230 gallon in-wall, room divider, reef build

[justingraham]

Those Afro eating worms are the worst haha I meant acro

 

[MarsRover]

Not off base but let's think out loud u have a 200 plus gallon tank I'm sure ur going to want tangs u think a tang is going to be okay in a five gallon tank? Let alone if you put another fish in there? How are u going to qt? 30 days of copper? If that is the case what if some of the qt water gets into the dt water no corals for you. With qting fish I would do them in installments do three fish the proper way copper prazi the works to make sure ur fish are good to go after u add them to the dt the go get another batch of fish. With qt ing corals and inverts u have to wait 72 days from first placing the coral in there u can add corals every day it will not restart the clock. But with corals u have to worry about pest as well like Afro eating flat worms and stuff so they don't get in the display. And the way u have it set up now with it being so close together there's a really good chance of cross contamination.

Ur starting a beautiful tank make sure no disease gets in from the beginning I had to restart my 90 and it was painful don't go thru what most of us have gone thru.

So if I were u I would do a ten gallon tank for frags and a 40 breeder for fish. I'm not a guru on qt but ask or look up @Humblefish and @melphry on here and they can better assist donit right the first time ur planning so much with the tank right now don't skimp on qt please look up the thread qting 40-50 fish read thru it in fact look thru the past treads in the last hour as someone just commented on it to find it and see the pain and agony it caused him by not doing it right the first time so hopefully we won't make the same mistakes.

You're absolutely right. I've been so lucky with my tanks so far, but the amount of fish and coral Ill be putting into this tank will far exceed all that I've gotten to date. It's been my worst nightmare to have a pest in my display and I can't rescue one or all of them.

I'm taking your advice. No QT's in the cabinet. Will need to find another area in my house for the QTs....luckily I have quite a bit of time to figure this part out.

Thanks @justingraham

 

[justingraham]

Hey man no problem glad ur learning from my mistakes I'm sure u will find a spot and if done right will look good just cause it's a qt doesn't mean it still can't look good

my 40 breeder qt was not an eyesore metal stand fake decorations everything

 

[MarsRover]

What do people do for chillers on large tanks? Is that much of a concern if you have so much volume in your system?

Maybe I can replace that QT section in my cabinet with a chiller. Certainly enough space...vent it up through the structural column I'll have on that side and maybe just straight out the roof....

Thoughts?

 

[MarsRover]

since you live in socal, have you looked in to the advanced acrylics sumps? John does great work. You can either pick one out from the website or have him customize it any way you want.

Hey @805reef

What sump do you recommend? There's tons of styles and options... not really sure how to discern between them all and size isn't really much of a constraint for me here...

Thanks!

 

[chrissu]

Tagging along

 

[justingraham]

Well what is ur "plan" for the setup?

Calcium reactor triton aquaforest two part zeovit?

Depending on that is what sump I would recomend

 

[Higher Thinking]

Hey there, looks like you've certainly been working through a lot of things. One thing I'd point out, and it's massively important, is to make sure your overflow tower is water tight. You may have already worked through this, but thought I'd throw it out just in case.

When you lose power (or heck, just turn off the return for maintenance) the water in the display will fall into the sump all the way to the level of the lower full siphon. When the siphon pipe is in a sealed overflow as is always the case, the just means it will empty the overflow box to the lower siphon. However, if you don't have your tower sealed, then the entire display will empty to the level of your lower siphon. That means overflowed sump, ruined floors, hate, anger, and frustration.

I recall you mentioning sealing the bottom of a PVC "container," so that should work. But if you decide to make a sealed off rock structure without an insert, just make sure it's actually sealed.

 

[MarsRover]

Tagging along

Thank you and welcome aboard!

Well what is ur "plan" for the setup?

Calcium reactor triton aquaforest two part zeovit?

Depending on that is what sump I would recommend

Well, I've been recently toying with the idea of a Ca reactor attempt on my current setup so i can get some practice with it before trying it out on the big money tank. Honestly, of all of those things you mentioned i wasn't "planning" on any of them! Hah. I'm a firm believer of K.I.S.S. and i started in this hobby back when i was in high school years ago (had a good long hiatus however and was blown away by the new tech) but it is clear some of the new tech is definitely worth it, and some, not so much.

Presently i just have really great success with dosing B-ionic 2-part and acropower. One thing i am certainly going to do is build a little autodoser for my self so i can stop manually dosing and start keeping parameters consistent all day long. Hopeing to also tie in a PID controller and closed-loop it with some sensors. Sort of segueing into another topic i was always interested in, what of these other pieces of tech (calcium reactor, other reactors, pellets etc.. etc..) are really REQUIRED for large tanks? Was i really naive to think that B-ionic and Acropower would do me fine on larger scale? Back when i was working at the coral store in H.S. nothing much was run other than massive skimmers and U.V. Sterilizers, mega-ton of Halides and water changes.

Hey there, looks like you've certainly been working through a lot of things. One thing I'd point out, and it's massively important, is to make sure your overflow tower is water tight. You may have already worked through this, but thought I'd throw it out just in case.

