jkhchris 105 gallon tank build
 

Well the tax return finally came. I ordered a tank through OA that was made by Seastar. It is 60"x20"x20" with corner bracing made with 1/2 glass. It has a overflow box in the rear left corner with a overflow and a return. The tank is made but I am waiting for the overflow box to be built. I started the stand last week at work. I based it on the Allglass style stand and made it out of pine.
Here is a poor picture of the frame of the stand.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...ris/stand2.jpg
Another poor picture of the stand framed in.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...ris/stand4.jpg
A picture with the doors on and ready to stain.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2605.jpg
And a few of the stand stain.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2606.jpg
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2607.jpg
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2608.jpg
I also fiberglassed the inside base of the stand to hold in water just incase I have any leaks or spills.
Chris

Lookin' Good! I bet you can't wait for the tank.

Nice touch with the fiberglass...looking forward to seeing the rest.

Ya it's hard to go into OA and see the tank sitting there just waiting to be filled up. But on the other hand this is something I have wanted to do for about a year now and a little longer to wait is really nothing. Atleast there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Thanks Drew I can't wait to see the rest too.
Chris

Looking good and congrats on the upgrade. Now you can grow your sps twice as big. Looking forward to the final build.

Thanks Chin , I can't wait till I get it set up and going. It will be nice to have some extra space. I might actually have enough pieces to fill the new tank already. The 65 has become basically a frag tank.
Heres a shot of it so you know what I am talking about.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2622.jpg
And yes that is full colonies on trays on the front glass.
Chris

WOW Look at that 65G.
Stand looks good Chris. Can't wait to see it with a tank on it

J

Thanks Jason I might have to call on your services for some help when the tank swap goes down.

Looking forward to it. But I'm really clumsy and might make a few frags 'by mistake' ;)

J

Holy mackerel. I suddenly realize there's a LOT more room in my tanks for stuff!!!! :lol:

Good luck with the new tank :)

Thanks Tony , I believe I still have some room on the underside of my powerheads and I guess the trays. Hey Jason what is with the spelling today. (climsy) ........ (genitally)
Chris:lol:

I was Diving all day yesterday. With Cprowler and Jack. On Cprowlers boat. Ate dinner at 10PM then got up to take my wife to the airport at 5:00am.
Not thinking sorry

transfer day
 

Chris
let me know when your transfer day will be. If i'm "around", i'll come by to help out.
Whats your plan for transferring? I ask because I've heard so many tragic stories of losing massive amounts of corals when people upgrade to bigger tanks. I lost about 60-70% of my acros when I transferred them to my 300g and i attribute the loss to the drastic change in water parameters. Start thinking about this because I would hate to see you lose any of your wonderful collection.

Just in case you're looking for some ideas, this is what I did when I transfered everything over from my 72 to my 180. I left all my corals and fish etc in the 72. I did all my aqua-scaping in new water, then moved the fish over. I let the new tank run for a week then I moved a couple of corals over as test pieces, acclimating them as I normally would. When the test pieces did OK for a few days I moved the rest over. No losses at all from the move, just a whole lot of stress.

Rob

Thanks for the offer Chin and the advice Rob. I was actually thinking of doing a post to get some suggestions. What I was thinking of doing was to having the other tank set up and ready to run. I do a 15 gallon water change every week on the 65. I would put the change water into the new tank with some power heads running to keep it stirring. I probably would do two of these a week for two weeks. About the time my wife could stand before saying something. That would create about 60 gallons of aged water in the two weeks and still have about 75 gallons of cleaner aged water still in the 65 gallon. I would also have my skimmer running in the new tank. I am still planning on having sand but would go with new and use a couple of pounds from my 65 to seed it. Then I would set a day to change it all to the new tank. I would also like to clean my old rock as much as possible durring the transfer. I also have about 50 or so pounds of dried dead rock that I have cycling in a rubbermaid with a 8 pound piece of live rock for about 2 weeks now. Any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks Chris

Looks great Chris

Just take it slow and plan out every move ahead of doing it.

Good luck

Tom R

Thanks Tom. How are you doing? Did everything go well?

Worked on The cap for the tank today. Got it built , sanded and a coat of stain on it today. Will put another coat on it tomorrow and try to take a picture of it.
Chris

Here are two pictures of the completed stand and cap.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2623.jpg
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2624.jpg

This is the frankenstien sump I will be using for the new system. It is a Allglass Mega Flow 4 Sump. It met a timely demise when it fell off the back of a truck upon delivery to a local LFS. I picked it up for $20 dollars. I figured if I couldn't make it hold water atleast the plexi would be worth $20. The trickle area was broken off in the spill which allows lots of room for the new Skimmer. I took 3/8 plexi strips and glued them over the cracks with weldon 16 and let them set. I drilled three 2 1/2" holes in the trickle overflow to allow the water to flow through instead of cascading over the first wall. I have had it at the shop holding water for 2 months now with no lose.
So far this sump has cost me about $35 dollars and a little bit of my time.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2625.jpg

Chris

Well got the tank today. I moved the stand and tank into the place and put it where I want it to be.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2631.jpg

Now the fun begins. I plan on starting to fill it tomorrow with some water . I believe I will try and get it alll swapped by Sunday if it is possible.

