Martin's 180g Reef Build
 

Finally my new build is underway :) I've been wanting a bigger tank for years now, it started about 5 minutes after my 75g was complete haha :)

Got a great stand built by The Grizz in Blackfalds. Right now I just sheeted it in 3/4 ply

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/IMG_1318.jpg

Tank is 60 x 30 x 24

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/IMG_1326.jpg
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/IMG_1327.jpg

Coming out either side of the overflow I have my returns plumbed into locline with water flow accelerators.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/IMG_1328.jpg

Inside the over flow I decided to use some flex pipe to plumb the returns without using elbows for max flow. You can also see the standpipes here. It will be a herbie overflow. I used threaded bulkheads so the standpipes can be removed and modified easy for some tuning. Going to see how it runs first without a top cap on the secondary pipe. Currently I have the main over flow about 2 inches below the secondary. Not really sure how much lower it needs to be however I can always remove them and adjust later.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/IMG_1322.jpg

Primary over flow is attached to a gatevalve .

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/IMG_1323.jpg

Overflow plumbing is 1 1/2 and the return is 1 inch from the pump reduced to 3/4 after split for the 2 returns.

I plan on splitting my overflow 1/2 going to a fuge tank then to the sump and half going to a water changer tank then to the sump. I can by pass the flow from the water changer, drain and refill for easy water changes. More on that later.

Thats it for now :biggrin:

Looks great. gives me some plumbing ideas.

Holy heck man look at your tank come to life excellent

Looks good so far Martin. Can't wait to see that bad boy up and running.

so um......whatcha gonna do for lighting???.....metal halide???:razz:

I would go with PC lighting :lol:

Tank looks great on the stand Martin, can't wait to see how the flow accelerators work for you.

If your doing a herbie you want one pipe ( with the gate valve ) to be about 1/3 up from the bulkhead & the other one ( emergency drain ) to be just above the water level when running. No caps on either.

looking good martin welcome to the year of the 180 build club lol ive lost count but there are a few of us

looks awesome! I'm currently doing a 90 gallon build and the tank isnt even wet yet and I want to upgrade... :mrgreen:

now i know where all the profits are headed

Not really, we got a pretty sweet deal on the tank IMO & I still owed Martin for some of my LED's & he keeps buying boxes & boxes of drivers & stuff :lol:

Looks good! As Lockrockie said, welcome to the 180 club!! Congrats!

We did the same thing with our plumbing, added in a valve off the return for water changes.

I wanna try it out having the primary drain a little higher to see how it goes first. Only reason is the overflow box is pretty big and a lot of water heading to the sump from the overflow alone during a power cut if the pipe is only 1/3 up from the bulk head. That's not even thinking about the siphon from the return until it hits some air to break it. Gonna have to be careful with that, trying to avoid a check valve in the return. Hence the threaded bulkhead, I can yank (sorry Americans) it out and cut another inch off until I get silence

Probably gonna try some old incandescent bulbs haha. About all I can afford right now.... oh wait I just found 5000 LEDs sitting here, hmmmm that's a coincidence :biggrin:

I'm actually most excited about the inline water change tank. Picked it up yesterday 29g so I can change 16% of the water pretty much automatically by just turning some valves, dumps the water down the drain, RO/DI kicks in, fills it back up, mix with salt and reverse valves to get it back in circulation. I hate doing water changes so this is going to make the process easy I think.

Got the sump and much of the plumbing done today. The sump is not 100% finished yet but I am pushing ahead anyways. I will drain and add baffles and such at a later stage as I need this thing going and my other tank shutdown.

The sump:
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1436.jpg

This is the return plumbing all completed. Knife shutoff valve from the sump to the pump and a gate valve on the discharge side. It then splits using a Y junction into some 3/4 flex pipe and back to the tank.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1438.jpg
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1439.jpg

Below is how the overflow is going to work. Its not completed as you can see. I ran out of pipe :(

To the right eventually will be an inline water change tank that will flow back to the sump.

To the left will eventually go to the left side of the sump where the fuge will be

Black arrow shows the normal over flow and blue the secondary overflow or emergency

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin.../overflows.jpg

When its all completed the Normal overflow route will actually be closed most of the time. Water will flow to the fuge and to the inline water changer (and back to the sump)

When I want to do a water change I would open the normal in this picture, shut off the water changer value and empty and refill the water change tank.

The pump is a reeflow barracuda and it is currently so noisy I decided to switch it off for the night. I installed it using some spacers and rubber washers (a lot of them). I thought that would be enough however tomorrow I will try a rubber pad. I just read I have to let it run for 48 hours non stop before I am allowed to complain about noise haha :/

Hiya Martin. Nice build so far.
If you don't mind some constructive criticism ...
Black ABS is for Waste water and may leach some undesired stuff into your system. I'd suggest you do your best to replace it all with 200, sch 40 or sch 80 PVC. You don't want any crap causing surprises that you won't be able to figure out.

And about your Herbie, I have my main 1" pipe about 2/3 up and the Emerg 3/4" pipe just below the DT level. Same as you, I don't want too much overflow box water draining into the sump. Plus it makes for a quieter box with the level higher. And when the emerg kicks in during testing, I hear sucking in the tank long before I hear drainage noise in the sump.

And about your Barracuda ... use lots of Spa-Flex and I mean LOTS
The more the better. I found with my 1262 Eheim pumps, even just a small piece of rigid pvc caused noise.
I have since clamped my spa to the wall with spacers to keep the rigid away and all noise is gone. Except for the return line of course. That is not clamped to any walls and is quieter as is.

Hmm I will have to see if I can use more flex once I get the rubber pad installed and the pump broken in.

Weird about the ABS never heard that. I've had ABS for 5 years on my other tank.

