80,000 Gallon Saltwater Aquarium

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Read your thread, and LiveAquaria.com facility popped into my mind right away. Here is one of their Youtube videos giving a quick tour, this might give you an idea of what kind of water systems you are looking at.
 
Justiful said:
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com


Here is a website that will help you. I would read a lot of the stuff there first, most your questions will get answered that way. This forum is specific to people building tanks of that size, scope, and scale. While you will likely get great info here also, as @Epicreefster showed, there forums have a lot of basic info covered in stickies. A lot of people there have built 10k+ gallon tanks. WARNING: There forums are not nearly as active as these forums, but browsing their forums is more educational to the 10k gallon club. That video gives you some idea of the scale of what you are planning. It is "only" 50k gallons... Also that guy seems active... so maybe ask to interview him for school, and use him as one of your sources for your paper. COLLEGES LOVE primary sources. He was last online 15min ago on monster forums.

I hate referring on one forum to another, I hope it not against reef2reef policy, just seems like that site offers a very rare and tiny nitch of fish keepers specific to what he is looking for.
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Yeah, I had stated earlier that I've seen his tank before. It's really awesome! That might help with the design of the tank, but it never really says anything about filtration or any equipment, just a little bit about lights. I'm a member on MFK, and I can say that this forum is much more active!
 
Why not research some aquariums that already exist? If I wanted to build a car, I would talk to somebody who builds cars. You don't have to start from zero.
 
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Windy said:
Why not research some aquariums that already exist? If I wanted to build a car, I would talk to somebody who builds cars. You don't have to start from zero.
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I know some have very low opinions of them but I would suggest trying to get in contact with Acrylic Tank Manufacturing, the folks from Tanked. The do have experience building large systems.
 
Not sure what your funding is like, but start up cost and operating cost is going to be substantial. Your probably looking between $300k-$800k at the least. There is no hobbiest level equipment that will work for this system and filteration on this level can be scaled up from a hobbiest perspective.

If you are interested check out our website @ Integrated-Aqua.com

Or give me an email @ [email protected]

We design and build commercial filtration systems for public aquariums, aquatic research facilities , and commercial aquaculture.

Thanks, Dillon
 
Hello all,

I spent about 6 months volunteering at the California Academy of Sciences Steinhart Aquarium in the Aquatic Husbandry Department. I worked on the coldwater marine systems there including a large grouper tank, giant pacific octopus tank, rocky reef tank, and of course the 100,000 California Coast Tank. I did this because I was curious to see how these aquariums were built behind the scenes in order to see if I could bring some of the concepts back to home aquaria. It was a great experience and I learned a lot.

Nonetheless, I feel I can help you with a few of the questions.

Glass will not work for a tank this big; acrylic panels (at least a foot thick) will be the only option. The rest of the tank will be reinforced concrete, preferably excavated into the ground, along with a sealant of which there are many.

Sumps for these tanks will either be reinforced fiberglass, or more likely for an 80,000gal system, concrete cisterns built into the ground on the scale of thousands of gallons.

MRC makes industrial sized skimmers, so does Aquarium Engineering which is Bill Wann's company. Get yours from Bill!

Lighting should be a combination of natural, metal halide, and it seems like LED's may be feasible now too.

Flow for a tank this big has only one option. The Hydrowizards is basically a huge prop pump. They used three of these on the 100,000 Cal Coast tank. From http://www.belowwater.com/category/pump/

Temp control can only be achieved with industrial size heat exchangers.

We fed a combo of fresh seafood like capelin and other small fish. We also fed what I can only describe as a "protein block" of food. It was sorta spongy and supposedly had lots of vitamins and other stuff.

Water changes can be performed by running to large cisterns in parallel that can be isolated. When you want to do a water change, fill the offline cistern with fresh saltwater, then redirect flow to this cistern. Drain the other cistern. Alternate order for next water change.

Best,
Kent
 
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retiredsailor said:
I know some have very low opinions of them but I would suggest trying to get in contact with Acrylic Tank Manufacturing, the folks from Tanked. The do have experience building large systems.
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That's exactly what I was thinking. I'll give them a call
 
Tidal Gardens
So this is just a design, not a design and build right? Is there a set budget... or is the the sky the limit? Just curious.
 
Also calcium reactor instead of dosers. The cost of dosing liquid will be very expensive on 80k tank.

And I agree talk to Bill Wann. His company specializes in building reef products for custom large reef tanks.
 
Also talk to @Pigpen he specializes in large aquariums. Currently has a 20,000 in home and custom makes all the equipment. He also does installs for other using his equipment so may be able to quote prices for you.
 
