Reefkeeper's 75 Gallon Build

Started work on the canopy over the past few days to get it caught up to where the stand is at. I want the finishing stage to be a strait shot thought out both the stand and canopy.

After taking some measurements we began work on the frame, starting with the two ends.



Had to drill lots of pocket and pilot holes due to it being easy to split the 1x2's when fastening them together.



Beginning to take shape!







Next up is the door for the canopy.

Current rocks. I've enjoyed all 3 of mine!
Hey reefkeeper, check out this LED accent lighting.
Had I used crown molding on my stand, I would've
incorperated this into it, under molding outta site.
at 0.1" x 0.3", and flexible, it's pretty easy to hide.
http://www.elementalled.com/flexible-led-lighting-by-the-foot.html

if you're looking for fans for the canopy
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...na&AID=10521304&PID=4169822&SID=1i90i3teboetd

many to choose from. Narrowed mine down to this one x4 for
my cabinet.

Japonicus said:

Current rocks. I've enjoyed all 3 of mine!
Hey reefkeeper, check out this LED accent lighting.
Had I used crown molding on my stand, I would've
incorperated this into it, under molding outta site.
at 0.1" x 0.3", and flexible, it's pretty easy to hide.
http://www.elementalled.com/flexible-led-lighting-by-the-foot.html

if you're looking for fans for the canopy
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...na&AID=10521304&PID=4169822&SID=1i90i3teboetd

many to choose from. Narrowed mine down to this one x4 for
my cabinet.

Click to expand...

The LED idea is interesting, I had never thought about doing anything like that before. The canopy will incorporate four eighty milimeter fans, two on each side. Two will blow into the canopy under the halides and the two on the opposing side will be sucking air out of the canopy.

fsureefer said:

that fixture sounds great! :banana:

Click to expand...

I have been extremely pleased with the fixture as a whole. I have had it for almost a year and still have no complaints. Originally I was concerend that it did not have anything for actinic supplement such as T5's but the 14k halides turned out perfect for me. I begin my daily light cycle with just blue LED's then, in addition the white LED's come on and finally the halides. Then the cycle ends in the same order, halides go off and the blue's and white's are left on, following the white LED's going off and only blue's remaining. Lastly the tank goes dark for a few hours.

Here's another update on the canopy status. Began constuction on the door that will allow access to the tank. Started by cutting 1X2's for the door frame.



Following with the assembly.



Used 1X4's across the middle to add some rigidity , and attached it to the canopy frame with two piano hinge's.



Then it was time to figure the hight the light fixture will need to sit. Ended up notching the top of the canopy frame on both sides to allow enough hight clearance to fit the two eighty milimeter fans directly under the fixture on each side.





Now that the frame was completed, it was time to skin it.

The fence on my buddys table saw could not reach out as far as we needed it to in order to make the cuts on the large sheet of thin oak plywood. So in turn we through together a quick DIY fence with a 2x4 and some clamps on his work bench to run the circular saw on to achieve a straight cut. It ended up working quite well.



Once the three sheets were cut to size they were glued and tacked to the canopy frame, starting with both sides.



Then the front(door).





Fit like a glove!





Next steps will be to paint the inside of the canopy white and seal the seams with kalk, then begin to route and cut the boards that will form the trim.

Thanks for looking!