29g AGA Build Pics

[BennyFrank]

Hey everyone,

 

I don't post here often but I do lurk quite a bit. Thought I would share some pics of my new build. Here are the specs;

 

Design Principles:

- modern and minimalist

- reduce (or eliminate completely) the amount of equipment/wires visible in the display

 

Water:

- 29g AGA display

- 40g breeder sump (~20g of which will be a display refuguim)

 

Water Movement:

- (1) 1 1/2" drain (700gph glass-holes overflow kit)

- (2) 3/4" returns connected to a SCWD wavemaker

- Eheim Compact+ 2000 return pump

- Vortech MP10w-ES (compliments of the nice folks over at glassbox-design )

 

Lighting:

- (3) RapidLED PAR30 20,000K LED Spotlights (60 degree optics)

- undecided on refugium lighting

 

Filtration:

- ~20lbs dryrock

- ~20lbs established liverock

- shallow sandbed

- macroalgae

- 50-100g capacity skimmer (not yet purchased)

- carbon/GFO reactor (not yet purchased)

 

Livestock:

- mixed reef (primarily LPS/SPS). Will probably go with fewer colonies to allow plenty of room for growth.

- fish option 1; pair of clowns, pair of bangaii cardinals, goby/shrimp pair

- fish option 2; species tank for a juvenile marine betta (Calloplesiops altivelis)

 

Pics to follow...

 

 

The space where I wanted the tank was originally framed for an in-wall wetbar, so I was limited to a tank that is 30" or less. Here are some of the original sketchups; quite a few things changed from these, but they were a good starting point.

 

 

 

 

 

The sump is in the room behind the display, so for the stand I just used 2x4s and sheetrock that were leftover from finishing my basement.

 

 

 

A buddy of mine does stone work and got me a great deal on a granite piece for the top.

 

 

 

Next was drilling and painting the tank.

 

 

 

 

Sump and plumbing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First set-back. Got everything plumbed and did a FW test. It ran fine for about 3 hrs and then I noticed a slow drip from the drain bulkhead :thumbdown. Disconnected the tank, tightened the fitting, and then replumbed it. No leak to date :smokin:.

 

 

 

 

Second set-back. I decided to use 1/4" acrylic for the fuge baffle as I didn't want to wait to have the glass cut. Upon filling it up, it bowed WAY beyond comfortable levels. I tried to wedge two pieces of eggcrate between it and the next baffle. It held for awhile but eventually cracked the glass bubble trap baffle. I would not recommend acrylic in glass sumps. Got a 1/4" piece of smoked glass cut for the fuge baffle and all is well. :beer:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is the tank in relation to the rest of the room.

 

 

The other side of the room (really just want to show-off my new table :lol2:).

 

 

Aquascaping and Lighting. Used a combination of superglue gel and epoxy to create the aquacape with ~15lbs of dryrock. Overall I'm pretty happy with it. Overtime I hope the corals fill in enough that you won't see any rockwork. The lighting consists of (3) PAR30 LED bulbs mounted in a standard light fixture. It is suppossed to be mounted to the ceiling so I had to MacGyver together a few parts to turn it into a pendant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This takes us to the present. I've been transferring over some pieces of established liverock into refugium. Already getting some goo.

 

 

[tyty22]

very nice setup, well planned out

[Orangutran]

[BennyFrank]

Thanks for the compliments. Not sure it is "bow-down" material quite yet though... maybe once it is stocked and fully grown out.

[CONSTANTNE]

Looks good so far. I like the fixture and how your incorporated the stand with the rest of the room. Will be following this!!

[tpme06]

That looks awesome, I love the LED fixture!

[bitts]

Wow so many ideas to steal. That use of sheet rock in the stand is fantastic. Defiantly adding to the list of possibilities for my 75. Where did you find the fixture for the leds. Assuming that it is not diy.

 

Any reason for going with the 29 over a 37. Personally I like the 29, but it sounded like the only limit you had was width. Anyway its always good to see another 29.

 

Welcome to nr. Pulling up a chair & waiting to see how this tank develops.

[cruzH20polo]

AWESOME BUILD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Pxiong85]

Extremely nice setup. Very simple but turned out astonishing!

[NU2REEFIN]

WOW!! Very nice, I considered something similar but didn't like the fact that the tank cannot be viewed from the sides. The way you've made the stand blend in is amazing.

[phi delt reefer]

Well done Benny - I think you have achieved exactly what you sought out for (modern and minimalist). Congrats on the tank - look forward to seeing it all stocked.

 

as for you aquascaping - how long did you let everything dry? what type of epoxy did you use?

 

thanks

 

Vince

[aquatame]

Love the rock work!!!!

[BennyFrank]

Looks good so far. I like the fixture and how your incorporated the stand with the rest of the room. Will be following this!!

 

That looks awesome, I love the LED fixture!

 

Thanks!

 

Wow so many ideas to steal. That use of sheet rock in the stand is fantastic. Defiantly adding to the list of possibilities for my 75. Where did you find the fixture for the leds. Assuming that it is not diy.