Deltec
kangadrew said:
Hey guys,

I'm new here, so go easy on me :)
So, for my marine biology class, I must design an incredibly large aquarium. So, I have decided to go with an 80,000 gallon system. The problem is that I must get feedback and ideas from others, plus get product names, and specific prices/quotes. So, I am coming to the nicest reef forum in the world to get advice! Below are some specific information pieces, plus all of my questions:

  • Display Tank is 80,000 gallons, or 302,834 liters
  • Display Tank is 100 feet long x 10 feet 8 inches wide x 10 feet high, or 31 meters long x 3 meters wide x 3 meters high
  • What should the tank be made of? Maybe 2 huge panes of star fire glass? It would just be on the front. It will also be built into the wall, so the rest may be built out of thick concrete plus some sort of sealant. Thoughts?
  • What size sump should this tank have? I would like one that has three partitions in it.
  • A RO Water Unit and Tank will also be installed. Hopefully one that produces about 4,000 gallons per day.
  • Water conditions will be important. Correct me if I'm wrong in saying this. It's an Indo-Pacific Reef design (I'll get into stock later), so the conditions will be: Alkalinity (7.6 dkh), Calcium (380-400 ppm), Magnesium (1,450 ppm), Phosphate (0-0.02 ppm), Nitrate (0.25 ppm), Specific Gravity (1.024), and Temperature (76.8 F).
  • The skimmer will likely be one rated for anywhere from 40,000 to 115,000 gallons. Any specific products? Looking to keep it simple with 1 skimmer
  • Lighting will have to be super specific. Luckily, T5's won't be necessary, as getting that many corals would run to the millions of dollars (not to mention perfect conditions and how devastating that would be to reefs). There will be coral inserts. Probably about 740 LEDs in total should be enough. Maybe 75 watts each? Super high wattage, but we'll get to that later.
  • Anyone know of any massive powerheads out there? I think 4 huge ones are in order for a tank of this size. I would like ones that can cycle up to 800,000 gallons per hour each. Minimum would be ones that can cycle up to 200,000 gallons per hour each.
  • I would like to go with a single pump running the sump system. Does anyone know of a pump that is capable of a max flow rate of 400,000 gallons per hour?
  • I need to know a good dosing unit. One that is capable of doing approximately 11,000 mL per minute. Custom built may be an option, but is not preferred. For smaller doses, the minimum should probably be around 75 mL per minute. I would like one run by some sort of motor.
  • What's a good top-off system for this tank?
  • This is the hard part - heaters. I would like 2 heaters, preferably about 45,000 watts each. Is there any way to cut down on the prices of this?
  • What's a good brand of UV Sterilizer for the tank?
  • No clue what type of reactor to use? Suggestions?
  • There will be an ORP meter on the tank. What brand to use?
  • Lighting schedule: They will be 185 blues, 185 royal blues, 185 whites, and 185 reds. The blues, royal blues, and whites will be on for 12 hours per day, at 100 percent. The reds will be run vor 4 hours in the morning at 15 percent
  • Three times a day, there will be foods fed. Not sure what types or how much. Also, some sort of "special" food, like a supplement, but food, will be fed twice a week. Again, I'm not sure what to feed for that.
  • Maintenance will be as simple as possible. I will do a 10-15 percent water change every 2 weeks; what salt should I use? Any maintenance with the reactors? The RO tank will be refilled once a week. The front and sides of the tank will be cleaned every 3 to 4 days, and the back will be cleaned every 3 to 4 weeks. The powerheads and skimmer pump will be cleaned every 6 months. Did I leave anything out?
  • I'm not sure what livestock will be yet - definitely some sharks, tangs, and other huge (and some not so huge) indo-pacific native reef fish.
So that's where I stand. I'll come back once I've decided on a complete stock list, and any feedback on this is appreciated. The assignment is to make this as thorough as possible, and to plan it out like I were planning it out to actually be built. Once again, thanks for any help!
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Am I the only person who thinks this whole thread is odd? I'm guessing since marine biology is fairly specific this is a college level course, and I've never had a professor suggest students utilize forums for projects or research. I think most of his questions are to specific and are basically asking others to do the work for him.

For example: how thick should the acrylic be? Pull out a calculator and figure it out. You'll quickly find from your own work and calculations that glass just won't work (and the required thickness of acrylic). You've probably covered the appropriate equations in class (or ask your professor in office hours what resources he suggest you use to find the equations). I've reported this thread and suggested that it's closed.

If I'm off on this, then I'd encourage the OP to post the university, course number, and professor, and let me run this thread by him.
 
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TylerS said:
Am I the only person who thinks this whole thread is odd?.
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What's wrong with bouncing ideas and getting feed back from other people. Ultimately, he will have to make decisions, get quotes, put it all together in a presentation and deliver it to his teacher/professor. Whether you get the ideas from a text book (doubt there is one on a subject like this) or from an online forum from a group of people with some experience in the subject, they are both valid. I hope it remains open, because I am enjoy seeing the aspects of a very large system, like the one described.
 
Mike in CT said:
So this is just a design, not a design and build right? Is there a set budget... or is the the sky the limit? Just curious.
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Well, I must plan this like the entire thing is going to actually be built. I have to plan out the budget - $15M is what I'm aiming for, and cheaper is better.
TylerS said:
Am I the only person who thinks this whole thread is odd?
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I'm really not sure why you feel this is odd. Part of the grade for the assignment is to bounce off of other's ideas (basically), but not just copy everything from someone. For instance, it must replicate a natural environment, and the stock list must be entirely from the same area. I have already run the forum by him twice, and he's perfectly fine with it. He has also recommended others to come to forums for help. But honestly, the thread isn't about arguing, it's about building a dream tank, so let's stay on topic as much as possible now.
 
I think there was a little confusion if it was going to be an actual build, and not knowing the budget probably made it harder for people to wrap their head around it.
Did you ever contact ATM? I would think they could give you a ball park figure pretty quick considering its a school project.
 

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