250 Gallon room-divider project log

[dougchambers]

Jeff,

The tank and stand look incredible! Nice work and I look forward to seeing the system completed.

What is your time line to get wet?

What are you going to do for rock?

Nice work! I hope ours turns out as well...

-Doug

[eraml]

Tagging along.

[jeffbrig]

Doug, probably a couple of weeks still till it gets wet. After the canopy is complete, I still have to paint the inside of the stand, do the plumbing, install my RO/DI, build a control panel for the system, wire the lighting system, etc. I have most of the materials I need, except for plumbing, which I'll order this week.

Also, I'm talking with Jeff Macare at Euroreef, and it looks like I may get to beta test their new pumps. We're working out a deal now to send in my 12-2, and he's going to convert it to a recirculating style with two of their new pumps. From what I've seen/heard so far, this should result in a significant improvement in the skimmer's performance. Not sure what the turnaround time will be, but I'll need that back before I start up the tank.

For LR, I'm 99% sure that I'll go with one of the FL aquaculture companies. TBS is an option, but I need to talk with them about availability and arrange for pickup. Or I could try something like gulf-view, and get just rock instead of the package with critters. I tend think TBS rock is a little more interesting to begin with, though I've seen great pictures of both.

[cscr212]

How did the popcorn ceiling come out?
Looking forward to seeing pics of the top as well.
Thanks for the documentation.

[jeffbrig]

Popcorn ceiling turned out great, you wouldn't even know there used to be a wall there

I'm working on the canopy as we speak. I hit a tiny snag earlier but I've made my way around it: When I unboxed the doors and cabinet faces, I found that they had a center stile (the vertical support where the doors meet), dividing the opening in half. That means the opening was smaller than my shoulders could go through. Problem was solved by taking the doors off and running the door frame over the tablesaw. Now I have 33"x15" openings to get into the canopy (as I had originally intended).

I'm cutting plywood to skin the canopy, and hope to get that assembled in the next few hours. Pics when it's finished....

[Wee Man]

if any water gets under the tank it might slide right off the table

[NewSchool04]

I've heard both good and bad about florida aquacultured rock. I'm sure you've done this but make sure you know what you are getting before making a significant order.

[jeffbrig]

Yeah, I've done plenty of research, but FL aquacultured rock has a few things in its favor

1) A huge variety of life to enjoy while the tank is new
2) It won't stink like uncured or dry-shipped rock
3) It's nearby, so I can get it without paying shipping
4) It's made from dry rock for aquarium use, so no stealing from existing reefs


WeeMan, are you joking? The tank weighs 350 lbs empty, more like 2500 once its filled, so I don't think a little water is going to move it. If I were dropping the tank on a smooth wet surface, that might be a different story.

I ran out of time last night before I could finish the canoy, so I'm going to work on it for a few hours this morning and head into work a little late. Anyone notice a trend here? Nothing ever seems to get finished when I originally 'plan' it to be.

[webpolk]

Originally posted by jeffbrig
Anyone notice a trend here? Nothing ever seems to get finished when I originally 'plan' it to be.

Hahaha, doesn't every married reefer fall under this dilema?

Kidding aside, I have been following this thread and what you have accomplished in the Kitchen is no small feat. My wife sells Marble and Granite and could not stop rambling about how nice it is to see 3cm's outside Dallas. In other words, she said the installers did a great job on your Kitchen. She also thinks you should be fine on the sealant as long as you reapply once a year.

Keep up the good work!
Steve

[GrndHog]

Jeff,

If your thinking about getting Fl aquacultured rock, you should check out http://www.liverocks.com/ They are located in New Port Richy Fl on the other side from you.

When I set up my 150 about 2 years ago, I went down there and handpicked about 80lbs of base rock, which is actually real liverock but with a little less life. I also picked up 80lbs of Keys rock that was full of life.

