190 Rimless upgrade

Discussion in 'New Tank Builds' started by Jake atkinson, Sep 1, 2018.

  1. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    So the plans have started for a new tank upgrade from my current 125 gallon. I just picked up the tank yesterday from the freight company in little rock. I got a bit worried with the manpower I had when I saw they had to load the tank on the truck with a forklift. The crate said it was 500 pounds!! Yikes!! Luckily my friend came up with a great idea using pallets I had at the house to help unload it into the garage. I will definitely be hiring a company who is insured to move the tank into the house on the stand when it is finished.
    So the stand is being custom made with older more dense oak wood for strength and support. There will also be a separate cabinet made to go next to the tank to house all the electronics and controller system and RO top off reservoir. This guy does amazing work so I cant wait to see it when its finished.
    We will be driving out to Denver , Colorado to pick up the custom sump in October. It is being made by Jeff at lifereef. Reason for the drive is that the freight company was going to cost between $6-700 to deliver on a crate. So if I am going to pay that I might as well make a mini vacation out of it for enjoyment. I am keeping all the same equipment from my current tank. All of my pumps and power heads are overpowered anyways. Of course I did that on purpose just in case I upgraded later. Just a hunch..lol..well later is here...one thing that i will add is another eco tech m1 return pump for extra flow and redundancy as a back up. And one thing that is changing is that I am swapping out my digital aquatics reefkeeper for a new apex neptune system that I recently bought. This system wont be finished for about another 2 months so I will update the post with pictures as things progress. It will all be started with new sand and reef saver rock from bulk reef supply which I have already ordered and ready to go. Here are a couple pictures of the tank in the garage after unloading it. It is 48"long by 37-1/2 wide by 24" high. It is a rimless with an external overflow that spans the width of the tank for good surface skimming. It will be viewable from both side. Pretty much like a peninsula style tank. I hope this will be something people may be interested in following. I have never posted a build thread before. Thanks for reading.
     

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    roco likes this.
  2. Botheboss

    Botheboss Director-At Large

    Wow! This sounds amazing! I actually moved my tank around by myself with pieces of pvc pipe as rollers. Like ancient Egyptians lol, the sketchy part was getting it on the stand. Can’t wait to see this thing filled up.
     
    Jake atkinson likes this.
  3. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Yeah this thing will need to be turned on its side to go into the door. Probably need those glass suction cup holders or something. I will leave that to the expert movers. I just dont trust myself enough to do it without breaking it..lol...its definitely going to be hard looking at it in the garage empty for the next 2 months waiting for the stand and sump to be built.
     
    Botheboss likes this.
  4. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    Wow! This will be epic. Can't wait to see this thing go live!
     
    Jake atkinson likes this.
  5. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Thanks doc...that makes two of us!
     
  6. Exciting! You'll be able to create a lot of depth with those dimensions!
     
    Jake atkinson likes this.
  7. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Yeah I definitely wanted more depth to work with this time around. I am excited to do the aquascape.
     
    SilentReefer likes this.
  8. That’s super exciting, don’t forget to document the process. Is the 125 for sale?
     
    Jake atkinson likes this.
  9. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Yes it will be for sale after I transfer the fish and corals over to the new system. How detailed would you like to see things? Never done a build thread before.
     
  10. Document it as much as you can. Let’s see every stage. You’ve posted empty tank. I would do a all equipment post. New stand with empty tank. After hard scape is in. After fish and coral are swapped over and system is up and running. And then do like a 6 month update.
     
  11. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Yeah cool, I will definitely do all of that then.
     
  12. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    We just got back from Colorado to pick up the custom sump for this build. We picked it up from Jeff @ Lifereef custom filtration. The build quality of this sump is like nothing I have seen before. Its absolutely perfect. The precision flawless. Here are a few pictures. They are not the best but it should give a good idea. Also, I should be getting the stand and power box cabinet next week sometime so I will post pictures of that as soon as it is here.
     

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  13. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    Beautiful Jake! I see that one filter hole has a media basket in it. Are you going to use polyfill floss or something similar instead of filter socks? I have started doing that and like it a lot. Much easier to just throw away the old floss than have to wash the socks. A big bag is about $2.
     
    cameronkclements likes this.
  14. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    So I think in one of the pictures you can see the black egg crate in the section. The filter socks insert above this area. I had him design the sump so that I can run filter socks or run a filter pad. That way during tank maintenance or anything that may stir up a lot of particles I can run filter socks if needed for refined cleaning. Otherwise I am going to run filter pads to keep things simple and cut down on using filter socks. The basket is something I picked up to experiment with and see how it works. I may run activated carbon in a mesh sock passively or something like that. Just thought it would be good to try to utilize in some way.
     
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  15. Very nice!!
     
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  16. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Thank you
     
  17. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member


    I'm using 3 of the same baskets to hold floss instead of the socks I usually have in those slots. Has worked very well so far. I have a manifold plumbed off of my return that I use to run reactors for GAC and GFO although I haven't had to run GFO for several months and still have PO4 around 0.02-0.03.
     
    Jake atkinson likes this.
  18. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    Yeah it may work better to put the floss in the cups instead of laying it down across the egg crate. I will try both and see how it works with this sump design. If your po4 stays the same like that then it sounds like you found a sweet spot to keep your tank balanced in that department. What brand baskets are you using? I got the red sea one but it fits a little loose and sloppy.
     
  19. huntindoc

    huntindoc RRMAS BOD Membership Director Staff Member

    I'm using the Red Sea too. You do have to get some water running in it to keep it from floating up and to seal it, but once done it stays in place and works well. Makes it easier to pick out pods and other useful inverts that you want to keep.
     
  20. Jake atkinson

    Jake atkinson Wrasse

    So I got the stand and the cabinet this weekend. Stand wont come in the house til Monday. It's very heavy and both are made out of solid oak and redwood. Did some preliminary plumbing on the sump and mounting of the power bars and such in the cabinet. I have another votech and two gyres but they will stay on the 125 along with the calcium reactor until I transfer corals. So I will mount those controllers when the time comes. I plan on cycling this tank for about 3-4 months so it will still be a while. I will post more pictures this week when I get the stand in.
     

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    roco, huntindoc and SilentReefer like this.

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