Wayne's 225
 

Current equipment:
225 Gallon Tank 72lx30wx24h
DIY LED! 4 Dimmable Pendants of 36x3w Cree's. Each pendant will have 24 XP-E Royal Blue and 12 XP-G Cool white.
Skimz SM201 Skimmer
Tunze 3155 Osmolator ATO
Reeflo Super Dart Gold
Profilux Controller
BRS ROX/GFO
BRS Dosers (3) w/two part
Finnex 300w heaters
Biopellets with TLF reactor
IN-SUMP frag tank LED lit
RO/DI
Koralia 8 (one per side in back)
EcoTech MP40WES (one per side in front)
140lbs of rock
120lbs of sand



http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...ankonfloor.jpg

I'm obviously tagging along.

go barebottom but leave that blanket there - looks awesome.

He's already got sun and moon coral with a few star polyps as well. Not bad at all...

Oh that tacky blanket is coming back to bite me... :redface:

Man I sure do like that tank. Great score Wayne! Can't wait to see this one back at it. :)

Yup. That's a tank that definitely needs SW in it.
What kind of system are you planning?

I'm going to try my hand at a mixed reef and go from there. I keep seeing these macro shots of SPS and drool every time. Wife likes softies :surprise:

Good choice. That tank deserves some nice SPS colonies. And as for the wife's choice: my condolences man. :lol:

Wayne, looking forward to seeing what you do with it!

.... I see pokes at my lack of SW development when I had the system haha... *sniffle

I'm still the only one who's gotten to salty second base with this tank.

That is a challenge btw...

There isn't much I can do to top the build thread you had going for it, I hope to get the stand built within the month. This might be a slow one.

Third base is corals and fish. I think you can easily top it and I'm looking forward to seeing it =)

wow his tank journal thread isnt even a day old and I see that its already going down the path to debauchery and mayhem:twised:......


Gonna be a sweet tank fersure......following:biggrin:

I suspect the silicone absorbed my essence and we're seeing the effects of this now as it spills back out into his new thread.

Besides, Canreef is pretty dead right now so we may as well congregate somewhere =)

I've worked up the courage to try and level the floor...

This is what 5 gallons of self leveling compound gets you.

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...nemah/5gal.jpg

This is with 25 gallons.

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...emah/25gal.jpg

Stand built, foam layed and tank is now on the stand!

Next is paint touch up and plumming!

The front of the stand will eventually be built into the wall. I want it to look like a clean ledge.

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...ah/onstand.jpg

Looks great!. Is that room seriously only about 7 feet wide? Did you build it just for the aquarium?

Thanks! I bought the house with a finished basement, the space was pretty much useless. I'm thinking the previous owner built it for a bar.

Well it should be nice and cozy for viewing the tank:biggrin:

Who would have thought the most stressful part would be lighting the tank! If anyone has any good advice, please feel free to pass it on.


Here are my current choices on the table (in no particular order):


Pacific Sun Metis CRP 4x100W -- Right now, the top of my options. This light has everything that I want and more. It's by far the cleanest unit and will give me a lot of room to get into the tank. The down sides are the price and upgradeability.


Aqua Illuminations 6x75w pendants -- I've *virtually* seen many of these in action (YouTube, how-to’s, reviews etc...). I have a very good idea of what these can do, the price is still slightly high, but I don't want to get stuck in a void of having to add more and more expensive pendants to offset the spotlighting these are known to have.


DIY 4 panels of 42 Cree XP LEDs (cool white and royal blue) -- I have the knowledge and experience of soldering and working with electronics. The price is much lower than the other options and I can change out anything that dies on my own... Most likely having spare parts on hand. Huge down side is looks, I don't have the resources to fabricate an awesome fixture for DIY.


I've considered T5's and MH, but I’m the kind of guy to forget about the initial purchase and gripe about ongoing maintenance costs. With LED I believe it's a pay now or pay later situation.

Lights are now chosen and ordered!

I'll be going with 4 seperate lights with 36 3w Cree LED's on each! 24 Royal Blue's and 12 Cool whites.

The best part is the ease of building these lights, pre-drilled and tapped heatsync, BJB connectors (solderless) and optics that click right into the BJB!

Which lights are they? Have a link?

I purchased them from http://www.reefledlights.com

There are many options, I just built each kit individually to get all the parts at a better price. After that I added a few items that I needed to complete the kit. They ship USPS and it's VERY affordable.

