New Fiji Cube 76G EXT Build

[Mayacan]

I ordered my pvc pipe from homedepot.com through Formufit (which is furniture grade colored pvc, schedule 40). Price was really reasonable compared to bulkreefsupply.com (cost about $35 for 20’ of pipe).

I ordered 10’ of 1” Blue pipe for my drains and 10’ of 3/4” Black pipe for my returns. The package already comes with schedule 80 fittings (I may buy some additional unions, you can never have enough unions). Pipe is scheduled to arrive July 5th so I’ll dry fit plumbing till then.

 

[Mayacan]

Forgot to mention, I already did my aquascape (45 lbs of Marco dry rock and about 3 pieces of foundation rock) and arranged it in a tub of saltwater @ 1.015 SG and set to 83 degrees. Started the cycling process of the rock, sorta a jumpstart while I waited for all my build parts to arrive. It’s been in tub for approximately a month now.

 

[Monte26]

Please post your observations and experience, would love to compare notes

You bet! I went with the IM APS stand and Fiji 30 sump. I'm sure I'll start a build thread here once I get around to plumbing everything.

 

[Mayacan]

You bet! I went with the IM APS stand and Fiji 30 sump. I'm sure I'll start a build thread here once I get around to plumbing everything.

Curious why you went with the IM stand, I k ow it’s made of aluminum, but it’s also a lot more expensive. So you just have the FC sump and tank? You purchased them individually instead of getting the package?

 

[Monte26]

Curious why you went with the IM stand, I k ow it’s made of aluminum, but it’s also a lot more expensive. So you just have the FC sump and tank? You purchased them individually instead of getting the package?

I’m in a bit of a unique situation as I work for BRS and used my employee discount on the tank/stand/sump. Since we don’t stock the Fiji packages, going with the APS stand was actually less expensive for me. Under normal circumstances, I probably would have ended up with the Fiji Cube package as well.

 

[Mayacan]

I’m in a bit of a unique situation as I work for BRS and used my employee discount on the tank/stand/sump. Since we don’t stock the Fiji packages, going with the APS stand was actually less expensive for me. Under normal circumstances, I probably would have ended up with the Fiji Cube package as well.

Envious. I should have hit you up for assistance… I looked into getting the stand separately (looked at aluminum stands) but in the end, couldn’t justify the extra cost. The FC package is very complete, only thing I have to buy is the pvc pipe, which I already purchased, but even all the fittings that come with the package look to be very high quality. Might need to purchase additional unions and have some street elbows and regular elbows in my BRS cart as we speak as I need to build the bean animal drains that will go in the overflow box (did you get the overflow box from FC as well?).

 

[Monte26]

Envious. I should have hit you up for assistance… I looked into getting the stand separately (looked at aluminum stands) but in the end, couldn’t justify the extra cost. The FC package is very complete, only thing I have to buy is the pvc pipe, which I already purchased, but even all the fittings that come with the package look to be very high quality. Might need to purchase additional unions and have some street elbows and regular elbows in my BRS cart as we speak as I need to build the bean animal drains that will go in the overflow box (did you get the overflow box from FC as well?).

Yep, Fiji cube overflow. I like that we can remove the whole internal portion on their overflows for cleaning.

Anyway, I didn’t mean to hijack your build thread. Just really excited to see someone else also setting one of these tanks up

 

[Mayacan]

Yep, Fiji cube overflow. I like that we can remove the whole internal portion on their overflows for cleaning.

Anyway, I didn’t mean to hijack your build thread. Just really excited to see someone else also setting one of these tanks up

Didn’t hijack at all, please give me more info on your build, I want to compare notes and make sure I’m seeing every angle while doing build and what better way to get feedback from another user in almost same boat (same tank and sump). I’m really worried about the plumbing portion of it, never done it and looking for guidance as to what is best way to do it (how to run pipe down to sump, what angles and positions of fittings, what do you need to glue and what you don’t, are you running flexible tubing from your return and transitioning to pvc pipe or are you running all pvc? What glues in to where, like do you glue in pvc into bulkhead on sump?). Put unions everywhere? Or where is best to position them.

 

[Monte26]

Didn’t hijack at all, please give me more info on your build, I want to compare notes and make sure I’m seeing every angle while doing build and what better way to get feedback from another user in almost same boat (same tank and sump). I’m really worried about the plumbing portion of it, never done it and looking for guidance as to what is best way to do it (how to run pipe down to sump, what angles and positions of fittings, what do you need to glue and what you don’t, are you running flexible tubing from your return and transitioning to pvc pipe or are you running all pvc? What glues in to where, like do you glue in pvc into bulkhead on sump?). Put unions everywhere? Or where is best to position them.

my best advice is to sit down with pencil and paper and draw everything out. Not only will this help you nail down the design, it’ll also help you order the right number of fittings

 

[Mayacan]

my best advice is to sit down with pencil and paper and draw everything out. Not only will this help you nail down the design, it’ll also help you order the right number of fittings

I don’t have to order fittings, the FC came with fittings (maybe I’ll have to order a couple here and there to complete, but not much)

 

[Mayacan]

My plumbing pipe finally came in today and began the process of cutting and dry fitting the drains and returns. Hopefully I have enough of each size (10’ of both 1” Blue (drains) and 3/4” Black (returns)). I think I will need to order a couple more unions and some schedule 80 - 45 degree elbows as it is kind of tricky getting from overflow to sump because of how the cutouts are on back of stand. Below are picks of the overflow box and inner box finally mounted on tank, along with the dry fitted unions.

