Hello, all thanks for looking at my build thread.
I have had several FW and SW fish only tanks my entire life. I have been out of the hobby for many years now, but my girlfriend’s daughter has re-sparked my interest, she is an avid FW aquarist.
This time around I am building the coveted reef tank that I have always admired. So, for the past year I have been doing research on the subject. Reading and watching countless videos on, Lighting, water chemistry, filtration, and the like. Someday soon I might start learning about what livestock I want, HA.
I am a busy person like most here and needed to make reef keeping as easy as I can from the start, so I MAYBE went backwards. Instead of the aquarium first I purchased a 7 stage RO-DI unit, storage and mixing containers, built the stand and put it all together, made great water yea… no tank to put it in though, but I have 180 gallons of fresh water ready to mix LoL.
Here’s my RO/DI station.
While doing all this I have been going to the LFS and started buying dry rock, a few small items, and building a friendship with the staff. As I explained my previous fish keeping method’s to them I was deemed as the Old School guy. I take that as a badge of honor not an insult.
As my research continued right or wrong led me to want to use the Triton method for my reef. My reasoning for this is vast and for another thread.
So here we go searching for a tank, and one was dropped in my lap. Figuratively speaking or I would have suffered broken legs and a long vacation in the hospital.
I found a used 150G almost complete system, it came with everything but the return pump, skimmer, heaters, water and livestock. A big plus was the sump even had the required refugium.
As it was used of course it needed an extensive cleaning and overhaul. Here it is sprayed off but not scrubbed. Not shown is the light fixture or the wood paneling that covered the stand.
So on to the sump.
From right to left you can see the refugium section, followed by the return pump area, followed by the skimmer section, and then the drain inlet section.
The sump is fed by two drain lines, looking at the rear tank picture above you can see the one drain line was split and feeding the separate refugium and the drain inlet. The draw back to this sump was the drain inlet section design, It had no access and created a impossible to clean or retrieve the pluming fittings without turning it upside down.
So now the cleanup begins. I had the stand and hood sand blasted and powder coated, tore everything off the tank and here is the result.
Turned out so nice I decided I did not want to enclose the stand, but this created a major issue. The sump was perfectly functional but due to its condition was never gona be a show piece ever again. My solution was to purchase the Triton 44 from Trigger systems.
So this is the final assembly.
The aqua scaping is not final but the tank as it sits is fully plumbed, water tested and functional.
I have had several FW and SW fish only tanks my entire life. I have been out of the hobby for many years now, but my girlfriend’s daughter has re-sparked my interest, she is an avid FW aquarist.
This time around I am building the coveted reef tank that I have always admired. So, for the past year I have been doing research on the subject. Reading and watching countless videos on, Lighting, water chemistry, filtration, and the like. Someday soon I might start learning about what livestock I want, HA.
I am a busy person like most here and needed to make reef keeping as easy as I can from the start, so I MAYBE went backwards. Instead of the aquarium first I purchased a 7 stage RO-DI unit, storage and mixing containers, built the stand and put it all together, made great water yea… no tank to put it in though, but I have 180 gallons of fresh water ready to mix LoL.
Here’s my RO/DI station.
While doing all this I have been going to the LFS and started buying dry rock, a few small items, and building a friendship with the staff. As I explained my previous fish keeping method’s to them I was deemed as the Old School guy. I take that as a badge of honor not an insult.
As my research continued right or wrong led me to want to use the Triton method for my reef. My reasoning for this is vast and for another thread.
So here we go searching for a tank, and one was dropped in my lap. Figuratively speaking or I would have suffered broken legs and a long vacation in the hospital.
I found a used 150G almost complete system, it came with everything but the return pump, skimmer, heaters, water and livestock. A big plus was the sump even had the required refugium.
As it was used of course it needed an extensive cleaning and overhaul. Here it is sprayed off but not scrubbed. Not shown is the light fixture or the wood paneling that covered the stand.
So on to the sump.
From right to left you can see the refugium section, followed by the return pump area, followed by the skimmer section, and then the drain inlet section.
The sump is fed by two drain lines, looking at the rear tank picture above you can see the one drain line was split and feeding the separate refugium and the drain inlet. The draw back to this sump was the drain inlet section design, It had no access and created a impossible to clean or retrieve the pluming fittings without turning it upside down.
So now the cleanup begins. I had the stand and hood sand blasted and powder coated, tore everything off the tank and here is the result.
Turned out so nice I decided I did not want to enclose the stand, but this created a major issue. The sump was perfectly functional but due to its condition was never gona be a show piece ever again. My solution was to purchase the Triton 44 from Trigger systems.
So this is the final assembly.
The aqua scaping is not final but the tank as it sits is fully plumbed, water tested and functional.
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