Starting my 300 gal build (1 Viewer)

[PygmyAngel]

Cobraden,

Wow..that's awesome so far....

But just curious, you didn't think of having the side of the tank viewable? Like the long narrow view from the side? You could have left it open and not sheetrocked it in on the left side, so you could see it like a reef wall viewing angle. I mean, the in-wall front view will be beautiful, but it would have been nice..just wondering if maybe you thought about it and that was just your preference to go with it all closed around, or if you just didn't even consider it.

 

[cobraden]

that is something that I thought about but I decided that it would look better centered in the wall. the way that I want to aquascape the tank also did not work with having it viewable from the end.

 

[Niko5]

Iv just been following along so far but I have to say that looks really cool!! The way you painted the tanks cabinets to match the rest of the room is very cool.

 

[cobraden]

Painting is all done and now I'm about to turn my attention to the plumbing.

The plan all along was to go with grey sched. 80 pvc just because I like the way it looks. Then I started thinking about the wall thickness and wondering if it would be better to go with schedule 40 because for the same size OD pipe the ID is bigger? Would love some opinions on this seeing as I was going to start plumbing tomorrow. May ponder this a little though.

Anyone using flex pvc? I'm thinking that might me an interesting way to go.

 

[BrianPlankis]

Anyone using flex pvc? I'm thinking that might me an interesting way to go.

I used flex PVC for my plumbing, but I have a VERY simple setup, one drain pipe and one return. It has worked great for two years, but hopefully people with larger tanks can chime in.

Brian

 

[cobraden]

She's all wet!

Well it's been a while since I've updated this thing but things have been so busy that time to work on tank has been scarce.

Anyway, did a little work on the tank this week.

since the tank is in the living room, I wanted to make sure it was quiet. The drains and vibration were of particular concern.

I used a thick rubber mat (about 1/2" thick) to line the the floor of my cabinet. That should take care of any vibration and is pretty water resistant.

For the drains, I was about to make a couple durso type drains but decided to do a little reasearch and I came across something called the gurgle buster (http://home.everestkc.net/jrobertson57268/HGB/index.html) so I decided to give them a try. Here is a pic of how they turned out. The outside sleeve is adjustable up and down so you can "fine tune" it for you flow rate.

After doing a little more work I finished the plumbing and decided it was time to water test. So....SHE'S ALL WET NOW!!!!

The water test is going well. so far only one pin hole leak. Can't seem to get it to stop so it looks like I'm going to have to cut that section out of the plumbing and do it again.

The gurgle busters work great. I fired the pump up and let her rip wide open and the drains were very quiet. Now to fix that leak and fill it with salt water.

 

[dbrock12]

I'v used the Hofer Gurgle Busters on my 180 for the past 2yrs. They are not as common as the Durso or the Stockman, but they work great and are silent.

Don

 

[Andy]

I have similar pipes on my 200 for about 8 yrs. The only thing you have to watch for is if something covers the holes, bubble algea, a piece of nori, etc. I took the cap off of one side & I still have no noise from either.

 

[R-BallJunkie]

impressive, planned and exexuted well. how did you get all this past the wife...new Lexus in the garage???


plumbing pics please.

c

 

[cobraden]

R-Balljunkie, Here are a couple plumbing pics. Hope they don't dissapoint because the plumbing is really simple. As far as how I got it past the wife...no wife, no kids and I try not to let the dog have too much say so in what I do.

The center valve on what i've dubbed my "neptune's fork" goes to the chiller which will connect with flexable hose.

Also though I'd add a few pics of some of the livestock. It's spread out over 3 tanks in 2 houses so this will just be a few pics of some of the things in one of the tanks

My clown fish decided to take up residence in my this bunch of mushrooms. Just for reference that rock is about 11" long.

Just a couple tanks and a leather. The leather is about 9" wide when open.

Sohal tang

Misc Coral pics

Going to drain the tank tonight and start filling it salt water in the next couple days.

 

[cobraden]

Got around to hanging my light system.

The lights are on a rail so that I can slide them all out of the way when I need to work on the tank.

Each light is also on a retractable hanger so I can adjust the height of them individually.

I'm going to start adding my rock this week.

 

[fishcraze]

I like your light rail design since it gives you lot of flexibility to work w/ the tank! nice work!

 

[cobraden]

Took advantage of a free weekend to finally move all my live rock into the tank. The rock was in 3 different tanks at 2 different houses so it involved a little driving as well as some heavy lifting over the 2 days. My guess is that I have somewhere between 500 and 600 lbs of live rock in the tank. Here are a couple pictures that I snapped about an hr after I put the last rock in. I still have come cords to clean up and I also need to add my Tunze pumps and the black plex that I'm using for a background behind the tank but she's coming together.

And of course the king of the aquarium hanging out in the "hidden cove". This damsel weged himself into a rock when I was breaking down one of the tanks. I think he just wanted to be first into the new aquarium.

Plan on moving my sand into the tank over the next couple of days and then I'll add the various fish.

Everything is doing fine but I did get one surprise when I got home. My lights were off and they shouldn't have been. I have them set to go out if the temp gets to 80 degrees but that shouldn't happen given the air flow in the cabinet and a 3/4 hp chiller. However that's taking for granted the chiller is working, which is isn't. Didn't think I'd get to use my back up chiller so soon but the little guy (1/3 hp) worked it's magic and brought the temp down.

Hey if nothing went wrong how fun would that be

 

[landfish]

Looking Good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nice to see it all coming together and that you backup cut off works

 

[crvz]

You are not kidding around when it comes to LR, huh? Thats incredible. Looks good, though!