 

Any reason for going with the 29 over a 37. Personally I like the 29, but it sounded like the only limit you had was width. Anyway its always good to see another 29.

 

Welcome to nr. Pulling up a chair & waiting to see how this tank develops.

 

Steal away! It's actually durock cement board under the sump (vs. sheet rock, which is standard drywall). It's solid and water resistent and I had it left over from a renovation project; sometimes inspiration stems from availability! In fact, everything but the actual tanks and equipment was left over from various projects so it was nice to save some cash and get the stuff out of my garage also.

 

The fixture I found at Mendards. I searched all over for something that would work (track lighting, pendants, flood lights, etc.) and I liked this one the best. It is designed to be mounted directly to the ceiling and hard-wired, so I had to wire a plug to it and throw together some pieces to make it a pendant (so I guess it's kind of DIY )

 

I did consider the 37 but I just like the dimensions of the 29 better. It is more visually appealing to me for some reason, maybe because it's closer to the dimensions of a golden rectangle?

 

AWESOME BUILD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Extremely nice setup. Very simple but turned out astonishing!

 

WOW!! Very nice, I considered something similar but didn't like the fact that the tank cannot be viewed from the sides. The way you've made the stand blend in is amazing.

 

Again, thanks for the compliments.

 

Well done Benny - I think you have achieved exactly what you sought out for (modern and minimalist). Congrats on the tank - look forward to seeing it all stocked.

 

as for you aquascaping - how long did you let everything dry? what type of epoxy did you use?

 

thanks

 

Vince

 

I used a combination of superglue gel and WaterWeld epoxy (from Home Depot) to make the aquascape. It is 8 pieces of liverock bonded together. I let it cure for 2 days as I wasn't in a hurry, but I think the package says it is curred fully in 60 mins.

 

Love the rock work!!!!

 

Cool, the plan is to have corals grow in enough so you won't see any rock work...baby steps...

[bitts]

great info thanks.

 

lol, sounds like why i went with a 29. the other reason was i could have a sump & still set the total system volume at 30 gallons. keeping it a "nano".

 

how much evaporation do you see, with the 40 as the sump in one room & the display in a second room. seems like it should be pretty high. my display is completely covered, so evap is only from the surface area in the 20l sump & weirs+fall. but still its still pushing about a gallon a day. so I would be interested in seeing how much the difference in sumps have on this.

[BennyFrank]

how much evaporation do you see, with the 40 as the sump in one room & the display in a second room. seems like it should be pretty high. my display is completely covered, so evap is only from the surface area in the 20l sump & weirs+fall. but still its still pushing about a gallon a day. so I would be interested in seeing how much the difference in sumps have on this.

 

I haven't measured it yet but I will do it soon as I'm curious myself. 1 gallon a day seems like a lot... Evaporation is dependant on a bunch of things though; ambient room temp, relative humidity, water temp/movement, time of year, etc. Just from eye-balling I would say that I'm definitely under 1 gal a day; it will pick up now that fall/winter is rolling in.

[bitts]

yeah there a couple things going against my tank. first one is denver is much dryer than one would expect. then combing that with the overflows in my setup bring larger than most. with the distance of the fall from the weir to the water line, i expect to be above the curve. but still from the looks of your setup I'd guess that your seeing about 2 quarts a day. its funny but one of my favorite things about this hobby is how small changes from one setup to the next result in such large differences.

[BennyFrank]

Bryopsis sp.? Never had it before but it definitely doesn't look like typical hair algae.

 

 

Introducing "Hector" the Yellow Watchman Goby (Cryptocentrus cinctus).

 

 

Hector's namer and biggest fan.

 

[bitts]

awesome!

[ap123]

Beautiful

[Orangutran]

Very nice photos. What do you shoot with?

[BennyFrank]

Thanks bitts and ap123.

 

Orang; I shoot my photos with a Nikon D60 w/ the kit 18-55mm lens... and beer.

[Billdemart]

Looks awesome. I've been wanting a YWG for a LONG time. Going to try and pick one up tomorrow. Love the setup.

[AdriftQuasar]

Very cool set up! I think my favorite thing is probably the lights, but I really appreciate how much planning went into it.

[BennyFrank]

Looks awesome. I've been wanting a YWG for a LONG time. Going to try and pick one up tomorrow. Love the setup.

 

Yeah I've always enjoyed their personality. Mine is just a little guy (~1in) and has already taken a trip down the overflow... none the worse for wear though. Did you end up getting yours?

 

Very cool set up! I think my favorite thing is probably the lights, but I really appreciate how much planning went into it.

 

Thanks! The process of planning ahead made me reconsider a lot of my plans/decisions and resulted in a better end product IMO.

[Deleted User 6]

Solid setup BF. The lighting fixture is a perfect compliment to those bulbs. The scape is fantastic as well. Should look amazing with some acros.

 

For the bulkheads, I actually always run a bead of silicone around the outside gap b/t the glass and plastic as added protection. Since I don't plan to move them anywhere it's a cheap way to earn some peace of mind.