New Tank Development (1 Viewer)

[Trey]

Hello All,

I am designing my dream tank, and I thought I would lay out the concept here, and let everyone take shots at it. I would appreciate all feedback, good and bad. I would hate to get too far into this thing only to find out I have a fatal flaw (besides the budget of course). It will be quite a while before this thing comes into being, if ever, but designing it looks like it will be one of the most challenging and fun phases.

I am hoping to remove a 6 foot section of a dividing wall between our living room and our dining room (yes, I already have permission to do that part). The hole will be about eight inches shy of the entire 8' wall height (room for a beam). A 72"x24"x34" tank which will hold 230 gallons of water will be installed into the hole on a custom made stand with a built in, externally ventilated, lighting canopy.

The tank will be a euro tank design with a center mounted 8" square single overflow tower. The overflow tower will also be the path for the two primary return lines. Two low returns will be incorporated along the tanks mid line half way between the overflow tower and the ends of the tank.

My goal is to create a two sided reef that can be appreciated from both the living room and the dining room with passage between the two sides for water and fish movement. I hope to create two very different astetics for the two sides in an effort to create interest.

I am planning on using a 75 gallon total volume sump system (46 gallon running volume). The system will include a section for protien skimming and heater installation, a refugium, and an attached sump for chemical addition, probes, and water level management.

The water will flow through the sump system at 1800 gph. This flow will return to the tanks through the combination of the four nozzles. I may take the flow for the low returns from the protien skimmer to manage the flow rate through the refugium (a plumbing option will be included). I will include four additional flows via powerheads on a wave system to generate additional current in an effort to randomize the currents.

I plan on using a combination of VHO amd MH lighting. I have much work to do on this topic. My current plan generates about 5 watts/gallon, but I might have too much trouble managing the heat at that level. Like I said, still much work to do on this topic.

I look forward to any and all feedback on this concept. Please tell me why I shouldn't do it (other than the budget of course). I suspect there are many traps that I might fall into. I just love free advise.

Thanks,
Trey

 

[Guest]

Sounds like you've done your homework. The only thing I can come up with at the moment is to make sure you have check valves on the 2 returns that go to mid water. And maybe have some sort of exhast in your stand since you'll have lights in it for the fuge, + heat from pumps, etc.

 

[Guest]

Add a closed loop for more circulation

 

[Guest]

That would be nice! Keep us updated.

When you said euro brace, I assume you meant glass. If you are, I would go with starphire for the front and back viewing sides. Have you thought about how you are going to get the tank in your house with those dimensions? Hopefully you will have no problem.

What type of a system are you aiming for? Hopefully SPS. JK.

The exhaust in your setup that FishinAggie recommended is a VERY good idea. Hopefully u can incorporate that into your dream tank. That would beneficial to your light bill and also to keep your PH stabilized from clean O2 air from the outside somehow instead of the excess CO2 that you may have if your house is always enclosed from the outside world.

You may also want to run separate GFI circuits to this one area. 2 20Amp circuits.

Good luck and keep us updated. I love in wall tanks

 

[aqua-nut]

as long as you have some kind of forced air ventilation to a jack on the roof, heat buildup won't be a problem in your home or attic.

If I were you though, I'd figure a way to vent it into your attic or into the room with a fan in the winter time as it will keep your house heated (why vent out nice hot air when it's 35 degrees outside?) Just make sure you do this safely with the input of a HVAC guy.

You may have mentioned it, but a chiller is something you'll have to have if you haven't thought of it yet. Best thing I have on my 150. It's ALWAYS at 79 ~ 80 degrees.

I'd love to see it when you get it in. Throw a party!

 

[Cakepro]

I personally wouldn't vent hot, wet air into the attic ~ that's a lot of evaporation to pump into your attic.

~ Sherri

 

[Guest]

can be any worst than normal summer conditions in an attic.

 

[Guest]

As dry as and hot as the attic is I wouldn't see that as a problem of course to solve that you can hook the exaust of the tank to an existing vent in your attic.

 

[Guest]

I'm gonna have to agree with Sherri on that.
My attic has my Heater and Water Heater in it.
I wouldn't like the idea of pumping that much humidity up there.

Even if they weren't up there, I still wouldn't want to pump humidity in.
Have to worry about mold and things like that.
I may be wrong, and there may be nothing to worry about. Just throwing in my .02

 

[Brad]

With a 34" depth and 72" width to the tank are you planning on using 3 400W MH? I think you will need 400W for a 34" depth.

Looking forward to seeing it on futher Tank Tours.

 

[Guest]

Where in your home are you planning to place the system? Will you have access to a closet or a garage? If so try to put as much of your mechanical external of the system. Much eaiser to deal with that way.

 

[Trey]

Hello Again,

Thanks for all of the great feedback. It's nice to know I can get so much help from everyone. I will try to clarify my intentions and see if that raises any new concerns.

Beginning at the top, thanks for the mention of check valves. I would have hated to figure that one out with my first power failure. There in the plan now.

Yes, I plan on venting the cabinet under the aquarium. I am still trying to envision what the total ventilation system will look like, but a few things I plan on doing are to vent the lighting canopy and the bottom refuge cabinet. I wish I could locate them in a remote area such as a garage or closet, but that doesn't work with my location.

I am planning on venting up into the attic because I want to move the humidity out of the house. I plan to exit the vent into a roof ventilator. The biggest challenge though is to limit the amount of conditioned room air I move out also. I have a couple of thoughts on how to do this, but they are very young thoughts thus far.

I appreciate the comment on closed loop recirculation and was planning on accomodating that with the low level returns by drawing water from the protein skimmer sump. This will require that all water exits via the overflow tower, but I am planning several low level overflow ports on the overflow tower as well. Does this make any sense? Should I design a closed loop as well? This is definately an area of thought that I could use some feedback on.

As for the tank, I mistated the dimensions. I should clarify and say that the tank is 72" long, 24" tall, and 34" in width. The point on depth is well appreciated. I don't want to light anything deeper than 24" if at all possible.

One more quick question. I am planning on a reverse photoperiod refugium and was considering a plenum design for the refuge. Any strong feeling one way or the other? There seems to be many highly qualified folks on both sides of this discussion.

Finally, I check with my wife and she is all for a party when I get this thing done (don't hold your breath though). I was thinking maybe instead of a house warming party, I would have a tank filling party (BYOF, bring your own frag). Just kidding about that. I will likely have an open house one Saturday once I finally get it built. I am also planning a web site to track this thing once I get further along. Maybe if I post the progress, everyone can help straighten me out before I get too far along.

Thanks Again,
Trey

 

[fishcraze]

May I ask where you're going to get that size of tank from? I'm looking at upgrading my tank, and the front dimensions must be 6'x2', but the width can be varied since it'll be an in-wall tank (the tk will be in the garage). So, I like the size of your tank. In fact, I'd prefer to have the width of either 28" or 30" - too wide a tank would be hard to reach/clean the front glass from the back.

 

[Trey]

I was planning on visiting with Keith at Aquatic Designs once I had the tank design finalized. I know he is closing his store front, but he indicated that I would be able to get in touch with him here. He has contacts for construction of tanks of all sizes.

Trey