New Build

Ok guys, ive decided to do another thread as i now am officially piped

LFS had been getting the right parts, just the guy down there was confused as it which pipe i needed lol.

Tank was sealed on Saturday and currently now starting to fill. I have been aquascaping for the last 2 days and will show pics then its in the tank. Maybe a teaser tomorrow lol.

Still have to wire up everything nice, and currently getting other rock from my small tank ready to be cleaned and put in.

Will let you all know how it goes over next few days, should have pics tomorrow for you guys.

Sorry john, could you move this to the marine section please

Edit, done now - sorry for the delay.

Great news fair play delighted for you

..............now where is the fecking pics ur killing me here ahhhhhhhh lol

Looking forward to seeing pics

Well its taking me ,longer than expected to aquascape, and fill the tank lol. im kinda in between doing work on it and work in the house since my 2 year old is gone for the week. I should hopefully have sometime for you guys soon. Its clean, about 600 litres of water in it now and i think most of the aquascaping is done. Heating up now, just have to finish wiring on top of cleaning up my sitting room since ive completely trashed it in the last few days lol.

Here is a pic of the tank clean level and in place, only thing i have on my phone. Styrofoam placed under tank and sump to make sure its all good sitting there for the long haul lol.

OK guys, got my misses to send me on a photo so you guys can see the extent of progress. Hope you guys can see the rockwork as its not a great pic. Ill do a 360 view of the tank during the day at the weekend so you can see it better.





There is approx 50-55kgs of rock in the main body of the tank and another sitting in the sump to cycle in case i need it. Running a 300w heater in the tank to start bringing it up to temp as i say tomorrow it should be full Also have one of my RW20's running in the tank for flow and must say its a damn good wavemaker, cant wait to put the second one in

Enjoy all, back to work for me before they wonder do i do anything lol

Don't know anything about marines but that looks like the start of something great

Its taking shape alright, sure it will be stunning!

Tom

Sorry for no update during the weekend guys, been busy lol.

Finished filling the tank and put in the second 300w heater into the tank. Added 22kgs of salt and salinity is currently 1.022 so will bring it up the rest of the way during the week. Havent done a water test yet so thats a job for the week.

Tried out my 2 new RW20 powerheads and i must say i will probably only need one lol, and at that probably only at 50 % lol as it was really moving water and my sand gravel mix, ive patches of glass everywhere now lol.

This is a complete learning experience for me as ive jumped from 136liters being my biggest tank to this one has approx 700liters. in 2 weeks i will do a 100 liter water change and do daily testing from there.

I tested my skimmer after i cleaned it yesterday and it didnt work then i found 1 grain of sand stopping the impeller from moving and then it was fine

Reactor will be built and put in during the week too hopefully but i am mad busy at work and home so im in totally no rush to get this beast up and running. Ill put on my lights someday and show you all the rockwork in all its glory. im loving it the more i see if, hopefully i wont have to change anything if i get dead spots.

Will keep you all informed.

Hey Jonathan

Following up your new thread. So far so good! But we want more pictures!!!

My name is Shane lol

I will have more pictures soon of everything thats going on. My cabling isnt any where near as good as yours but i think i will follow your footsteps and get rails put in so i can keep everything tidy, might take me awhile to get that far tho, maybe in a couple of weeks.

The tank is in the front room of my house which doesnt get any direct sun except for the very early morning, plus i dont have my lights on the tank yet so i havent been able to get a good picture of the rockwork.

If anyone has any ideas on positioning of wavemakers for a 5ft tank will you gimme some ideas. I currently have one each side middle, mainly pointing directly accross the tank and up slightly. Even at 10% im getting good wave on the surface but im getting abit too much sand movement. hopefully i will get some pitures up to show you this week.

wanna basically cable and tidy and get the skimmer and reactor up and running this week. as well as starting water tests. Ive been having issues with power in my extended kitchen which i taking up abit of my time but its finally sorted since my landlord sent an electrician today. my two daughters are currently sick so not getting any time to work on the tanks for the last 3 days.