Thanks for the comments.

So ABS has never given you grief? No unusual amounts of algae? Slow growth? Deaths? And all that?
As long as you are comfortable with it, 'carry on my wayward son', just wanted to give you a heads up.

The spa flex may have saved my build as there was a time when the wife said ' No way, that is too loud', and I agreed. I changed a bunch of stuff and all is now good.
Use as much of it as you can between every fitting, even your closed loop.
It's amazing how much noise it takes away.
The biggest difference I found was to leave as much room as I could between the pump and the first mounting location.
You'll get the vibration sounds transmitting through your pumbing if you clamp anything rigid to anything solid, like a pipe to a stand.
In my case, I had a piece of Spa clamped to the wall behind our stand and it was humming downstairs. I had to re-position the spa after I un-clamped it to stop issues with the tank, but I got rid of the nasty hum by our front door.
Also, I have re-done my sump plumbing 3 times already with testing, so, because your tank is empty, you may want to fill it and test everything like I did, then think about it for a day or 3.
I am glad I haven't rushed it.

Keep up the posts and pics :mrgreen:

I was going to comment on the ABS also. Know a guy that had a 200gal reef and he lost everything. Couldn't explain it for the longest time but all signs pointed to the ABS piping leaching stuff into his water.

Yea, I've never had an issue with ABS at all been using it as I said for at least 5 years. Was just doing some reading on it and a lot of people say its a myth.

I will be removing most of it from the return pump today to replace with flex however the stuff in the overflow is pretty much permanent and I dont want to rip out the bulkheads and replace them already since I am planning on moving some inhabitants in today.

Nice build Martin, can't wait to see it wet.

I put one of those flow accelerators on my new box. The only problem that I found is the gap between the outlet and the "nozzel part" will suck air from the surface. I ended up putting it lower in the tank than I wanted to. Had to drill 3 holes for syphon break in the return line in my overflow which works fine. Other than that they are pretty slick. I think I'm ~450gph out of my mag 7 but when you put your hand infront of it feels like it puts more our than my 550gph koralia.

Look like a nice build.

Yea I noticed that you cant use those near the surface for sure. I ended up going with the regular nozzle just below the surface for the upper return and the flow accelerator for the lower. That way the siphon will break basically as soon as the power is turned off with the regular flat nozzle right at the surface pointing downwards. Will post a pic of that when it get it all tuned.

I didn't see any lighting. Did I missed it?

I think Martin is just going to go with some old floresecent lights :twised:

I wouldn't worry about the abs, everyones bulkheads are abs, plastics uses for pump housings among others are abs.

I came to the same conclusion. I know reef tanks are sensitive but I'm not; haha so if it can put up with me it will survive the ABS. :lol:

Ok so small update today. I install rubber padding under the pump thanks to TheGrizz

Moved the sump over a little so I could install PVC flex and I replaced the discharge side with PVC flex also. All in the name of getting some quiet time.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1441.jpg

I also put rubber padding around every part where return meets stand.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1443.jpg
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1442.jpg

I'm happy to say that it cut the noise in half and to a level where I'm confident that once the stand is covered I can get back to watching John Stewart in peace.

Now for lighting. I am not going to reveal too much. However I did decide to just throw a loanly AI Sol up there to see how it would look. Its the white case white LED model. Check out the light beam from this thing (the tank is a little cloudy still)

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1444.jpg
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1445.jpg

I wont be using Sols however I'm impressed with the lighting that just one can do. Granted the tank is a little cloudy still. Its been settling for 4 days already ugh!

its like a scene from the abyss

Possible plumbing idea?

Consider running your emergency into your Fuge, dialing your herbie to whatever flow you want through your fuge. This would remove some clutter and PVC, and still do the trick that you want it and you would control the flow through your fuge from your valve of your main drain?

But other then that I don't see anything wrong with it!! I can't comment on the waste pvc pipe.

Alien / UFO Abduction.

Well we are just about all moved in here. The tank looks amazing and I love it already way better than my 75g.

No aqua scaping yet still waiting on the cloudy water. However since I added the canister filter it is cleaning it right up.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1449.jpg

The lighting is a mess haha. However good opportunity to show you the difference in LED colors haha

From left to right

• Sol White (66% white, 33% Royal Blue)
• 50/50 white/blue with the whites running a little higher than the blue
• 100% Royal Blue

I've been putting my carpentry skills through the works in the last few days finishing the stand.

Sheeted with ply
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1451.jpg

Its getting an oak trim
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1453.jpg

Followed by a Chinese cabinet look (i think, either that or pirate ship haha)
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1457.jpg

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1458.jpg

stealing your stand trim idea for my next build.


i need to get a brad nailer next christmas!

following along. Like the look of that stand.

After I read your post it scared me a bit because I had a few pipes and a few elbows made from ABS for my refugium. I don't know how to change to the regular pvc pipe because they are all clued together. I have found this info, I am still not sure if I still require to change the whole thing or not.

http://www.reefaquariumguide.com/for...-pipe-bad.html

Sounds good I will send you an invoice for the design hahah j/k

I got mine on special at home depot one day, they are pretty reasonable and I use it all the time.

I dont intend on changing mine. I dont have too much ABS but as you can see from that link its as safe as PVC. I'm not worried about it at all been using it on every tank i've owned for years.

Thank you :mrgreen: Big relief !

Heatsinks for my lighting came in today. Check these bad boys out haha. 50 x 6 inch.

Should be able to hold quite a few LEDs.:lol:

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1474.jpg

Little update on my stand progress too. I've been dragging my feet on it this week however got some trim on around the tank and one of the doors complete. They are bi-fold doors. Hope to get the rest finished today.

http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1475.jpg
http://applications.ccusa.com/martin...k/img_1477.jpg