Jasen's Office Tank - 15 gallon Reef

JasenHicks · Sep 29, 2020

Got my brackets finished for my vertical pipe (return) done. These will do two things: space my tank from the back edge of my stand properly and hold the pipe in place so there is no movement. One will be screwed to the tank stand top, the other will just sit against the tank with a bit of rubber to parent it from sliding while maintaining the pipe perpendicular to the stand top.

JasenHicks · Sep 29, 2020

JasenHicks · Oct 4, 2020

A couple new things made while I figure out the noise for my drain (still trying more things @Takaki1980 - it's still too loud). Here's my Skimz Quiet Por DC Pump controller bracket.

If you want to 3D Print one yourself, here's the Thingiverse Link: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4614504

JasenHicks · Oct 12, 2020

Finished my power station and controller board for the reef tank. Laser cut acrylic and 3D printed parts for the win!

To make it quiet (the system) I made a muffler thingy and limited the flow. Not super stoked about limited flow in the fuge, but the limits of this tank are real. It's a basic 7mm thick piece of Plexi cut to a star shape that fits into the drain pipe.

Also made this Kessil light mount for over my fuge section. Inspired by Parker's Reef on YouTube and his new showtank build.

Machpoint89 · Jan 13, 2022

Awesome work. Time for an update!

PeterEde · Jan 13, 2022

JasenHicks said:
I'm not a huge fan of the included baffle plates for my tank, so instead of living with it ... I just designed my own. Mocked up in Solidworks, shown below. I'll cut out of 3mm black acrylic on a laser and use weld-on to keep the pieces together. I didn't like the lack of teeth around the top of the baffle because I could see the 4 thin slits getting clogged almost immediately and the slits around the bottom went all the way to the bottom so I suspect it those would get clogged up as well.

My design has 10mm x 5mm teeth around the top and 2mm wide, 50mm tall slits around the bottom that start 75mm above the bottom. This is well above the top of the sand I intend on using (likely going to use about 1cm of sand just to have something down there.

I think cutting the slits deeper would allow for a lid on the overflow. Might quieten it a bit more?

JasenHicks · Jan 14, 2022

Well, here's my update. I got tired of the setup... it was overall too small and I didn't like the Japanese style overflow and plumbing setup. It sat right next to me in my office and while I thought it looked cool, the rolling water made me have to pee far more than I wanted and the openness of the stand/etc. wasn't appealing to everyone else in the office (which I didn't care about too much, I am the senior person there).

I decided to replace the tank and setup with a Red Sea Reefer XL300 system and sure am glad I did! The new tank is HUGE compared to the other one (15 gallon display to roughly 60 gallon) and it gives me a lot of room for additions. I did reuse my Ecotech MP10s, my Skimz Protein skimmer, heater, water, fish, rock, and biomedia. I did have to upgrade to the bigger version of the light I am using and shifted to a DC return pump that is bigger. Its the Varios 4.

I did the move in an afternoon, after I prestaged 3x 100L tanks in my office with water, a few trash cans to hold old water and livestock, and random towels, and cleaners. Everything made it fine, had a minor spike in ammonia that didn't really do much and fought through a small bacteria bloom for about a week after 2 weeks of it being setup. Everyone is happy and thriving! Since its setup in my office in the basement of a military building its hard to get photos, but Ill do my best to get some and post it up.

Future plans: add more corals, add more fish, swap the skimmer. I like the skimz OK but I think a Deltec 600i or Maxpect. Not sure yet

JasenHicks · Feb 24, 2022

Well... here's another update. My office decided I needed to be moved to a different directorate and I brought the tank home. It was a huge move and a pain in the rear, but we got it done in about 2 hours (drained, moved to the house). Everything made it... the fish and other live stock remained in a cooler with heaters (it was f*ing heavy) while I reconnected everything and filled the water back to the tank (we salvaged it all sans a few gallons). There are many benefits to this move...

1. The tank is at home.
2. Maintenance is much easier.
3. I get to see it more.
4. I can take pictures!
5. I can do fun internet stuff for it.

My first "upgrade" will be to get everything onto TP Link Kasa Smart Power Strips so I can monitor everything in Home Assistant and control it with my phone and some well placed NFC tags. I'm not there yet, I have some builds to do (slide out shelf, etc) but its going to happen in the next few weeks. Perhaps I'll do a YT video for the journey.

If you aren't familiar with Home Assistant, its basically a smart home controller. I wont spoil all my plans but using the Power Strip lets me do something like this with it... Don't worry, I'm in Japan so that voltage is right and fortunately most everything uses an AC-DC (100-240V) brick now

Tank ****.... this was day 1 after it was all moved.

This is a new Euphyllia I added recently

My GSP rock. Hard to believe this is only 14 months old and its from a GSP rock that jumped over to it. Its well away from everything else now

It started as bare Marco Rock I superglued with sand together

My easily serviceable and stackable bio-ball rack with chateo!

JasenHicks · Mar 19, 2022

Spent some time finishing my controller cabinet and tidied up my sump area of the reef tank. The cabinet isn't my finest work, but I also don't have a lot of tools here in Japan.

Final install: