[FreshToReef]

Hey everyone! My names Thomas, I'm 18, I've been on TheReefTank for quite awhile, but after a failed attempt at constantly bandaiding a 55 reef, I decided to tear it down save up, and start off one right.

So recently I purchased a 125gallon tank. (TRUVU claims its 125, but math claims its ~112), Undrilled and scratched up a bit. So I painted the tank with Kyrlon Fusion black paint, Built a stand which is still in the process of being built, I'd like to make sure I have enough room for everything before I finish it. So it's just the frame of a stand for now.

I have several items from Glass-holes.com coming in the mail for drilling it and DIYing an overflow, and with the help of my mom, who still thinks I should follow my childhood dream of becoming a Marine Biologist rather than a Software Engineer and entrepreneur, I will be receiving a number of parts for Christmas, which is when I'll know what I personally have to buy.

My lighting, I decided based on the price and reviews, is Dimmable taotronics with some stunner strips. So far I love them, the fans are a bit noisy just testing it out, but since they'll be on timers, the fans only come on during the day when noise isn't an issue. I made my choice based on this review "http://www.3reef.com/forums/led-aquarium-lighting/my-taotronics-par-results-136136.html" sorry if I'm not allowed to post links to external sites D:

I'm going with a Reef Octopus skimmer, maxijet return, BRS RODI system, 50lbs of live rock, 50lbs base rock, and a thin .5" sand bed just for aesthetics. I have a 55 gallon sump, with about 1200gph flow. My display, will have about 7000gph of flow from 4 JBJ wavemakers. I'm going to do all SPS with a few LPS corals toward the bottom of the tank, with a carpet anemone and a RBTA (But those wont be here for quiiiite awhile) And maybe a few NPS based on my success with this tank.

Fish are mainly going to be a few schooling cardinals, several anthias's, maybe a few wrasse and a healthy assortment of different shaped tangs.

As for aquascape, I'm going to go with a large rock mountain sloping down from the right side of the tank, until it will stop, there will be about 10 inches of open sand, and then another mountain with a positive slope. I might stack the rocks with a hollow interior to provide more hiding spots, but place a powerhead in the cavern to keep it from being a dead spot.

This is where I'm at right now, if I can figure out how to post a picture...

Well I couldnt embed it, but it is attached... Thanks guys, and I look forward to your constructive criticism, as well as (hopefully) some praise and approval.

 

[james30ct]

Congrats on the build.

 

[FreshToReef]

Thank you! If you or anyone else reading this has any questions/concerns about how I'm going about anything, feel free to ask!

 

[scotkenny]

Cool man!Any plans on buffing the tank out before you fill it?

 

[FreshToReef]

The inside is really just blemishes, all the hazing and scratching is on the outside, which I'm definitely going to sand and buff out this Sunday. Then I'll fill it up with water and see if there are any scratches I can see on the inside and if so I'll go ahead and buff those out as well.

 

[Zark]

1200 gph going through your sump is going to give you micro bubble problems. I had the same basic sump set up and couldnt get rid of them without slowing the return to about 700 gph.

Be careful buffing out the scratches. It will create weak "dimples" in the glass that will be easier to break than the surrounding glass. If they are not terribly noticiable I would simply live with them.

 

[scotkenny]

Ya 1200 actual gph would be a bit much but a 1200 gph pump is what I run on my 120.A mag 12 which after being t'd and after 4 ft of head pressure is somewhere round 7-800.Deep gouges are one thing but most scratches (even some knarly ones) can be removed rather easily.Not to mention a good overall buff n polish will make a world of difference!:agree:Ya wanna see those prurdy sps ya plan on growin I'm sure.They sell kits and there's some youtube vids out there.I did it and was def worth the time.Got a 75 done in a relatively short day.

 

[FreshToReef]

Well the pump is rated at ~1300gph, I shouldve mention the 6 foot headloss... So it should be substantially lower. I was already foreseeing the microbubble problem, so I'm going to get some sort of pad or floss between the baffles that I'll give a quick powerwash every other day or so.

 

[FreshToReef]

Got my bulkheads today! Ordered the bulkheads and drillbits through glass-holes.com. These guys are a real pleasure to work with, awesome prices, extremely sturdy bulkheads, cheap and fast shipping, and they even give pieces of Candy in the package. Although they do lose a star because they sent a Tootsie Roll and they should know I hate tootsie rolls... But they also sent Swedish fish so it wasn't all bad :rotflmao: I got bulkheads for 1 1/2" pvc, two for a herbie overflow and 1 1" for my return. These things are massive... I've only installed 1/2" bulkheads, and by comparison these are huge!


As you can see in the picture, they're as big as my fist! Which actually look kind of small in the picture, so now you guys are just embarassing me...

 

[FreshToReef]

Okay, drilling went flawlessly... except for one flaw... Just kidding, it went almost perfect, except for one beam is 1/4" in the way, luckily, I made the stand an inch longer than needed in every direction, so I can just move the tank forward just a little bit, probably hardly noticeable. I'll be doing the plumbing one of these days! Probably tomorrow actually... Glad everything is movin' along.

 

[FreshToReef]

Alright guys, intake plumbing and overflow box is siliconed into place. Quick update right here, just showing the plumbing and the box I made, and how I plan to aquascape.

So heres the plumbing, went with two 1-1/2in herbie intakes for the herbie overflow, and a 1inch return.

The tank now done with overflow box in place. Which I did myself and got a nice battlescar from the acrylic.

And my two Island aquascape plan with alot of room for fish to swim. Might end up doing a bridge across the sections but I'm not sure.

 

[FreshToReef]

Hope everyone is enjoying the Holidays! Today several boxes came for me, and I also picked up a few bags of sand and Salt. Going with Reef Crystals for the salt. As for the boxes....

My refractometer and TDS meter came, both pretty sweet and will definitely come in handy.
My ATO came from autotopoff.com pretty sturdily built and I'm glad I won't have to constantly fill the sump anymore...
Two Maxi-jet pumps came, one for my GFO reactor which comes monday, and one for transporting water from my saltwater mixing station to my tank.

Finally, the item I'm most satisfied with is my wavemaker kit.
I ordered two JBJ oceanstream kits, one 500gph set (1000 total) and one 1600GPH set, (3200gph total). The 500gph set came today, and these things are perfect. I've read that they're bulky, but I must've gotten the new models or something, I don't believe this will push out 500gph. They're about the size of a small lemon and the magnets are extremely powerful. the 500gph ones are just going to be used directly at the surface for plenty of surface movement, and indirectly pointed at the section of the tank where all my SPS shall flourish. Then I plan on having the 1600s going across the center of the tank at a slight angle to get all the sps, and brush over the few LPS I plan to keep on the bottom of the tank.

 

[FreshToReef]

Alright, so last night I began making RODI, after a few problems, we got it running strong. about 3gph. so It'll take about three days to fill... I got 32 gallons done since overnight it was having problems. And the tank looks practically empty with those measly 32 gallons...

I have all my equipment except for the protein skimmer and rock. Rock will come sometime this week, Reefcleaners was really friendly in their personal email regarding my rock request. Ordered my protein skimmer on affordableaquarium... a week ago, still hasn't even shipped. They're killin me here as I can't baffle my sump yet since I need to know the shape of the footprint of it.

But heres the tank with 32 gallons of water!

 

[FreshToReef]

Alright, so after a few days of troubleshooting, the tank is looking good. All my rock gets here tomorrow, along with a GFO reactor and my JBJ powerheads. (Never ordering things during the holidays ever again...) My skimmer still hasn't shipped from affordableaquatics, although they had assured me it would ship monday even with holiday delays.

So my herbie overflow took hours to tune properly, I don't know why, my overflow box is also cracked. I probably should've went over with another layer of silicone but I'll run to the home depot in an hour or so and buy a longer piece of pvc for the lower herbie intake, so that incase of pump failure only 15 gallons or so gets pumped into my sump rather than about 50...

I plan on ordering a clean up crew on sunday from Liveaquaria, and that'll be my first livestock purchase.

 

[FreshToReef]

My LFS is going out of business as well, so I picked up two massive frags of Monti. One Red and one purple, both about the size of my palm. 15 dollars each! They're being stored in my friends tank for the time being. He doesn't dose anything and doesn't do WC's too often or anything, but hopefully they manage to thrive in his tank.