Hi guys, I remember there was interest in my starphire and stainless kiddy pool thread a while ago. I made a lot of neat improvements since that thread. Unfortunately, the house I was renting was badly flooded in the massive rainstorms we were having in the Seattle area. I had to move to a new house, which meant tearing everything down and re-building.
I decided that I would like to try a Zeovit and vodka doseing system in my reef, and this sadly means I will have to go back to using a skimmer. I had room left for a normal size skimmer under my stand, but I wish to make a giant DIY cone recirculation skimmer. This will require making a lot of extra room, so I began the re-build with maximum space savings in mind.
Here is a before picture to give you an idea of what I'm trying to simplify.
Notice that I only have a small strip of space available against the side? I want to open that entire center area up. I also will be using PVC water drain traps to function as tools to slow water down before it reaches the sump. The last build was very quiet for a very high flow large reef, but I want the new setup to be whisper quiet. I bought a new 230v 3 phase motor for the barracuda, and I removed the fan assembly. I also bought a new Dart, as the last one was still working fine, but making scratchy noises. The plan is to enclose both motors in acustic dampening pad material and mount a silent computer fan ducted into each motors encloure for cooling.
So, let's begin.
Here is a shot from shortly after getting the VFD controlled wave maker pump mounted up high on the stand. I was just begining to think about plumbing at this point.
I began by fitting as much of the old plumbing as I thought would still work in the new setup.
It turns out, I was being mostly optimistic... Essentially only the old manifolds will be usable for the new pump locations and design. So, I get to plumbing!
So, another few hundred in PVC later, and the closed loop plumbing is complete! Where before it took a lot of space under the stand, now the entire closed loop is smashed flat against the bottom of the tank.
Here is a shot with the tank. I'm going to dump a gallon or two of muratic acid into the tank while I'm doing the leak testing. Hopefully it will disolve that damn coraline plauge that covers everything in my poor tank.
Here I am laying the liner in and trying to get all the wrinkles out.
Looks pretty bad now, but once those sumps are inside there it will look OK. The sumps will hide the wrinkles and things.
This is how it looks after sliding in the sumps.
I all ready much prefere the closed loop pump mounted way up high. I wish I could mount the return high too, but being auto-priming is a necessity to me.
This is where I've left off as of today. Hopefully I will finish all plumbing tomarrow. I will show more pics, and hopefully the before and after compairison will look much improved with much more usable space under the tank, while still reguarding all the function of the previous setup.
Best Wishes
-Luke