Here is a breakdown of what was ordered:


48 Cree XP-E Kit – 48 XP-E Royal Blue

• 4 CoolTron Fans w Powersupply ($19.90)
• 12 XP-G w ELN60-48D Driver & Carclo Optics ($121.00)
• 4-40 Allen Head Screws W Nylon Washers QTY 100 ($15.00)
• Carclo Frosted Wide w Holder ($69.60)
• 60 BJB Connectors ($51.00)
• 2x 12"x8.46" Pre Drilled & Tapped ($115.00)
• 2 ELN 60-48D Dimmable ($65.00)

48 Cree XP-E Kit – 48 XP-E Royal Blue

• 4 CoolTron Fans w Powersupply ($19.90)
• 12 XP-G w ELN60-48D Driver & Carclo Optics ($121.00)
• 4-40 Allen Head Screws W Nylon Washers QTY 100 ($15.00)
• Carclo Frosted Wide w Holder ($69.60)
• 60 BJB Connectors ($51.00)
• 2x 12"x8.46" Pre Drilled & Tapped ($115.00)
• 4 ELN 60-48D Dimmable ($130.00)
• Set to 700mA ($16.00)

8 x Fuse Holder
10 x 5 Watt 1 Ohm Resistor

25 x CREE XP-G R5 Cool White 3W LED On Star

• No Screws ($0.85)
• Soft Wide ($1.45)
• No Optics ($0.00)

Picked up the rest of what I needed from Marine Aquaria. They always seem to have stock on special items and Harvey went out of his way to help me out!

Huge thanks guys!

Received some equipment today!

I'm quite impressed by the Skimz SM201, it's a sexy beast!

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...emah/sm201.jpg

Several months into this hobby and I'm already WAY over my head.

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...emah/parts.jpg

Killer sump from Marine Aquaria (Super Dart Gold just fits beside it).

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...nemah/sump.jpg

your light idea is looking good...one issue the concerns me is that the ELN drivers are known to cause harmonic issues when you use more than a few of them together...which could result in your in-wall wiring heating up and potentially being a fire risk. There is a lot of info on this on the DIY led thread on RC. That's why many people are going with the HLG driver and going parallel instead of serial. I suggest you look into it before your build. Otherwise...looking awesome:-)

I believe it'll be fine. I appreciate your concern, it's a good one for sure.

Essentially the harmonic and inrush issues come with startup. I'll only have two drivers come online at any given time. The Blue's will just dim at night and never really turn off and the whites will come on in pendant pairs (one driver per pendant for whites). I've read cases where people are powering 8 of these things without issues. I'm not sure I can change my order or design at this point, so I guess we will see.

I've always been treated very well when I go there as well, it's nice when people know your name when you walk in a store.

I can't believe I missed this build thread... look great so far! I'm looking forward to seeing pics of it lit up with the LED's.

Some progress on the build! :)

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0232.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0233.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0234.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0235.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0236.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0237.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0238.jpg

http://i1194.photobucket.com/albums/...h/DSC_0243.jpg

Looking great what model skimz is that?

And you'd better be krylon-colouring those bright white threaded inserts :biggrin:

The skimmer is Skimz - SM201.

I had another look today, those things are very bright white! Will they turn all green and nasty? or just to match the blacked out awsomeness?

Lol I has thinking to match the black. Sorry and proceed please haha =)

Subscribed!

Very interested to see how this puppy comes together, looks amazing at this point! Any ideas on a stocking list?

I totally agree with you!!! :) Matching would be awsome, I was worried about leaching chemicals into the water.

Thanks! :)

As for "fish" stocking list, I'll most likely just pickup whatever seems cool at the store's plus what I have now. For corals, I have no clue... I'll likely ask for some advice and help in this area.

Ohhh cmon have some fun with us, what sort of fish catch your eye? What do you have right now? You got tones of room in there.

I am in like flin, can't wait to see the LED lighting. Took a quick look at the site you got yours from, very interesting to say the least.

Hah!

Okay okay!

I currently have: Red Sea Sailfin, Anthias (not sure what type), File fish, Algae blenny, tribal blenny, six line wrasse, ruby headed wrasse, Yelow-blue damsel, couple of standard clown fish.

Wanted: Yellow tang, kole tang, masked rabbitfish, regal tang, powder blue, any wrasse I can get my hands on (love these things), more anthias to school with my lonely one.... Pondering the idea of having a couple of trigger fish and angels in there.

I'm not planning to get all of the above fish, but will pick and choose depending on what my system will allow. Anyone know of a good way or rule of thumb for this?

The LED's shipped this week (they used UPS instead), it should be here Monday. Duties and taxes were already charged to my card ($159 on a $1500-ish order). Overally pretty good. I'm planning on sending the heat sinks away to get annodized black ($60 for all 4) :lol:

I cant wait to get going on that build, should be pretty fun.

Do what you feel comfortable with and wait for a few people to start bitching. Then re-evaluate your choice accordingly LOL.