I bought a 150 gallon a couple months ago to consolidate my tanks and just to have a nice overflow tank (my 29g and 40g were using siphon boxes and I really wanted to get away from that). So here it is, I set it up when I came home for Thanksgiving break. The tank is 60x24x24".

Livestock as of 5/18/2010, I'm sure I've forgotten some
Fish:
Red Sea Regal Angelfish
Juvenile Emperor Angelfish
Flame Angelfish
Copperband Butterfly
(2) Red Sea Purple Tangs
Blue Hippo Tang
Sailfin Tang
(2) Green Mandarin Dragonets
(2) Bangai Cardinals
Sixline Wrasse
Royal Gramma
(4) Occelaris clownfish
(14) Green Chromis
Yellowtail Blue Damsel
Huge Rose Bubble Tip Anemone bought at 6" or so, up to about 14-16" right now (measuring the 'plate' part, not the tentacles).

Invertebrates:
(2) Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
(4) Emerald Crabs
(80+) Blue Leg Hermits
(2) Scarlet Red Leg Hermits (I want to get more but $$$)
(125+) Cerith Snails
(30) Nerite Snails
(35) Astrea Snails
(60) Nassarius Snails
(4) Large Fancy Nassarius Snails
(20) Zig Zag Periwinkles
Lettuce Nudibranch
A bunch of small starfish (the little white ones and mini brittle starfish)
More snails, lots of little baby snails
Various other hitchhikers, snails, slugs, nudibranches, etc.

My Refugium Macroalgaes:
Chaeto
Codium
Gracilaria
Fern Caulerpa
Shaving Brush
Ulva
15 Red Mangroves

Corals:
Softies:
A variety of Zoas (every color but blue)
A variety of Mushrooms (mainly green and red)
Red, Green and Blue Ricordia Mushrooms
Green Star Polyps (mostly growing on the overflow but also some of the base rock)
Metallic Purple Clove Star Polyps
Kenya and Colt Trees

Large Polyp Stony Corals:
Green Metallic Hammer (bought with 6 heads, has about 22 now +/- small ones)
Neon Green Candy Canes (bought with 16-18 heads, now up to 36-40)
Green Closed Brain
Green Open Brain (gets to be about 10" when fully inflated)

Small Polyp Stony Corals:
... I'm not very good at the SPS names/genius yet
A variety of Birdsnests
A blue tipped green body acro
A neon green monti
A couple different torts (still want some blue)


Equipment:
150g Display Tank
AGA MegaFlow 4 Sump
10g Refugium
CNC A300 Askoll 1500 based Protein Skimmer EuroReef RS-100 Protein Skimmer
Coralife Turbo-Sea 1270 return pump (need to switch to my Iwaki WMD30RLXT)
(2) 1" Sea Swirl wave makers on the sump return line
(2) Hydor Koralia 4 pumps
Phosban 150 reactor
Rena XP2 (running the chiller, has polyfill and carbon in it)
(2) Marineland Visi-Therm 300w Heaters
Current-USA 1/15hp Chiller (I originally bought it for my 10 gallon, I need to get a larger one for this tank :-/ )
(2) Lumatek 250 watt Digital Ballasts
(2) Reeflux 20k 250w SE bulbs under batwing reflectors
Coralife 36" 96w Compact Florescent with 420nm bulb
(6) Current-USA 24" 14w 460nm Actinic T-5 lights in the canopy plus one under the stand
(2) Current-USA 24" 14w 10,000k Daylight T-5 lights in the canopy plus one under the stand
Coralife 12" 36w 50/50 Compact Florescent on the Refugium
Puratek 100GPD RO/DI Filter System
Tunze Osmolator Universal 3155 Auto Top Off
Digital Aquatics Reef Keeper Lite Controller


12/24/2009 Full Tank Shot:


150 gallon setup:







Here are some of the pics I snapped while I was setting it up:

You can click for larger pics

Is that some type of branching monti or just a rock that the RBTAs are on? It looks very unique.

It is a coral skeleton, although eventually with this tank I'd like to have nice SPS's growing, I only have a few small frags at the moment. My dad has a ton of coral skeleton decorations he's collected over the past 35 years or so. He's always had fish only tanks and he would clean/bleach every few months to keep them white but he's decided to move away from the sterile look and go more in the reef direction with his tank after taking care of mine for the last few months. He put a couple in mine in hopes that the coraline algae will start to seed on them. There is actually one in the last picture just to the right of the center that has been in my system since last summer or so along with in the second to last picture above the hammer, my candy canes are sitting in it. The coraline likes to grow on them, I kind of wonder if it is slowly "eating" away at them because they are calcium based.