Will try adn keep you all informed

STILL ENJOYING IT THO

I have a rw15 in my 3ft tank running at 50%
It's at the back middle of the side panel at about a 30 degree angle towards the surface

Plenty of flow with just enough surface disturbance and absolutely no sandstorms

Love the new tank! Great job so far!

Hahaha

I dont know why I thought I was talking to Jonlate! my apologies Shane

Those cable trunking are very nice and very cheap. I bought them from electricalwholesaler.ie. Took a while for them to deliver them because I believe it was out of stock. They only sell them in 3 meter pieces but even them I think it was only like 5 euro or something like that.

Cable management is something you can do after or while the tank is cycling so no rush for you.

Cant give you advice regarding wavemakers, I have always found it hard to find the right flow patterns. Normally I point 1 up towards the top slightly pointing to the back and another one towards the glass but it really depends on your rock work.

hi shane sent you a pm reguarding the wavemaker . Robert

I think im going to go with the trunking, was actually looking at electricalwholesaler.ie this morning lol. really good prices on it and cheap bends and piping to hide everything away.

Just wondering did you get your amp box from there??? Would like to have something that would be telling me how much power the tank is using and im planning on making an area for cabling to the right of the tank, maybe a little press of some sort to help hide things and to make sure my little ones dont go near them lol.

Im planning on leaving the tank cycle for at least a month now, well to try and let real life stuff came down abit at the same time so i can have abit more time to work on it. I have a little operation start of next week so might do a few bits for the 2 days i have off and not being able to talk lol.

I think i might not use both RW20's think i went abit too mad with getting two of them and should have just gotten 2 rw15's instead. Going to go with using one and trying the same setup as hammie, back middle side with an upward angle. kinda what i have going on in my 3ft m90 with a 4000l/h blau, which i would recommend staying away from, they aint that good lol.

Robert, thanks for the message, replied in kind

Hey Shane

I got one of my boxed from them which I dont really like as the wall fix points are in the middle, the other one I found it in my local hardware store. The one from wholesaler is 4 module IP65 proof, the one from my local HS is a 9 module IP 55. You will need grommets so water wont get inside the Circuit box. You can only use 1 RCBO per unit/CB as they are very small and they are not designed to fit more than one. It is not a physical limitation but a technical one. With this I mean that you can fit 9 RCBOs if you want but as you only have 1 neutral plate this will create an imbalance which will constantly trigger the RCBOs.

The Voltage meter I have is this one

link

Took a while to get to Ireland (over 3-4 weeks) but it was worth it. I have ordered a another one just as a spare.

Installing it is easy enough once you know how it works, if you have doubt let me know.

I find these boxes very nit and helpful. To be honest I though I would be using much more electricity but even with everything on I never go over 3-4 amps per unit which leaves me over 9 amps to spare. I could even connect all my equipment to one single unit and still have room to spare.

Remember that I have split them in two areas, left and right, but I have also wired in such way that I can easily connect equipment on the right of the aquarium to the CB on the left and viceversa. I did this just in case one of them would fail in the future.

Also my Apex EB power modules are split as well, one is managed by the left CB and the other by the right CB.

Trunking makes a big different, also it is made out of plastic so it wont rust!

Thanks for the info, will have a look at seeing what i can do. My girlfriend's dad us an electrician so might get some ideas from him.

No problem. If he is an electrician then you are very lucky... I had to read a lot and watch a few videos before I figure out how they work.

oh and ask him if there is an RCBO limit in a circuit box as well, I found out after buying 3 RCBOs and realizing they wouldnt stay on then I read it was because a imbalance caused by the neutral plate (apparently you need to have more than 1 to put several RCBOs but I was never 100% sure)

Will ask him tomorrow for you. Hes coming down for a visit

Very nice....didn't know one grain of sand could stop the impeller moving ...so just goes to show the importance of maintaining these pumps...