The baserock $2.00 a lbs
and the keys rock was $3.00a lbs

The only negative is that there are things in the rock that I didnt want (mantis).

Best thing to do is take a bunch of coolers and over, I live 400 miles away from them in the panhandle but have in-laws in Orlando so I incorporated a visit.

The owners name is Mike, I have his # if you want

[jeffbrig]

Thanks for the link GrndHog, those are some pretty good prices. I'm going to drop them an email and see what they could do on a big order (3-400 lbs). Did they let you take your rock home in water? I like the idea of buying rock and critters separately. The TBS package kinda scares me, with 2 hermit crabs per gallon...

BTW, what part of the Panhandle are you in? I'm originally from Pensacola.

webpolk, thanks for the info on the granite, glad your wife approves! Actually, it was a pretty cool shop I bought it from. They let you walk the warehouse and pick the actual slabs that they will make your countertops out of. Very cool.

I have completed all of the cuts for the canopy, should just be a matter of gluing it together this evening.

[GrndHog]

They would let you take the rock home in water but Mike expailned to me that if its tranported in water and one small item on the rock dies in transit then you pollute the whole batch thats contained in that water. Made sense to me. he told me that I pick up those heavy duty blue paper towels that they sell at automotive stores and thats what he wrapped the rock in for transport, worked great.

My rock was in the back of my truck for about 5 hrs, I had the water and sand already to go. I put the rock straight in and my cycle was complete within a week and a half.

The only thing that I would have done different is that I would have freshwater dipped it first to get the nasty off (hairy crabs and mantis shrimp)

I'm in Defuniak Springs and work at Eglin AFB

My DIY is kind of like what your doing but I put mine in the wall, with viewing sides from the hallway and my office (see thru)

Good luck

[jeffbrig]

Well, the canopy isn't quite done, but I thought I'd throw out another teaser shot. I could actually have the doors mounted on it in about 5 minutes with the nail gun, but decided it would be better to paint/seal the canopy frame first. So, here's the frame sitting above the tank (I wanted to make sure it was square and the proper dimensions before I proceed any further)



Since the canopy is spreading out a bit, I decided to start playing around with some of the equipment that's arrived in the last few days.

First up, MH lighting:


I went with a combination of 250w icecap ballasts and pfo mini pendants. There were a number of reasons for this combination, so let me walk you through my logic. I ruled out magnetic ballasts early on, for fear of humming (anything that could potentially drive my wife nuts would be a poor choice), my desire to avoid the added heat they generate, and the amount space taken up by the ballast box.

Once deciding on electronic ballasts it was a question of SE vs. DE. We all know DE bulbs allow for more efficient reflector designs, but DE pendants cost a bit more. Because I was planning to build an open top canoy, pendant lights made more sense for concentrating light downard than semi-open reflectors. When comparing a SE pendant (RO I) to DE pendants (RO III or PFO mini), the cost difference was minimal, so I decided to go with DE.

I decided to stick with PFO after reading a few threads about random issues with the icecap/RO III combination. I've looked at Sanjay's data quite a bit, and while the RO III has higher peak PAR close and center, I interpret the data as showing that the PFO covers a slightly broader area with better intensity as the distance from the bulb increases. Also, PFO allows me to get the PFO/icecap adapters, so I can easily swap ballasts around or disconnect the pendants for maintenance.

Tonight I wired up one of the ballasts with a pendant to try out. It only took about 5 minutes to connect everything using wire nuts (I will solder these connections for the permanent install). I picked up a used Ushio 10k bulb a while back (to sample the 10k color before committing to a big purchase), and used that to test the setup. The sockets were slightly too far apart, so I loosened one of them and moved it slightly closer in. Once that was done, I was actually surprised at how easy it was to mount the DE bulb, especially after reading horror stories about people breaking them in tight sockets. The bulb clicked right into place, and I fired it up - no problem. This is my first direct experience with metal halides, and WOW these things get bright. I'm really looking forward to having a tank that can support corals. My previous tank was started on a high school budget (about 12 years ago), and all I ever had was a pair of normal output flourescents.

