SHF's & BC Mosaic's new 220g Starphire system

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

So, my friend Richard asked me to rehome his fish & corals for at least the next couple of years, maybe forever & we finally settled on his 220g starfire tank instead of the 7' 265g (too big to fit into my place).
The new tank had its front pane replaced by BCMosaic, Kolewolf & myself and has sat in storage for about a year. REALLY shocked that Irene said yes to this upgrade!

Timeline:
Saturday - Aug.14, 2010 - Built 6' x 25" x 34" stand out of 2x6s, 2x4s, & 2x3s

Sunday - Richard brought over tank & we water tested it on my lawn
- water test went well so we drained, drilled 2 holes for 1" bulkheads, painted back blue & built black acrylic overflow box system
- the 2 of us transported the tank into my livingroom & hefted it onto the stand

Monday-Thursday - Plumbed the tank, built an 80g sump (too tall) so bought an old 90g wide & cleaned it up & modified into a 4' x 2' x 18" tall sump. Sump has 2' wide 28" long skimmer "box, a section for the refugium (stored extra live rock) and a 6' section for the return pump

Friday - transported 200lbs of Live Rock, some corals and saltwater from Richard's 7' reef tan
- spent most of the night aquascaping the rocks

Saturday morning - went to Richard's & caught & transported fish, corals & water to my place
After lunch (all-u-can-eat fish&chips at C-lovers), we caught out the last fish, scooped up the last corals & drained thte tank to collect all the sand
Released fish into my tank at 7:30pm and started washing sand (2 or 3 hours) then did final aquascaping, setup skimmer, setup return pump, setup lights
- FINALLY finished at 4 am & turned on the new lights (6' 3x1502 metal halide with 14000k Phoenix bulbs - but we only turn on the end lights not the middle

Monday - August 23 - Added second skimmer due to heavy bioload

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

System Specs:

220g 6' long x 2' wide x 30" tall
Starphire glass front - low-iron glass for extra clarity
Overflow - 12" x 6" x 6" DIY black acrylic with 2 x 1" drains & 1 x 3/4" return
Return - Sedra 9000
Skimmers - SWC Extreme200
- Marine Tech 250 with Sedra9000 meshmodded impeller pump

Flow - HK Magnum8 & HK4 & HK3

Stocking:
1 6" Vlamingi tang
1 4" Elongate (A. mata) tang
1 4" Blonde Naso tang
2 4" Purple tang (Red Sea)
1 4" Chocolate tang
1 3" Orange Shoulder tang
4 4" Yellow tangs
1 3" Blue Regal tang
1 2.5" Kole tang
1 8" Porcupine puffer
1 6" Marine betta
1 4" Emperor angel (Juv.)
1 4" Lamark's angel
3 Lyretail anthias
2 Psychadelic Mandarin gobies
1 Cleaner wrasse
1 Leopard wrasse
1 Scissortail goby/dartfish

Still to be added from my other tanks I'm shutting down &/or selling:
4 Blue-eyed cardinals
1 Bangaii cardinal
1 Yellow Watchman goby
2 Black Leopard wrasses
1 Lyretail hawkfish
1 Black Sailfin blenny

Corals:
Assorted LPS, SPS, Photosynthetic Gorgonias & softies (mostly frags or small colonies)

Inverts:
Lots of snails
Not much else (Poofie the puffer would make short work of them)

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

Now for some pics - Cause a tank journal thread without pics is a waste of time, I know, I know.
These were taken Tuesday morning after I spent Monday plumbing the overflow system.



Empty tank on stand



DIY black acrylic overflow with Durso silent drainage system



Felicia in front of tank to give size reference & cause she's sooo cute



Side view from my computer desk

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

These pics taken Friday night (after hauling rocks & water from Richard's):



90g wide sump (allows me to work inside the short stand (I usually build much taller, but wife wanted a shorter stand for viewing from the couchs)





Tank with 150g new water, 40g old water and 170lbs live rock



Other side view

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Saturday night - around 4am after finally installing lights
The plywood & doors have NOT yet been installed, just leaning up against the front of the tank:







No flash for this last full tank shot:

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Water is a little murky since everything is still a little stirred up:



Side view (Saturday night/4am)



Just the tank



Left Rock structure



Right Rock structure

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Today (Monday early afternoon: August 23) - second skimmer just installed & micron filter sock on down tubes have helped clean the water up

Cut the plywood facing, installed facing & cabinet doors - VERY HAPPY with how it turned out (cabinet stand) but still need to finsih the side panels (adding doors to those as well)

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

Sectional shots (Monday, August 23, early afternoon:





Left side:





Right side:

Most of the pics were taken without my contacts on (relying on teh Nixon DX3000's autofocus completely)

Thanks for looking & hope you enjoyed.

Anthony

[lastlight]

Really nice job with the towers. They look really good as is but I imagine those will be boss for coral mounting location/variety.

That's one heck of a long span for those 6 foot 2x4s is it not?

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

Originally Posted by lastlight

Really nice job with the towers. They look really good as is but I imagine those will be boss for coral mounting location/variety.

That's one heck of a long span for those 6 foot 2x4s is it not?

Those are two 2x3s and 1 2x6 for each 6' span. The planks are all glued and screwed together for extra stength. Altogether, the beams are roughly equivalent to 4x6 beams, so more than adequate. I tend to over-engineer everything I build, especially big fish stands. It would hold the weight of my Honda CRV no problem