Chris

Oh good you got it in the house.

Looks Great. I guess you can get a few Tangs now LOL

J

Already have three . Don't need no more.

havent been around for awhile and stumbled on this build, finally eh!

were all dreaming but for some of us dreams come true. Happy to see that you got the new set up in what are you gonna be using for the lighting?

Looks great Chris.

Tom R

Thanks Chris and Tom. I will be using the same lights that are on the old setup. The hamilton reefstars 400w DE and 250w DE.
Chris

Well Have the tank about half full now with fresh salt water and the new sand. Here's a shot of the tanks cloudy water and you can see the cap on it.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2639.jpg

I guess I can tell you guys about the equipment I am going to use. I have a Allglass Model 4 sump. Which will have A Eheim 1262 pump in it. It will be teed off to be my return going threw a Current 1/4 horse chiller and back to the tank. The pump will also run 2 to 3 phosban reactors and a feed line to my calcium reactor. I have a knock off skimmer as well rated for 250 gallons run by a sedra 7000 as well.
http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2638.jpg


For flow in the tank I will be using 2 MJ 1200's with the sure flow 2100 mods and a Tunze wavebox. On my return I added a Pacific Coast flow accelerator and am not sure what I will get out of that. Lighting I will be using 2 Hamilton Reefstar Pendents. One is a 250w DE and the other is a 400w DE. I will hang the lights to a shelf above the tank and put them on drawer tracks so I can move them out off my way when I need to work in the tank. I have 2 heaters a won bros 250W and a stealth 250W. My top off is going to be gravity fed . I added a shelf in the stand that sits higher then the sump and accomidates a smaller rubbermade tub with a 1/4" bulkhead union in it. This will be controlled by a kent float valve in the sump.

Chris

I also ended up putting a piece of foam under the tank. Was having a leveling problem. I will be putting a piece of 1/4 round on the front of the tank to hide it. On the sides that you can see I might just use a brown jiffy to colour it.
Chris

do you like the mega overflow kit ? is it worth the money?

Nice Chris. Have you decided on a transfer plan?

Pastout I didn't want to build one that was the only reason I used that kit. I have not gotten to the point yet of using it. Not enough water in the tank yet. Chin I am going to fill the tank 3/4 full and let it run for the week with 50#'s of dead rock and 8 #'s live rock. I'm setting up 2 powerheads and the skimmer up in the tank. I was going to transfer some of the live rock from my 65 . Basically whatever I could get out that doesn't have coral encrusted to it. There is about 20 gallons of water out of my 65 in the new tank already. Was planning on doing it all tomorrow but decided to let the tank run 3/4 full for the week to let things settle for a bit.
Chris

I decided to make a good air silencer for my skimmer. How it was set up it was quite loud. So I got some 1 1/2" pipe ,two 1 1/2" end caps, two quick connect fitting that will recieve 1/4" air line and has a male threaded end and some filter floss.

http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2649.jpg

I drilled a 1/2" hole in both end caps. The threaded ends of the quick connects screwed in tightly without having to thread the caps. I rolled the filter floss up and put it into the 5" of 1 1/2" of pipe. put the end caps on without glue so I can open it up if the silencer gets wet or whatever.

http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2650.jpg

Upon hooking it up I noticed the skimmer to be way quieter then before. I added about 10" of air line to the other end and that dropped the sound a bit more. I did not notice any drop in air consumtion in the skimmer.

Chris

Well got the 65 gallon into the 105. It took about 8 hours and did not get the lights set up till this morning. All and all it went well. I do have about 25ppm nitrates and have lost a few frags to the rock work. Nothing to major. I believe the week will let me know how it went. Now I have to mount all the corals , set up the top off, get the calcium reactor going and figure where the two power heads should go so they don't kick the sand up. All and all I happy how it turned out. The fish are really happy with all the extra space.
Believe I will be getting ride of most of my caps and some frags. Jason thanks alot for helping out. I deffinetly wouldn't have finished it with out you. I really appreciate your help. Anyways here is a shot of the tank tonight.

http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2656.jpg


Chris

It looks great already!

Looks great Chris. A little less crammed than the 65!! Point your powerheads towards the water's surface to minimize substrate blow-up.

Looks Good Chris, Glad I could help.

Keep us updated on the progress

J

Looks good Chris, was that all from your 65g?

Thanks for the replies. Thanks for all your kind words .Chin already have them pointed to the surface and the one in the middle on the other end now. The brackets provided with the mods are weak and they keep slouching. Was thinking of putting clear tubbing in between the powerhead and bracket to hopefully solve this. When I get it done or figure it out I will take a picture and post it. Cprowler I did add about 50#'s of dead rock to the mix and got ride of some live rock from the tank. Other then that most of it is from the 65 gallon tank I think Jason was quite supprissed of the size of some of the collonies when we pulled them out. I do have a shot of one of the three rubbermaids full of coral fish and clams.

http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2654.jpg

And here's one of me holding up one of my frag trays (1500 Seio powerhead) Ther is a 5"x3" pink millie , 3"x2" green acro and a 2"x1" piece of blue millie on it.

http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s/IMG_2655.jpg

Chris

Looks good Chris.

Can't wait to see it in person.

Congrats

Thanks Callum.