Three MH setups will run down the center of the tank. They will be supplemented 4 60" T5s (with SLRs) - two blue+ bulbs on one ballast, 2 aquablues on another (both icecap 430s). These will be arranged with one of each bulb on each side of the MHs, so the color will appear the same when viewing from either side.

I plan to run a 3 tiered staggered lighting setup
early morning - blue+ only
mid morning - blue+ and aquablue only
midday - blue+, aquablue, and MH
late afternoon - blue+ and aquablue only
evening - blue+ only

Exact time/hours are still up in the air. I plan to shift the photoperiod so the 'midday' carries into the evening for prime viewing. The MHs will probably run something between 6 and 8 hours each day.

That's all for today, I'll see where I get tomorrow.

[dougchambers]

You are killing me Jeff! If we were to do it over, we would likely go with a similar DE setup. As it is, we are going to use two Luminarc L3 reflectors with our 250W SE bulbs on electronic ballasts.

Interesting that you are going with T5s for Actinic/Blue supplemental lighting. I tried the T5s quite a while back, but never did get the look we wanted. We will stick with our URI VHO actinics. With the wall and HUGE size of the Luminarcs, the VHOs bulbs will be slightly under the edge of the reflector, but we should be in good shape.

Initial pictures of the tank look outstanding. Miracles attached the external overflow Saturday.

Keep us updated. I still love the Marble!

-Doug

[Fliger]

I log in twice a day for updates. I can't wait to see how the canopy turns out. Are you going to make sure the bottom of the canopy covers the water line?

What MH bulbs are you running? I used to run 10K 250W DE with T5 Blue Plus and the color is perfect. Now I'm running 14K, but I'm adding some T5 as soon as I get the canopy finished.

edit - just saw - Ushio. I really, really like the BLV 10K 250W DE with T5. It's the purest white bulb I've used and I've used them all. I think Sanjay's tests showed this to be true as well.

[jeffbrig]

Doug, I read your story about the T5s several months ago, but I just realized now that it was you who had all those issues. I hope I don't have any issues with my T5s, but if I do, I can easily convert over to VHO. Did you ever come to a conclusion on what the problem was? Do you think you had too much light, or was it just too big of a change too quickly?

Fliger, I still haven't purchased bulbs to use. The Ushio I have is part of a $15 experiment to see what one looked like in person before dropping $250-300 on a full set. I do like the color, doesn't seem yellow at all to my eyes, and I think they would go well with the T5s I've chosen. I'll make my final decision once I have all of the lights mounted in the canopy and can see what they look like in the living room.

Yes, I have a trim piece to go around the base of the canopy to cover the water line. I used the same 2" light rail molding that's on the bottom of the wall cabinets in our kitchen. I had to rip it on the table saw to get just the flat front of the molding (it comes with a L shaped profile for easy cabinet mounting), and I'll glue it to the bottom of the face frames on the canopy.

[hk]

bump

[dougchambers]

Originally posted by jeffbrig
Doug, I read your story about the T5s several months ago, but I just realized now that it was you who had all those issues. I hope I don't have any issues with my T5s, but if I do, I can easily convert over to VHO. Did you ever come to a conclusion on what the problem was? Do you think you had too much light, or was it just too big of a change too quickly?

Jeff - I think it was a combination of a number of things on the T5s. Too much light too quickly and a stagnant sand bed. A few months before we tried the T5s we noticed some things in the tank were degrading. I thought is due to our old VHOs, but in hind-sight, I don't know that we gave the T5s a good shake.

[jeffbrig]

Okay, the canopy was assembled last night, after a few coats of polyurethan to seal the frame.