Love the rock work.

Sorry for the lack of updates guys, Had an op on monday and still not feeling the best.

Small update as im in work and have loads to do lol.

Tank is cycling well, no amonia, ph 8.1, salinity 1.025 and my nitrates are above 50 but i didnt have the skimmer running yet.

Installed a filter sock, running my skimmer without its lid at the moment to let it settle down, do need to raise it abit but getting feet for it during the weekend.
Reactors i still need to get put together, started dosing stability during the week just to help the cycling process. Lights are currently just sitting on glass but not on, did turn them on to see ther tank in all its glory, if i get some time later tonight ill have a pic up.

Had to put some larger 10mm coral gravel in to stop my powerheads from blowing my mix of 1-3mm and 3-5mm gravel about and its worked a treat

Power heads are moving the water great.

Lights are going to be suspended to help with the heat from them, bought a kit so hoping to do that during the weekend.

Other thank that looking forward to showing you all something during the weekend, you will have to excuse the mess of wires are everything but that will be my job after its all running.

Photos soon, sorry its taking this long lol

Did you get the wave maker.ok just seen your pm , I got it for my pond but couldn't get a suitable mounting

I'm going to make him a mounted rock lol. I'm going to glue the powerhead onto a rock drill through it for the cable and rewire it through so you will never notice it. Amazing what you can think of sitting bored in work lol.

Hey Shane

I think I posted this on the wrong forum but just remember when you are fixing the powerhead to the rock that you will need to do maintenance at some point so make sure it is easily removable, also, in case it breaks, you want to make sure you can remove it entirely!

Can't wait for those pics, hope you are filling better from your operation

Only going to be on a small rock, just big enough so it won't move when in use. Thing to use coral glue so it can easily be removed if needed.ill put up some pics of my dad's pond someday soon. They going on holidays soon and I'm on charge of keeping them safe lol.

I also started building a 22k liter pond, well making a 8k pond bigger for my partners dad. Started last year but only got lining and filling done last year. In August I'll be hopefully finishing it. Can only do it when I have a good chunk of time off work as they are in roscommon and I don't drive.

Other than that I'm feeling good, poussin nearly gone and my face is no longer a bruised lol.

Tested tank late last night no ammonia, nitrate 20, pH 8.1, kh 3.6, but nitrite is 1. Need to get my reactors up and running lol.

Wow Kh is quite low.

What salt are you using? I would recommend using a Kh buffer such as Balling light Calcium Mix from Fauna Marine.

The cycle is almost there I think

Using red Sea pro but I may have not done it right, had a better reading 2days ago. Going checking it again tonight.

No thats normal.

Calcium levels will deplete in a new aquarium although I think 3 is way too low, Red Sea Pro has a Kh of 12 if I remember correctly, I would have expected the Kh to go down to maybe 8 but not less, specially in such short period.

But aquariums at the beginning can have Kh and pH swings hence why a buffer will help. I use marinostail which came with the ceramic rocks, is the same as Tropic Marine triplebuffer, it helps stabilize the aquarium for the first few months and it is simple to use. A pH/Kh swing like this could kill most of your live stock.

This is another reason why they dont recommend adding hard stony corals as they need calcium to survive.

Well my partner really wants to put something in the tank as my daughter came home yesterday and keeps looking in the tank trying to find something in it lol.

For my previous tanks I got shrimps from lfs to check if they would survive rather than a fish. My daughter was only 1 at the time but she could find them in them so will go with that. 1.75 is a good start to see if something will survive

Im sorry, no updates all weekend, house full of sick kids, funeral, and general not assed to do anything cause im wrecked.

Will get reactors up and running hopefully tomorrow, skimmer running still with collection cup off, will sort that out too. Overall what do you think of the tank with its lights on