40g Custom Rimless Reef Build

T

Tswifty

New Member
New to the site, and to start out... I think I'll post some pictures of my custom 30" x 22" x 16" tall rimless acrylic tank build that I'm currently in the middle of. Feel free to comment.

I'll start off with some specs:

External Overflow w/ 3 - 1" bulkheads
2 Hofer Gurgle Busters & 1 Emergency Line
No isolated pumps used to feed equipment. All Equipment is fed via a Manifold.
Refugium will consist of Cheatomorpha w/ Live Rock Rubble substrate
1/2" Sandbed Carib Sea Fiji Pink
50-60lbs of Live Rock

Equipment:

250w PFO Mini Pendant HQI w/ PFO M80 Ballast & Aqualine AB 20k bulb
EcoTech Marine VorTech MP40w
Marine Solutions MSX-160 Protein Skimmer
Eheim 1262 Return Pump
Two Little Phishes Phosban Reactor 150 (Carbon)
DIY 18" Tall Kalkwasser Reactor w/ MJ 600 Stirring Pump (ATO)
Korallin 1502 Calcium Reactor w/ Reef Fanatic CO2 Regulator
Aquacontroller 3 w/ DC8, IO Breakout Box, 2 pH Probes & Temperature Probe
250 watt Blue Line Biotherm Titanium Heating Element

Pictures:

Tank when it first arrived:



Custom acrylic sump as well:



Tank & Stand shot:



Where I'm at right now in the build...

Under the stand:



Full Tank Shot:

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Thanks for looking. :drink:
 
T

Tswifty

New Member
Haha...

I'm not planning on adding anymore rock, there's another piece of large rock in the refugium, because I couldn't find a spot for it, but I think that's going towards another tank I'm picking up on Saturday. :cool1:

I am planning on adding more refugium rubble though. I'd like to have about 2 or 3" in the fuge.
 
T

Tswifty

New Member
So it's definitely been a while, so let's start the rundown:

Here's the Ca Reactor setup I am using



DIY Kalk Reactor which is hooked to my ATO



Before I could move corals over, I needed to build some type of light rack to hold the pendant. So I bent a 3/4" piece of conduit and painted it black



The refugium substrate consists of about 5lbs of live rock rubble. I am removing cheato, and hoping to add about 5 more lbs later this week.



To hold my ATO float switches and my probes for the ACIII, I had a little holder fabricated out of acrylic by a friend of mine.



 
T

Tswifty

New Member
Here is a semi recent shot of the sump:



Also, I had a top cut out of some plastic peg board like material. This only goes on the tank at night to discourage jumpers





 
T

Tswifty

New Member
I'm not completely satisfied with the look from just one MH pendant, so I decided to build a floating canopy which will have space to hold potentially another 250w pendant (if I want) as well as 2 or 4 VHO's or T5's.

This is not on the tank yet. I hope to bring it online next week sometime. It will hang 6" or 8" above the tank, so that the tank still maintains the rimless look. The canopy was also designed to mirror the stand.











 
T

Tswifty

New Member
I'm VERY unhappy with my colors right now. I had a bad MH bulb, and was unable to borrow a PAR meter until last week. So I was basically growing my corals in the dark without knowing it. I lost a few of my ORA corals, as well as had 3 or 4 corals STN on me, and a lot more darken or brown before I was able to get to the root of the problem.

So hopefully the next 2 months will show a big improvement in color and growth in my tank, especially after I pull off the lighting upgrade. After 1 week, I'm already noticing an improvement in some of the coral's color.

Also, the tank looks a little different now as well... so I'll try and get some updated FTS's later today.
 
T

Tswifty

New Member
Aqualine AB 20k.

I will be switching out to 2 - Pheonix 14k's, and adding either 2 or 4 - 24" Super Actinic R VHO's. I have an IceCap 430, so I plan on running whatever I end up having room for.
 
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