I didn't get to take pictures last night, so here's the best I could do with daytime lighting. Proper white balance is almost impossible to achieve with the varied light sources, and there are enough windows that almost every angle comes out backlit. I'll get some better pics later, but this will at least let me share my progress.

The stand from the living room side:


Canopy with the doors open for full access:


A piece of the trim that will go around the base of the canoy to hide the waterline:


Unfortunately, the bottom trim won't go on for a few weeks. My wife disagreed with my original method for mounting the trim at the waterline, so I'll need to get some more filler pieces and do it in a slightly different way. In the meantime, the crown molding can go up and I can start working on the lights and plumbing (I finally ordered all of my plumbing supplies from aquaticecosystems).

My Euroreef CS12-2 was sent off yesterday for a serious upgrade. I will be beta testing a new pump for them, and they're converting my 12-2 to recirculating with the new pumps. Performance is supposed to increase 50% with the new pumps, plus I'll get the benefits of the recirculating design. From pics shared by one of the other beta testers in the ER forum, the new combo pulls some very dark black skimmate, while generating almost twice the skimmate volume as before.

I got a lot of strange looks when I was driving the UPS store. I had the top down, and the skimmer box sitting in the passenger seat (it wouldn't fit in the trunk). The box was so big that it was sticking out about 10" above the windshield.

[jthnhale]

you've made great progress in a short amount of time.
what a difference from the first photo you posted!
looks great! do you have any ideas for the aquascaping yet?

[jeffbrig]

jtnhale, I have some ideas as far as what I like for aquascaping. The basic idea is to keep the reef structure towards the center, with swimming room around all three viewable sides. I'd like to avoid having a plain wall though. I like clams and fungia corals, so I want to have some open sandy areas that receive strong light. I like the idea of making a cove in one area, I've seen that in a few tanks. I also like the idea of having a valley where you can see sand all the way across the tank. I think this would work really well on a diagonal for a room divider, but I'm not sure how easy it would be to set up. In general, I think the rock will be highest at the overflow side, and lower on the open side, this will let you look down the length of the reef from the far end.

I really think I'll just have to play around with the rocks once they're in there, and decide what works best.

I emailed Mike at liverocks.com (at GrndHog's suggestion), and the prices look pretty good over there. I think I can buy rock from them and buy critters separately for less than the TBS package price. I still need to decide how much I want to get, and how full I want the tank to look.

[jthnhale]

the width of your tank will really let you do some cool looking things.
if your able to pick out your own rocks I would try to get a few large ones, or maybe just one that can sit alone towards the end of the tank.
I agree you don't want a wall look in there at all. I made some racks that are well hidden,
they allow for some nice caves for the fish to swim in, and you don't need as much rock to build up the "reef". I also like the idea of large open areas, less rock also gives room for the coral to grow. your right though, you have to see the rock first then come up with some final ideas. also with the racks you can drill holes in flat rocks and zip tie them to the racks. this can give you some great outcroppings you otherwise could not create. just make sure the rack is well counterbalanced.

[GrndHog]

Jeff,

I thought I would maybe help out a little by posting a few pics of my aquascape. Like I said earlier, I have a see thru tank and had to scape it like you decsribed your thinking of scaping yours. The only difference is that you have one end opened and I do not, just the sides.

My idea was to build it all down the middle of the tank and have corals on both sides and also a couple of bridges where the fish can go from side to side.

Please ignor the out of control xenias

Office Side Office Right side Hallway side Hallway right side

[polskp]

That's an AWESOME project. I can't wait to see you get some water in there. I will be looking to build a setup in the next year or so with my father-in-law, and I will definitely be referring to your thread. I think that your stand looks so classy with the granite, and it makes an exceptional room divider.

Cheers!

Pete

[BlueTBird]

This project is way sweet. Cant wait until you got stuff it it. Keep up the great work. Keep the pic's coming!

I also just finished a room divider project with a 105.

here is the link if you are interested:

http://archive.reefcentral.com/forum...hreadid=350276