90 Gal reef and 50 gal predator tank builds

[Oxymoron]

Hello all
I decided to share my tank building experience with everyone
So first off I'd like to mention that these setups are my first ever aquariums.
The bulk of my personal knowledge is what I have learned off this forum (especially off the reference section). I also have the help of a well experienced friend.
We started to set up the 90 gal reef about 1.5 months ago and came home with the following
90 gal drilled tank with overflow
30 gal bio wheel sump
Black stand
Protein Skimmer
basic flourescent lighting
instant ocean salt



The following day we added 20 lbs of live rock from a lfs

And the following day an additional 20 lbs from a different lfs.

I scoured the forum for a couple weeks while out of town and eventually found Sandy with 130 lbs of live rock for sale (2 kinds, tonga and fiji). We arranged to have it picked up and my buddy threw it in the tank for me.
This brought the total up to 4 different kinds of live rock
After arriving home from work I decided to re aquascape and remove about 20 lbs or so as I thought it looked cluttered. The final design we were able to create came out very stable and required several hours and many beers.
Here are some pics of the final design.

Side

Other side

[Oxymoron]

I also added 2 Tunze powerehads
http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/tz...mp+-+6065.html
And just recently today a Coralife 9w uv sterilizer
http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/uv...izer+-+9W.html



The 2 inhabitants in the tank atm are a black molly and a yellow tailed damsel.

(forgot to get a pic of the molly)
Both are feeding well and look great.

With the remaining live rock and a 50 gallon tank we decided to build a FOWLER tank to house perhaps a sole lionfish or something special. Some sort of predator tank anyway. Ill have to put some thought into over the next couple weeks into what kind of inhabitant I am looking for.
Esentially a basic system with a Fluval 304, 300w heater, basic life glo flourescent lighting. Under the cabinet it will house perhaps several 2.5 gal feeder tanks for the tanks inhabitant (or inhabitants).
Will update this one as it progresses. Here are a meager 3 pics of the Fowler tank.

I will take more pictures in the following weeks / months as these tanks progress.
Thanks you all for taking your time to check out my builds. Any questions, comments, suggestions as well as any knowledge you can part with would be greatly appreciated.
Oxy

[Oxymoron]

Ahh I see the pictures came out beautifully. Hmm what to do...

[Oxymoron]

So it would appear I have screwed up the picture attachments. I will try to fix this today and hopefully have a working thread by the end of the day.

[Der_Iron_Chef]

Oh good...it's not just my computer. I was disappointed I couldn't see the pics!

[Oxymoron]

Ok looks like I got it working. Sorry about the delay

[sharuq1]

Great start! Are you from a different forum? Your name looks familiar. Loving the LR, looks good. What are you planning to stock the reef with? What kind of lighting are you going to put on it down the road?

[Oxymoron]

Originally Posted by sharuq1

Great start! Are you from a different forum? Your name looks familiar. Loving the LR, looks good. What are you planning to stock the reef with? What kind of lighting are you going to put on it down the road?

Hi Sharuq,
Thanks for the compliments
I actually started out on another forum (not sure if im allowed to name it or not) but found they weren't busy enough for me. So now I check out both from time to time.

Im hoping to stock the reef with a mixture of sps to softies. Im leaning towards housing the rarest species that I can get my hands on.

My next purchase will perhaps be a pair of flame wrasse's and down the line I am hoping to purchase a black longnose tang. This will be several months down the line once I am absolutely certain that my system is stable and I have given myself some additional research time. After hearing that certain members on this board have been able to keep a tang alive in captivity for 9 years or more I have convinced myself to justify the cost.

Oh yeah, I have since added a yellow tang, a bicolor pseudochromis (lfs said it was a royal gramma, bah stupid me), a cleaner shrimp and a sixline wrasse.

I also have added several frags (some from you) as well I bought a toadstool, green bta and a leather coral from my last trip to Calgary.

The frogspawn that you were worried about opened up very nicely btw and has already started growing noticeably.

Everything atm seems to be going well and all new additions are feeding well (added a drop of kent garlic extract). The pseudochromis has actually been chasing the damsel away from his "spot" about twice a day. So far It has been the only signs of aggression in the tank. The black molly that has been in since day 3 is still doing great, I hope she lives to a old age.

I have taken pictures of the whole process and will post them sooner than later.

As for lighting atm I am using a new 36" tek t5 4 bulb fixture (15k and fiji purple) This lighting system is temporary and will be moved to my 50 gal once I find what im looking for. My next set of lighting will not be metal halide due to my need to produce an automated system without a chiller. I am hoping to see an advance in the LED technology and pricing by the time I am ready to upgrade and would like to go that route. If this is not feasible i will most likely settle on a 8 bulb 48" t5 fixture and led's for moonlights (heard I can still get some shimmer with the led's). There will also be a custom ATO, a new skimmer, ca reactor and controller added to the system in the near future.

Well that's about all I have for tonight. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for updates
Oxy

[Oxymoron]

The skimmer that I have decided to go with is the following
http://www.superskimmer.com/SumpBuddy40.htm
This skimmer has been selected based solely on its footprint dimensions.
I am hoping that It will make do on my tank. I did have my heart set on a bubble king. However after trying for quite some time to make it fit under my cabinet I eventually found this one. I actually have only found about 3 skimmers that would fit in the small footprint I have available and this ones seems to be the best bang for my available size.
The ATO will be custom built and the calcium reactor will be a whole new challange.
Does anyone know of a suitable ca reactor for a 90 gal + 30 gal sump with an extremely small footprint? Or perhaps a custom builder?

[GreenSpottedPuffer]

Looks good so far. You mentioned not wanting MH because of heat and not wanting a chiller. Many people use MH without a chiller with no problems. Fans if used right work wonders. I have used MH for years and never needed a chiller. Even now I am running 800 watts of MH over a 95G tank and can keep the temperature right between 79-80. I would recommend a controller though if you use MH with fans, so you can have them turn on and off as needed.

Glad to see your getting off to such a good start in this hobby!

Whats going in the aggressive tank?