My 300 gallon Drop Off Reef Tank Build

[Gripenfelter]

What I decided to do for the drop off part was have a 1000 GPH pump circulate water in each of the chambers by T-ing off into each section. Also dumping the crabs and snails into there.

[lastlight]

How will they crawl out once they're in there? The holes are up pretty high...

[Gripenfelter]

There will be some live rock rubble in there.

Aquascaping will be similar to pic below but more caves on the top portion. Plan on adding lots of sponges and sps on the top.

The sump and refugium will have most of the rock.

[cale262]

I really like the concept and the pictures look great...Just a thought, Have you considered making those lower chambers into a DSB system???

[mike31154]

Getting in on this interesting concept a bit late, but couldn't the same thing be accomplished using a pvc framework or something similar? Why glass? PVC would be lighter, less prone to breakage, probably less $$$s too. Easier to disassemble if it comes to that...

[Gripenfelter]

Originally Posted by mike31154

Getting in on this interesting concept a bit late, but couldn't the same thing be accomplished using a pvc framework or something similar? Why glass? PVC would be lighter, less prone to breakage, probably less $$$s too. Easier to disassemble if it comes to that...

Acrylic was NOT cheaper actually. I had estimates from shops in Alberta, Minnesota, Ontario, and even Las Vegas (ATM aka TANKED).

Even shops in the States who are usually much cheaper than glass had a brain fart when I showed them the design. Initially I had planned to do this in an L- shaped acrylic tank but after weighing the pros and cons of it and considering the fact that acrylic is much easier to scratch etc, I decided on glass. Price was very close to the same.

I wanted to actually do a bullnose end on the tank but the fact that it would be a 2 ft radius curve meant it would look like a huge magnifying glass and distort everything. If I went bigger than a 2 ft radius curve we wouldn't get it into the house.

So we went with glass with beveled edges.

[reefwars]

i think he means pvc piping for a frame acrylic is def not cheaper than glass just stronger and lighter glass is easier to get and cheaper by the sheet love this build btw awesome job mate

[MarkoD]

Originally Posted by Gripenfelter

Acrylic was NOT cheaper actually. I had estimates from shops in Alberta, Minnesota, Ontario, and even Las Vegas (ATM aka TANKED).

Even shops in the States who are usually much cheaper than glass had a brain fart when I showed them the design. Initially I had planned to do this in an L- shaped acrylic tank but after weighing the pros and cons of it and considering the fact that acrylic is much easier to scratch etc, I decided on glass. Price was very close to the same.

I wanted to actually do a bullnose end on the tank but the fact that it would be a 2 ft radius curve meant it would look like a huge magnifying glass and distort everything. If I went bigger than a 2 ft radius curve we wouldn't get it into the house.

So we went with glass with beveled edges.

What he meant was you could take PVC pipes and build a shelf structure. Not acrylic

[Gripenfelter]

Originally Posted by MarkoD

What he meant was you could take PVC pipes and build a shelf structure. Not acrylic

When you're already tipping the scales at 1000 lbs, what's a few more?

Acrylic would be more expensive.

[mike31154]

Ya, thanks reefw & marko, that's what I meant. Just build a box with pvc or any number of other material than glass. Great concept, just seems like a waste of glass & overly complex to me when a similar result, shelf or whatever could be accomplished by other means. Glass usually good when you need to see stuff, but if it's hidden, makes no sense. Maybe just me, I dunno. Kudos on the fine glass work though, looks great.