 

[Mayacan]

Spent 7 hours (off and on) gluing drains. Have main and secondary all glued and connected to sump. My emergency drain is almost complete just want to put a union (ran out, put an order in for one) before getting to the sump. My returns shown in pics are temporary (returns will be 3/4” black pipe), just wanted to make sure drains and returns did not hit each other.

 

[Mayacan]

So I got some more items for the tank. Purchased a raceway to be able to route all my cables neatly from my controller board I purchased and will be inside my cabinet (I’ll take pics once it is installed). Also purchased foot long extensions so I can connect all my equipment to my smart strip I have also purchased. The extensions have a flat 45 degree low profile head so everything fits behind the controller board.

 

[Mayacan]

So I got some more items for the tank. Purchased a raceway to be able to route all my cables neatly from my controller board I purchased and will be inside my cabinet (I’ll take pics once it is installed). Also purchased foot long extensions so I can connect all my equipment to my smart strip I have also purchased. The extensions have a flat 45 degree low profile head so everything fits behind the controller board.

All my plumbing is now complete. just waiting for a black vinyl hose that BRS sent me by mistake (sent me 1" ID when I ordered 3/4" ID) for my return pump to be connected to return line. I'm just waiting on that and a lid I purchased for my ATO container from Octo Aquatics (original lid came in slightly off dimension and wont fit on container, Octo was nice enough to redo lid and ship out).

I just purchased the Nyos 120 skimmer and it is currently being shipped should arrive mid week, also purchased my second AI Prime 16HD as I will run 2 AI Primes on this tank (first AI Prime I will be taking off my nano and probably replacing it with a Kessil A80 for my 20 gallon nano). I'll also be purchasing an IceCap 2k wavemaker (one for now) and will decide in the future if I need to buy a second one, but I'll also probably move my AI Nero 3 from my nano to this tank.

Once I get all this equipment in, plan on mounting everything on control board I purchased which will go in stand, and route all cabling neatly through and back of stand to control board. I had thought of putting control board on some rails so i could slide in and out (like rails you put on a drawer on a dresser), but decided to just go with the french cleat and hang it inside my stand where it sits in the picture below.

After all this, I'm planning on getting tank wet next weekend, plan to fill it up with RODI water (76 gallons + about 25-30 gallons for sump, should take a good 12-15 hours to fill I imagine). Also, I ran line from my RODI setup in the garage through wall to back of tank so I will have direct access/supply of RODI water whenever I desire and don't have to buy Brute trashcans to move water from garage to tank (pictures attached). I'll let it run for a couple of days and if successful, ill drain tank about halfway, add salt to a 1.026 SG, add heater and get up to temp (78 degrees) and then add my dry rock to tank that has been cycling for over a month now, add sand (going with Caribsea arag-alive special reef grade), start with around 40 lbs of sand (want a shallow sand bed) and re-topoff the tank and let it go from there.

 

[Mayacan]

Today I got two major pieces to the puzzle, installed/placed my Sicce Return Pump and my Nyos 120 Skimmer.

 

[Mayacan]

Today I got two major pieces to the puzzle, installed/placed my Sicce Return Pump and my Nyos 120 Skimmer.

Skimmer looks so small in this huge sump

 

[Ro Bow]

updates?

 

[Mayacan]

updates?

Tank is sitting around, I have everything set except the last AI Prime for the tank (that I don't need to start the tank), but I will get Reefled 50 I purchased in on Friday and will put that on my 20 gallon nano and switch the AI Prime to this tank. My 40 lbs of Arag-Alive Sand will arrive tomorrow and the plan is to fill up the tank on Saturday with RODI water and leak test tank and plumbing and sump. If all goes well with the leak test, I then plan on draining around 20-30 gallons of the RODI water and salt the remaining water in system to 1.026 SG, heat up tank to 78 degrees and add my aquascape to tank (which has been cycling for the last month and a half) and add the 20-30 gallons of saltwater that is sitting in bin with aquascape currently and get this tank moving. To tell you truth, I could have done this last weekend, just got involved in other things and to fill 76 gallons of tank + 25-30 gallons of sump is going to take at least a day. I'm also a little nervous about encountering leaks, crossing fingers that goes well.

 

[Mayacan]

My journey starts…. Tank getting wet

 

[Mayacan]

Well, it’s been a long road and a berry long weekend (took about 12 hours to fill this guy with RODI water), but it’s done. System is up and running, put in my aquascape (after it sat in saltwater bin for 2 months). Took a heck of a lot of salt (currently sitting at 1.023), but will slowly bring it up to 1.026. I will put in my sand tomorrow (probably should have put it in when I had less water in system, that whole displacement thing), but I’ll adjust as I put it in, starting with 2-20 lbs of live sand, se how much coverage I get. Will send pics tomorrow when sand is in.