Bignose's 95G reef
 

Hi everyone. This will be my first attempt on a tank with a sump. I decided to start a thread so everyone could witness the good and the bad. Please ask some questions and make comments. Some of the stuff you might see on this thread will make you snicker but I did this all myself with almost no help. But you can still laugh if you like:smile:

I've been in the salt water hobby for about a year now so I'm still learning as I go. My fisrt tank is a 10G nano reef. I started with something small to see if I could handle a SW tank. Once I got a hang of everything it was time to convince my girlfriend for a bigger tank. Slowly I found equipment locally mostly here on Canreef. It took about 6 months but here I am now.

My setup consists of:
95G eurobraced tank with center overflow 1" returns 1.5" drain and emergency drain.
Big als stand that I reinforced.
48" 6x54 Tek5
Euro-Reef RS135 skimmer
Quiet one 5000 return pump
2-Koralia 4 powerheads
2 jager heaters
approx. 85-90 pnds LR
100 pnds LS

Here are some pictures

Tank
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...tankonside.jpg
Just turn your head sideways and ignore the other tank and light.

Overflow
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/overflow.jpg

Reinforced stand I made deeper and boxed in the back
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...orcedstand.jpghttp://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...ton1/boxin.jpg

I'll update more soon.

Looks good to me. Using uni-seals on the side on the overflow for your returns?

Assuming Herbie, if you have a short stub on the primary, cuts down on the noise from the water dropping into the chamber (less drop)

Looking good. Glad to see another reefer jumping in with both feet.

Have you considered what you are going to keep in the tank? In looking at your equipment right now, your only flow is the return plumbing.

If you get the Teklight, have you thought about your bulb mix? There are some great people on here for asking about how to get the most out of your T5HO fixture so I would be looking for their help.

I agree with Mark that if your doing a herbie, go with some kind of pipe on the main drain. It will keep the noise down and also if fish get into your overflow, they don't get sucked down the drain really fast and hard. I did mine about half way up the overflow so that less water drains to the sump when the return pump goes off. Just something to think about. Looks good so far though!

The seals on the return are the ones that it came with. The bulkheads I had some trouble with because I ended up buying the wrong type. I also had to use a ball valve instead of a gate valve for the return line. I'm regretting this now because it's very hard to get the level in the overflow where I want it. I hope the valve loosens over time becuase it's hard to fine tune.

Other than that for my first plumbing job I'm very pleased.

Here is a picture of the sump area.
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...pton1/sump.jpg
I hope I plumbed right considering there is almost zero room in there.

Oops I for got to list that I have 2 Koralia 4 powerheads so I updated.

Don't have siphon breaks myself (room in the sump) but wondering if you're running them?

Two things that I noticed from the pics. and from Mark said, as there is no check valve in the return plumbing, I would suggest a siphon break, a drilled hole just above or right at the water line in the main tank on the return line and i would relocate the electrical power bar away from the top of your skimmer, because if your skimmer were to over flow ( and they do ) it looks like the power bar would get very wet.

I was thinking about drilling the return but I haven't yet. I going to eventually I hope the power dosen't go out:smile: What size holes would you drill?

Will your sump flood if the power goes off (draining back from the tank), if it does, you need to do something. If your sump has the volume, no worries.

Quite a bit actually. I'm going to drill the holes today.

Then I would address the power bar issue as well

I got about 40pnds of LR for free from a local reefer which was frozen... Yes frozen. There's a first for everything. He left his tank to a friend to take care of it while he was out of town and he ended up crashing the tank. He put the rock outside because it stunk and I was the lucky one who got it for free.

Here is the rock when I was cleaning it and cooking it.
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...rubbermaid.jpghttp://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...ompton1/LR.jpg
Talk about a stink! I had to do this in my apartment. My girlfriend was ****ed!:razz:

I also bought about 37pnds of rock from other local reefers in the city. I paid about $5/pnd which is alot better than store prices.

A couple of months later the rock was cleaned and ready to go into the tank.
I also added about 7pnds of rock from my established tank

Here is a pic of the rock in the tank
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...n1/LRadded.jpg

At this point I was starting to get excited. All the searching for equipment and rock was starting to pay off.

Looks good so far!

I was going to suggest some foam under your tank, but seeing as it full, and with so much rock (free rock is extra awesome rock by the way), I'm hoping you'll be fine as you are.

So what is your plan for this tank? Fish only? Reef?

Thats looks good man , love the tank. but the stand looks like its bowing in themiddle and there is no styro foam either.... just plywood

I thought about using foam under the tank but I never did. What is the advantages of foam? I'm planning a mixed reef. Most likely will be softies and lps but I hope I can have some sps near the top of the tank. I'm going to transfer my fish from my nano tank but I haven't done much research on fish yet. I want some tangs for sure.
The stand is ok if you look at the top of the pic it looks like the tank is bowing up. Maybe my camera?

The assumed 'bowing' in the picture is the fish-eye effect from your camera's lens. No biggie, but the lack of some sort of cushion under the tank is a little scary... foam is generally used to cushion the bottom of the tank against any sort of imperfections in the surface that the tank is sitting on, so that there is no localized stress on any one part of the bottom panel of the tank. This reduces the risk of cracking over the long term.

That said, you seem to be off to a good start!

I added 100 pnds of sand into the tank. I used 60pnds of sugar sand on top of 40pnds of crushed coral.

In goes the sand
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o.../sandadded.jpg
Time to drink some beer and wait:mrgreen:

The skimmer started doing its magic right away.
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/skimming.jpg
The cup filled about 3 times with cloudy water.

Hours later the tank started to clear up
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...clearwater.jpg
I'm not sure if this is too much sand but I like the look of it

I added a couple more rocks to the tank to make a nice looking cave on the left side. I still have about 5-6pnds of rock left to transfer when I shut down my nano. I think it's enough rock but it could use some more to cover the overflow.

Here is the most recent picture I took of the tank.
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...on1/moreLR.jpg
The light is temporary for now. Looks dull with only the center lit up.

Here is the cave from the left side.
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...pton1/cave.jpg

looking good!

Dig the over hang...that's a great ledge for an sps colony LOL

I like the head on shot, its nice!

BlueAbyss is right on about the foam.

Thanks for the compliments. The tank is 20" deep so there should be good par. I'm going to experiment with a small frag of sps down the road.

I wish I knew what the foam was for when I set the tank up. I thought it was for noise reduction in the tank. Guess I should have started this journal before I set everything up lol.

There are diatoms in the sand so I think the cycle has started.

hurah!!!

This is kinda off topic but I popped the big question today. I'm getting married woo!!

congrats there Bignose...*salute*

CONGRADs!!!!!!!!!:D:D:D

Congratulations!

If the stand was true and sturdy to start, can relax about not having the foam.

Thanks everyone. To be honest with you I didn't check the stand. I hope nothing bad happens to the tank. When I reinforced the stand the wood seemed nice and flat and I drove the screws in deeper than the surface of the wood.

Any suggestions on fish? Something not too advanced. I want some tangs for sure I just don't know which ones yet. There will also be my 2 perc clowns a allans damsil and a chromi that will go in from my nano. I want to get rid of the damsil but my girlfriend er.. fiance is attached.

Well I've been doing some quick research for the fish I'm interested in.
This is very hard because there are alot to choose from and picking suitable fish is confusing.

Here are the fish I want to choose from:

Yellow Tang
Kole Tang
Purple Tang
Powder Blue Tang
Regal Tang
Racoon Butterfly
Coral Banded Butterfly
2xPurple Firefish (and/or) 2xOrange Firefish
Yellowhead Jawfish or Bluespot Jawfish
Pygmy Flameback Angel
4xchromis
2 Perc. clowns

- This list seems long to me. I'm trying to find the inch/gallon ratio but I'm finding mixed answers. Can all these fish survive with the inch/gallon ratio?
- Will all these fish get along together relatively?