When you lose power (or heck, just turn off the return for maintenance) the water in the display will fall into the sump all the way to the level of the lower full siphon. When the siphon pipe is in a sealed overflow as is always the case, the just means it will empty the overflow box to the lower siphon. However, if you don't have your tower sealed, then the entire display will empty to the level of your lower siphon. That means overflowed sump, ruined floors, hate, anger, and frustration.

I recall you mentioning sealing the bottom of a PVC "container," so that should work. But if you decide to make a sealed off rock structure without an insert, just make sure it's actually sealed.

Roger dodger! That is an excellent argument for not trying to go with sealed rock alone. Something some guy earlier in the thread couldn't manage to come forth with. I'm leaning towards doing some sort of insert to ensure sealing. I don't intend to have my full siphon pipe very low regardless, but, still important nevertheless. Thanks for chiming in!

 

[justingraham]

It will work but it will and can get expensive that's all I'm talking about two part.

I would just do a three part sump refugium skimmer section and then return section easy as pie

 

[MarsRover]

It will work but it will and can get expensive that's all I'm talking about two part.

I would just do a three part sump refugium skimmer section and then return section easy as pie

Okay I'll have to look into it more. Plentyyyy of time to do research while the tank cycles.....after I design everything.....and build everything..... but the glass should come soon....hopefully a few weeks...

 

[justingraham]

Ur doing a fine job

 

[MarsRover]

Demo day two today after working A LOT this week. Demo Went pretty well! Wall is down on one side. Enough to know there are no more surprises I have to worry about. Also excavated mostly enough for the plumber to move the gas pipe! Got a quote, about $300. Is what it is.

Also, have my two first attempts at making rocks. Small one is 2:3:3 cementerlite:sand the big one is 4:7:6.

Both with grey Portland cause that's all they have at my local shop. Will call cement company tomorrow.

The little one I made upside down in a bucket and then topped it off to turn it into a stand for fun. The big one is more realistic of what I will need in my tank. Both cast in sand.

Super easy to make! Easy to get decent quality looking rock. I was surprised.

Photos don't do it justice

 

[MarsRover]

I've been doing a bunch of research on sump designs and i don't see UV sterilizers..... do people not run UV sterilizers anymore??!?

 

[prsnlty]

Your rock looks great!

I am concerned about that load bearing wall though. Do you have plans to shore it up somehow?

 

[MarsRover]

Your rock looks great!

I am concerned about that load bearing wall though. Do you have plans to shore it up somehow?

Oh yeah, for sure! I'm a mechanical design engineer at NASA. This sort of thing is easy

Now that i have the wall exposed, i intend to CAD up my intentions for structural support. Stay tuned Jackie!

 

[prsnlty]

Oh yeah, for sure! I'm a mechanical design engineer at NASA. This sort of thing is easy

Now that i have the wall exposed, i intend to CAD up my intentions for structural support. Stay tuned Jackie!

That's good

 

[MarsRover]

Need to make a list of electrical demands for UNDER tank electrical. I'm going to have all lighting electrical (2x400W MH systems and probably some T5's) all above the tank. IF i have any powerheads, those too will be plugged in above.

So under tank here's my list so far, let me know if you think i've missed something:

1.return pump (outlet and light switch)
2.skimmer (outlet and light switch)
3.heater (outlet and Lightswitch???)
4.chiller (outlet and lightswitch????)
5.UV sterilizer (maybe?) (outlet and lightswitch)
6. controllers? (outlet)

I'm trying to spec out how many GFCI outlets i'll want under the tank and how many light switches i'll want too.

so far, above, that is 6 outlets and 5 light switches. At this time, my design can support what looks like 6 light switches and 2outlet receptacles (i.e. 12 plugs).


thoughts?

 

[justingraham]

So I have two dedicated 20 amp gfci outlets above my tank and one below my tank
I plugged two different apex power pars into each one
I have more then enough outlets

Six lights two halides two leds refugium light and a moon lights

Skimmer

Two return pumps

Two heaters

One fan

With two eb8s I have 16 outlets then I have two power outlets connected to each 20 amp circuits with five outlets a piece

I'm nowhere near the 20 amps on either circuit

My power heads are the wavs by Neptune so I just plugged the outlet into one of the dedicated power outlets.

U can use a uv light if ya want some people swear by them but for the most let if it's not a good one they are not worth the hassle.

this is on the wall behind my tank in my sump room.

that is the last picture I have of my wall on my phone I'll take an updated one when I get home.

If you plan properly u should only need two dedicated outlets with possibly four outlets all together if u plan on getting an apex or similar controller

 

[MarsRover]

alrighty folks, i designed a sump today. let me know what you think. i was finding it difficult to manage keeping the water level at the proper hight for the reef octopus elite 220int skimmer while also trying to keep the depth as deep as possible for the fuge section. Marked around the skimmer box (on a red stand to elevate it as much as i can with still being able to empty it without being stuck under the bottom of the tank) is the range which the skimmer needs the water level for operation.