I am pleased to announce the beginning of my new reef setup. I finally got the tank I wanted after buying and selling 3 of them in 1 month
(Thanks Rich and Steve for the help)
It isn't the big one I plan on setting up eventually
but this will last me until I do. I started out planning a small 40g (Inkblue tank) reef but as I gathered all of the equipment (5 months of lurking on the boards...),I realized I could set up a larger tank. It took alot of coaxing from Rich (Jackson6745) and Steve (Stingnyc) to start looking at larger tanks. I needed something that was 48" long that would fit in my bedroon without taking up so much space. I also didn't want alot of noise while I was trying to sleep (got to have my 2-3 hours a day you know) which dictated my equipment choices.
My tank had to have a few requirements:
1. Furniture grade stand and hood that could fit "ALL" of the equipment and the tank had to be at eye level. The stand is 40" high and the canopy is 20" high. So the tank and stand all look like a piece of furniture and not a tank with fish and hanging lights...
2.The tank had to be quiet and energy efficient. I don't need an electric bill that is prohibitive to having a tank since they raised our electric cost by 38% in the last 8 months alone. With summer is coming and the chiller and air conditioner running in 3 bedrooms and the rest of the house I did not want to see the bill.
3.The tank had to be simple and somewhat maintaince free. I travel alot and don't want to come home to alot of dead stinking corals and fish.:grumpy:
4. All equipment had to have good warranties and be simple to replace in case **** happens (like it always does). I also didn't want the tank to depend on any one piece of equipment to survive. I also didn't want to "Upgrade" anything once it was under the tank. I was tired of getting something that I could use until I could afford something better or until something better came along... We all know this one.
5. It had to be able to sustain anything I could dream of having in the tank... nuff said.:lol_large
Well here goes the list.
1. 90 gallon reef ready tank single overflow with 1" in and out. (going barebottom)
2. Mahogany stained canopy and stand
3. Custom made sump 36" long with a remote deep sand bed
4. Euroreef 6-2+ skimmer (thanks Steve for the deal) with OEM gate valve mod for finer tuning
5. Dual 250 watt Hamilton 14k bulbs with 4x32w actinic PC's and 2x54w T-5's (one red and one true actinic)
6. Schuran Jetstream calcium reactor with a peristalic pump feeding it. M3 regulator and 2x 5# co2 bottles for redundancy
7. MRC Kalk reactor for top-off
8. Tunze Osmolator for top-off fed through the MRC reactor
9. Tunze 2x6100's,1x6000 and multicontroller for flow
10. Tunze return pump for return and split to feed the chiller
11. Aqualogic 1/5hp inline chiller vented through the A/C port in the wall so no heat in the room
12. 4 moonlights for nighttime viewing
13. 2 x Phosban reactors. One for carbon and one for Phosban.
14. 150 lbs. of Tonga branch. I wanted alot of flow in the tank and less chance of settling detritus.
Now I am just waiting for my starboard and return pumps to get here so I can start adding water. I got my salt (thanks Ronen) that will last me for 6 months. All of my test kits are here along with all of the incidentals. I still need to pick up a control interface (Aquatronica, Aquacontroller or RK2) I will decide in a few days as to what I really need or what is worth the expense.
I will start posting pics today after I get some sleep.
Happy Happy Joy Joy:bablefish :groupflip
Kasei
It isn't the big one I plan on setting up eventually
My tank had to have a few requirements:
1. Furniture grade stand and hood that could fit "ALL" of the equipment and the tank had to be at eye level. The stand is 40" high and the canopy is 20" high. So the tank and stand all look like a piece of furniture and not a tank with fish and hanging lights...
2.The tank had to be quiet and energy efficient. I don't need an electric bill that is prohibitive to having a tank since they raised our electric cost by 38% in the last 8 months alone. With summer is coming and the chiller and air conditioner running in 3 bedrooms and the rest of the house I did not want to see the bill.
3.The tank had to be simple and somewhat maintaince free. I travel alot and don't want to come home to alot of dead stinking corals and fish.:grumpy:
4. All equipment had to have good warranties and be simple to replace in case **** happens (like it always does). I also didn't want the tank to depend on any one piece of equipment to survive. I also didn't want to "Upgrade" anything once it was under the tank. I was tired of getting something that I could use until I could afford something better or until something better came along... We all know this one.
5. It had to be able to sustain anything I could dream of having in the tank... nuff said.:lol_large
Well here goes the list.
1. 90 gallon reef ready tank single overflow with 1" in and out. (going barebottom)
2. Mahogany stained canopy and stand
3. Custom made sump 36" long with a remote deep sand bed
4. Euroreef 6-2+ skimmer (thanks Steve for the deal) with OEM gate valve mod for finer tuning
5. Dual 250 watt Hamilton 14k bulbs with 4x32w actinic PC's and 2x54w T-5's (one red and one true actinic)
6. Schuran Jetstream calcium reactor with a peristalic pump feeding it. M3 regulator and 2x 5# co2 bottles for redundancy
7. MRC Kalk reactor for top-off
8. Tunze Osmolator for top-off fed through the MRC reactor
9. Tunze 2x6100's,1x6000 and multicontroller for flow
10. Tunze return pump for return and split to feed the chiller
11. Aqualogic 1/5hp inline chiller vented through the A/C port in the wall so no heat in the room
12. 4 moonlights for nighttime viewing
13. 2 x Phosban reactors. One for carbon and one for Phosban.
14. 150 lbs. of Tonga branch. I wanted alot of flow in the tank and less chance of settling detritus.
Now I am just waiting for my starboard and return pumps to get here so I can start adding water. I got my salt (thanks Ronen) that will last me for 6 months. All of my test kits are here along with all of the incidentals. I still need to pick up a control interface (Aquatronica, Aquacontroller or RK2) I will decide in a few days as to what I really need or what is worth the expense.
I will start posting pics today after I get some sleep.
Happy Happy Joy Joy:bablefish :groupflip
Kasei
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