AquaNerd
Guest
I have finally acquired the 180 I've been both babbling and dreaming about. It's 72"x24"24" with 3 sided Starphire glass, Eurobracing, an external overflow box (with two 2.5" drains), and a 70 gallon sump.
I picked it up today and this is a beast for sure. Had to take four people to move it and it wasn't too much fun. It's currently visiting my folks for a couple of weeks while I wait for our new place to be ready.
I've been kicking around several ideas on how to equip the tank and finish it out. I am thinking about going with Fiji Pink sand by CaribSea in order to get that white sand look. I will be moving all my rock from my 90 (and yes I'll have to add more) to the tank once it's in the spot I want it. To speed up the cycle I'm sure to get, I'll be using Prodibio products...mainly to help populate the sand bed and prevent any ammonia or nitrite spikes.
I'm not too sure yet on how I want to light it. I figured since it's a big tank and will be SPS dominated, I might just go with metal halides and T5HO for supplementation. But, I do love T5HO. We'll see.
For water movement, I already have the controllable Koralias. And on top of that, there's a nice couple of holes already drilled into the back of the tank for a closed loop. Originally it was used as a gravity feed and return for a chiller, but I obviously don't have a chiller, so I'll adapt it for a closed loop. I'm not too sure on a return pump yet. I plan on modifying the current layout of the sump a tad to make it more to my liking. I think I'll take the baffles currently in there, rearrange them, and possibly go with an external pump.
For skimmers, I'm going to go budget for a little while (only temporary until the expensive ones can be afforded) and go with an ASM G3 that I'll probably mod a little bit. They are cheaper than most and do a decent job of skimming. Again, it's only temporary. I'd love to go with the MSX/Octopus Extreme skimmers but they are on backorder almost everywhere I look. So, an awesome skimmer will have to wait.
Livestock wise...I plan to weed out my current corals and fish and go a tad more high end. I'll keep most of the fish I already have (sailfin tang, royal gramma, 3 chromis, 2 pj cardinals, yellow watchman, gold sided fairy wrasse, and my ocellaris), but I'll eventually get more high end SPS and fish like LE Tyree stuff (wanting a Sunset Monti!!!) and fish like a Mystery wrasse or something cool like that.
I didn't snap any photos tonight, but I'll take some this weekend. I need to clean out the tank and fix up the plumbing a bit. But, I gotta start somewhere.
I picked it up today and this is a beast for sure. Had to take four people to move it and it wasn't too much fun. It's currently visiting my folks for a couple of weeks while I wait for our new place to be ready.
I've been kicking around several ideas on how to equip the tank and finish it out. I am thinking about going with Fiji Pink sand by CaribSea in order to get that white sand look. I will be moving all my rock from my 90 (and yes I'll have to add more) to the tank once it's in the spot I want it. To speed up the cycle I'm sure to get, I'll be using Prodibio products...mainly to help populate the sand bed and prevent any ammonia or nitrite spikes.
I'm not too sure yet on how I want to light it. I figured since it's a big tank and will be SPS dominated, I might just go with metal halides and T5HO for supplementation. But, I do love T5HO. We'll see.
For water movement, I already have the controllable Koralias. And on top of that, there's a nice couple of holes already drilled into the back of the tank for a closed loop. Originally it was used as a gravity feed and return for a chiller, but I obviously don't have a chiller, so I'll adapt it for a closed loop. I'm not too sure on a return pump yet. I plan on modifying the current layout of the sump a tad to make it more to my liking. I think I'll take the baffles currently in there, rearrange them, and possibly go with an external pump.
For skimmers, I'm going to go budget for a little while (only temporary until the expensive ones can be afforded) and go with an ASM G3 that I'll probably mod a little bit. They are cheaper than most and do a decent job of skimming. Again, it's only temporary. I'd love to go with the MSX/Octopus Extreme skimmers but they are on backorder almost everywhere I look. So, an awesome skimmer will have to wait.
Livestock wise...I plan to weed out my current corals and fish and go a tad more high end. I'll keep most of the fish I already have (sailfin tang, royal gramma, 3 chromis, 2 pj cardinals, yellow watchman, gold sided fairy wrasse, and my ocellaris), but I'll eventually get more high end SPS and fish like LE Tyree stuff (wanting a Sunset Monti!!!) and fish like a Mystery wrasse or something cool like that.
I didn't snap any photos tonight, but I'll take some this weekend. I need to clean out the tank and fix up the plumbing a bit. But, I gotta start somewhere.
