600 gallon Acrylic Reef

[pwhitby]

As most of you know, I currently run a 225g glass tank set up as a reef. When I bought this tank, about 6 years ago I didnt spend the extra and buy a reef ready set up, I considered that, in hindsight, to have been a mistake. Originally the tank was established with VHO lights and mostly soft corals. A few years ago i decided to change up and rework the system. I added a couple of hang on overflows from lifereef, added a sump (75g) with a 30g refugium. I then upgraded the lights to 250W MH. Once the change over was completed I purchased a bunch of frags and let the tank do its stuff. I was really ahppy with the results. The corals grew well and the tank 9to me) looked great. To encourage more growth, I replaced my old skimmer and upgraded the lights to 400W. (5 of them) This necessitated adding a chiller. I also added a calcium reactor. Stuff really began growing then, which puts me at the point Im at now. I have ran out of space. Over the last 6 months I have had to aggressively trim many corals. These I have sold for the most part and the money i made has gone to the new setup.

For those who have not seen my tank recently, here are a few pictures of the 225g.





One of the the things that I did while working on my old system was to buy equipment over-rated for my needs. I always hoped to have a larger tank, and thus bought equipment with that goal in mind.

The tank is now ordered, and barring anything unforeseen happening, I should be able to see it in a few weeks. The basic tank is going to be acrylic with a black acrylic back plate. The overfows (gotta be reef ready) are located on the outside of the tank to leave more space for the corals and fish. The last pic I have is the basic design of the system to give you an idea.



This tank will be a beast. Looks small on paper, im sure I will freak out when I see it in person. Im even more sure that Lynn will definitely freak out......oh well....

Ill keep you guys informed on progress and post any pics I may have along the way.

Paul.