spoon Posted September 22, 2011 Report Share Posted September 22, 2011 after pretty much losing my marine tank in feb with the big quake , ive been planning my come back since then. i was fortunate enough to save the 4 fish i had , 2 common clowns, a pj cardinal and a blue damsel, lambo on here looked after them for me for a few months until i set up a 30l tank which was meant to temporarily house them until i could get a new tank, (was waiting on eqc cheque). now its 7 months on have been paid out but the fish are still in the 30l and i have been given a few frags and brought a few as well. the 30l started off with a 9w flouro and a small HOB (from bdspider) with a sack of purigen in it. it now has a large aqua medic hob skimmer (with a barstardised pump) and a diy ato and 36w pl flouro. i lost the blue damsel in june i think he jumped out during a quake . the clowns are going well and can be hand fed they also think the hammer coral is their nem and give it bit of a hiding. i also have some gsp and pulsing xenia which is growing well. these photos are a few months old Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted September 22, 2011 Author Report Share Posted September 22, 2011 once i got my eqc money i started buying the things i needed for my new tank. the tank is an aqua one aquience 650s its a 650mm cube its over 200l it had a 80mm wide 10mm thick brace right across the top of the tank which was in the way ive removed this and euro braced the front and sides with 10mm 80mm across, the back has two layers of 6mm 20mm across up the other way. i used such i wide braces to reduce water sloshing out in another quake. i wasnt to keen on drilling it as my last cube cracked there in the quake so decided to go with an overflow box instead it wouldnt flow the amount of water i neede through the bulkhead fitting at the back so i added another drain to it the one pictured is a 20mm ive upgraded it to a 25mm since. i had to cut part of the aluminium trim to fit it on. i used flexible return piping as its cheaper than pvc and flows around corners better as you dont use 90 deg or 45deg elbows on it. for the return im using my old pump its a sensen 4500lph, ive split the outlet into two with one side controllable to make it so i could have a different flow on either side. it runs into eductors(from fay) which are nifty little things which work like a water venturi, these are on loc line for adjustable direction. the pipe ive used is threaded 20mm thickwall ppvc for irrigation etc. i used this because its cheap and its black. it works well ( please note all the threads are tapered and require the use of teflon tape to seal them) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted September 22, 2011 Author Report Share Posted September 22, 2011 the lights are a chinese led unit i ordered from ebay its 120w (112,1w leds) and has two power cords one for white and one for blue. i had some of the leds changed out and got 405nm added to the blue and red and green added to the white the leds are all 90 deg angle i also got a led moonlight its a nice cyany blue here the pics im not happy with the mount i made and i will get a steel one welded up and painted at work some time soon moonlight blue white blue and white reflections showing layout of leds on nano tank look at light on wall the shadows caused by leds are cool but by using green and red it cause another shadow behind the fist shimmer line so i have to find some diffuser plate to help blend it in over all im very happy with it its very bright and i love the colour Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Posted September 22, 2011 Report Share Posted September 22, 2011 Wow that is an excellent setup !drool: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted September 23, 2011 Author Report Share Posted September 23, 2011 i have more to post but have to take more photos Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted September 28, 2011 Author Report Share Posted September 28, 2011 to keep the tank secure during an earthquake i had two problems one was the tank falling off the stand the other was the whole unit , tank and stand falling over. my original plan was to attach the tank to the stand somehow the bolt the stand to the wall using a custom bracket but after talking to codking a few weeks back i decided against this he was saying he had seen large cabinets that had moved and taken no-load bearing wall with them. he reckoned a better idea was to add a few pieces of timber between the joists then drill through them and the floor, then put threaded steel rod thru cut to length and bolted up his idea is good given that the walls and floors move differently in a quake and all the weight of the tank is on the floor , by being attached to the wall it could break the cabinet forcing it out of square. however my wife to be wouldnt take to kindly to me drilling two holes in the carpet(considering we are buying our first home soon) also having two bolts in the stand may make it harder to set up the sump. so heres what im doing instead i built some aluminium corner brackets to hold the tank on the stand they may bend or break during a quake but if they do they will absorb enough of the movement that it should be safe secondly instead of bolting the tank to the floor i plan on taking the feet off the cabinet then getting a heavy piece of ply which is 400mm bigger than the base of the stand all around( except the back ,which will be 200-250mm bigger as theres a wall there anyway) ill cover it in some nice looking carpet and screw the stand to it this should make the stand heavier and give it a footprint of about 1.25m2 which should be enough to prevent it tipping over it will aslos double as a place to soak up accidental spillage without ruining the new carpet underneath. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted September 28, 2011 Author Report Share Posted September 28, 2011 i also upgraded the extra drain on the overflow weir to 25mm instead of the previous 20mm now im really confident it will flow what it needs too this photo shows the placement of the return plumbing also to reduce the chance of bubbles forming in the weir and also to start the syphon . ive routed 4mm pipe through a tee to each eductor this acts like a venturi drawing out any air bubbles ( also water ) it gets some serious suction as well . a lot of people use a another pump with a venturi fitting to do this but i couldnt find a small enough pump to be visually unobtrusive and big enough to be reliable so went with this instead from my trials its working great. it was suggested to me to use an aqualifter but i was quite worried it wouldnt be able to start the overflow fast enough the loops are to give the tube some "give" so i can adjust the eductors without kinking the pipe i was going to drill a small hole at the water level to prevent the return back syphoning in a power -out or pump failure but i read on a another forum that the back pressure from a eductor is a lot and and it makes a huge noisy jet of water also i decided the the eductors were more effiecent with as much back pressure as the pump could provide. so to stop back syphoning ever happening i brought this one way valve its 20mm plumbed and is quite large and unrestrictive it works really well also heres a pic of my ro unit i have yet to plumb it up and i also need to get some DI resin this the filter sock ill be using on the overflow where it enters the sump i also took a few photos of the nano Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Posted September 29, 2011 Report Share Posted September 29, 2011 Looking great Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waterlogged Posted September 29, 2011 Report Share Posted September 29, 2011 Thats really cool. I like all the effort that can be seen in the filtration and what not Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted April 29, 2012 Author Report Share Posted April 29, 2012 well finally built the sump last couple of nights its now set up , with freshwater . base is 10mm, rest is 6mm, drilled a 15mm hole in it for a 1/2 inch bulkhead fitting put a valve on the inside so i could close the cabinet door :gigl: skimmer is BM nac6 , filter sock can barely handle flow so may end up removing or going with bigger sock :bounce: heater is fluval E300 in one of the bubble traps as it need plenty of flow over it return pump is cheap knock off pump but works well rated at 4500lph but would be closer to 2800lph when head height is taken in account has a one way valve on it ( sump can hold extra until syphon breaks anyway if the valve fails) return is split into two ( see earlier pictures) and the eductors really hum , has some serious flow in there bought a seio m820 for $20 brand new and will get another, have taken out half of the grill on the water inlet and removed the adjustable ring for more flow, other filter in the sump is just a reactor filter gunna run phosphate remover in it. have to sort out wires , temp controll and fine tune a few things for noise but other wise almost ready to go water is pushing out of the filter sock too much flow for it too handle both hoses are 32mm one is not flowing any water as its a back up some nice turbulance on the surface the eductors really move the water Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Posted April 29, 2012 Report Share Posted April 29, 2012 Awesome Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spoon Posted July 8, 2012 Author Report Share Posted July 8, 2012 well had fish in for ages now , lost the clowns to marine ich a few weeks back , lost the nem to a power head the week i put it in not really using the filter socks much as the clog overnight gonna try find some 400micron ones heres some photos clown hosting toadstool leather after the nem got killed cleaner shrimp cleaner shrimp moult coral beauty skimmer gunk -smells like what it looks like the only fish i have left since the clowns died- pajama cardinal and coral beauty new aqua scape supported by 15mm pvc pipe need to be turned around and ~1kg of liverock added eductors causing surface agitation- great invention! think of it as an underwater water venturi all in all tank is going well just taking it slowly got plenty more things i need to set up like the ato and temperature controller Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe Posted July 8, 2012 Report Share Posted July 8, 2012 Looks great :thup: I love the Coral Beauty! They're such a cool fish Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marinefish4life Posted July 8, 2012 Report Share Posted July 8, 2012 Looks great :thup: I love the Coral Beauty! They're such a cool fish +1 :thup: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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