is bright, plus white styrofoam and white background. I like the background, white background is quite original, most often people go black or just let algae cover their back glass. If I could turn back time I would spray my back white as well haha.


Stanley,

added a fish today. I decided to go with my first saltwater fish ever, the royal grama. I named him Andy after my previous royal gramma too :)

I added 6 blue/green chromis. No more fish for another month now :)

I had to turn the vortech down to about 70% because at 100% the fish were staying only in a small corner of the tank lol.

the gramma still hasn't come out yet but he poked his head out briefly about 45 min after adding the chromis. hopefully the new fish will act as dither and the gramma will be a little more comfortable in the tank.

I've got some more live stock since the last post. a lawnmower blenny, a new wrasse which I forget the name but looks quite good and RED BUGS.

i've got a thread started separate on it so this is possibly a x-post. I think things'll be under control in a few weeks.
(http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=42268)

I started the 2nd red bug treatment today. I'm 2 or so days behind schedule but it shouldn't be a big deal. I added a rainbow wrasse recently too and it's activity has brought out the lawnmower blenny which used to be quite skiddish.

I also took a few pics of the tank:

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...4/acropora.jpg
I got this from greg. It's turned blue the body over (had blue at the last 1/2" of the tips before). Reacted quite well to the move :)

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar.../birdsnest.jpg
see all those white tips? It's been getting ready to divide like mad. I know this is going to be pretty big once it starts rolling. I wish I had actinics because it was phosphorescing green polyps at the store...

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...4/reeffull.jpg
Here's a full on shot of the tank. It's still looking pretty bare. I've been waiting for SPS to get in stock. Waiting and waiting :(.

http://www.kwirky88.com/images/aquar...4/roomshot.jpg
Picture of the tank in the house next to the new 90g cichlid tank. (cichlid tank journal here: http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=42512