That's a lot of tangs for a 95 gal. There will probably be a lot of aggression. Also Powder Blues are difficult to keep. I would let the tank mature quite a bit before introducing the Butterflies. The remainder of your list seems fine. Good Luck.

Here is a update on my tank.

Water test results:
Amonia - 0ppm
Nitrite - 0ppm
Nitrate - 5-7ppm
Sal - 1.026

A pictures as of today. Jan 24, 2009
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/IMGP0134.jpg
This light is totally wrong:sad:

[Here are the fish I want to choose from:

Yellow Tang
Kole Tang
2xPurple Firefish (and/or) 2xOrange Firefish jumpers
Yellowhead Jawfish or Bluespot Jawfish jumpers
flame angel, BI color for color
3 x chromis
3 anthias
star fish assorted colors
leopard wrasses x 2

that is what i would put in there

Today I went out and bought the rest of the CUC. I got 12 snails and 5 more hermit crabs, 6 empty snail shells and a fire shrimp. I also wanted to get a cleaner shrimp but they didn't have any. I forgot to mention that I added 8 hermit crabs on week two.

I bought everything from Aquarium Illusions. They had some very nice fish in stock. I especially liked the fairy wrasses and purple tangs.

Thought I would update my tank. It's been established a month today.

Here are the results of my water tests. I'm still making sense of some of this so if there is something out of whack please inform me.

NH3 - 0
NO2 - 0
NO3 - 10-15 Doing my first water change tommorrow. Currently mixing water.
pH - 8.2
Ca - got to 600 and stopped. :question:what the heck? old test kit?:question:
PO4 - 0.25
KH - 80
Sal - 1.024

I'm using a API Master test kit. I don't trust these results myself. What brand would some people recommend?

congratulations!
 

And............ your tank is going to be great!

I finally bought the light for my tank locally from a fellow canreefer. It's a Tek-5 54Wx6 4" fixture.

The way everything is now is exactly what my goal was in the beginning of this build, a basic but complete system for a beginner. I've decided to post the approximate cost of my system. The components are ~50/50 new/used. This will not include the cost of salt and the LR from my nano.


What I found at canreef and kijiji locally.
95G Tank - $200
30G sump - free
Tek-5 T5HO - $280
RS-135 - $180
LR ~40pnds - free
LR ~40pnds - $200
Refractometer - $60

I also found some of my receipts and here is what I found.
2 Koralia 4's - $100
250W jager heater - $35
Quietone 5000 - $169
100 pnds sand - $93
plumbing and wood and stand - $280
bulkheads - $28

Grand total ~$1625

Overall I'm happy with the cost of this system and the equipment I found. I never calculated the cost of a completely new system but I'm sure it would be alot more.

Six months of ad surfing and research, and little bit of saving paid off in the end. Now for the livestock! What am I thinking? it never ends:wink:

Here is a picture of the tank.
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/IMGP0169.jpg
FTS
http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...n1/zoocave.jpghttp://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...ton1/beach.jpg
Sorry about the picture quality. I have never been able to take clear pictures.

I addressed the power bar issue and moved the Skimmer to the other side of my sump. Not only did it make it safer but it also made it easier to remove the collection cup.

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/IMGP0192.jpg
I was barely able to get the skimmer into the other side. Took some time and effort but I got it in.

I got bored so I took pictures of some of my coral. Some of you may recognize these coral.

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o.../candycane.jpg
Candy cane and some kind of Leather

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...ton1/clove.jpg
Pipe organ

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...1/elephant.jpg
Elephant ear - gone through hell and on its way back

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...pton1/zoo1.jpg
zoos - nice purple blue color

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...pton1/zoo2.jpg
zooos - bright orange in person

http://i379.photobucket.com/albums/o...pton1/zoo3.jpg
zoooos