My Dad sent me a picture of the anemones the other day

I can't believe how big they have gotten. They started out in my 40 gallon with a 96w PC and a couple 14 watt T-5's. Then I put a 250 watt metal halide on it and they haven't stopped growing since lol. They are occasionally target fed mysis and such and I'm sure they catch some floating around feeding time but I've never given them silversides or anything (I don't even know what they look like). Just strong lighting and good water conditions. Before the metal halides they were more long tentacle-ish and ever since the metal halide they look like bubbles, this is the first time I've seen one without a lot of bubbles.

I can't believe how big they have gotten since I first bought them.

Picked up a 10 gallon acrylic tank today for my refugium






So I finally got around to taking some nice pictures of the setup:


Under the hood

The container to the left of the sump is my freshwater container for the auto top off.



Refugium (is also home to my clowns from my 55g tank I had at school) Eventually I'm going to paint the pipes black.


Full Tank Shot

http://i188.photobucket.com/albums/z28/Teh...G_9184-crop.jpg

In the process of adding a remote sump






fish were having fun

great shots of your tank!
i hope to see more fishes in it!

My Dad went to the Barrier reef sale last week and picked up a sailfin tang and sixline wrasse for me. Also I have a purple tang and juvenile Emperor angel coming next week!





The green star polyps have started encrusting on the overflow

I like your bicolor angel. Looks healthy!

I love when gsp grows up the glass

Thanks! He is, but a little too healthy, he started pestering my green open brain and since I'd like to have clams in the future the first chance I get to catch him I think he's going to find a new home in my Dad's 255 gallon tank :-/



This picture is from april 3rd, apparently now the two sides have connected (I'm still at school so I don't get to see my tank very often, only 8 more weeks till I graduate )


I figured what better why to hide the overflow than with GSPs

here are more pics from April 3rd,
the softies on the left side have been removed and ordered 30lbs of dry rock for my dad to pile up instead so it will seed into live rock




one of the two Bangai Cardinals I bought from a local breeder (he had 50) I love how they shimmer under the metal halide, wish they were more active but oh well.


I'm hoping to pick up a Purple Tang this weekend along with some more chromis

This tank is awesome!!!!!!

I am amazed that the Copperband is not picking at the anemone, and other coral for that matter.

Quite the system you have there. Very nicely done.

Thanks for the comments guys!

I ordered 32lbs of dead rock from www.reefcleaners.org last week and my dad sent me these pics last night






I'm planning on placing a much larger order in the future, I just wanted to see what the rock looked like prior to making a big order and I'm really happy with it. It's nice because my tank seeds rocks really quickly, I wouldn't be surprised if by the time I'm home the dead rock will be covered with coraline and feather dusters. My Dad and friend have asked me to seed rock from my tank for theirs so this is going to become a process I become very familiar with in the next few months.

Right now the rock is stacked in the center of the tank but eventually I'd like to order another 100-130lbs to build up the back of the tank. 24" tanks really take a lot of rock to fill out front to back.

Rearranged the rocks and added a second flame angel, I'm hoping it is a female.

All the chromis look great. I have 5 and really want to add more but I'm scared to screw up the group dynamic, this is the longest I've ever had a group of them get along.

Yeah it's tough to say. I've been having issues with them finding their way into the overflow box. I'll be setting up an All Glass Aquarium 125 gallon when I get home and taking down this tank so I won't have that problem anymore (and will actually be able to take nice pictures and see my corals true colors again vs the scratched acrylic ).

It turns out the second flame was a male. My Dad was able to catch it and the bi-color so I told him he could have them for his tank. I wanted to start keeping clams so I needed to get rid of the bi-color (he was also nipping on some of my birdsnest/other SPS). He also caught one of the three skunk cleaner shrimp and one of the two yellow tail blue damsels so I told him he could put them in his tank as well. When I was home a few weeks ago I took a couple of my softy rocks over to his tank, the kenya tree, various zoas and mushrooms, etc.

I ordered 100lbs of dry rock from reefcleaners.org today, and yesterday a large clean-up crew order (also from reefcleaners.org) came and I had my dad split the inverts between his 255g and my 150g and put the macroalgaes I ordered in my refugium. I asked him to build this shelf in my sump to hold the red mangroves I ordered until I get home (5 weeks) to setup a new, larger and mangrove friendly refugium. The 10 gallon is too full now.

My LFS had an order of purple tangs come in today and they had them on sale so I asked my Dad to buy two of them for me. He also picked up one for his tank along with a yellow tang. With all these additions the past few days he's been driving a lot, the two tanks are about 17 miles apart.

Lastly to wind up this insanely expensive day I placed an order through saltwaterfish.com. They finally had the fish I wanted in stock and I needed to use a $47 store credit.

Juvenile Emperor Angel (so much for clams haha)
Regal Angel
Blue Hippo Tang
Copperband Butterfly
Green Mandarin Dragonet (I already have a pair, I bought this for my Dad, he's been taking care of my tank while I'm away at school).
I also picked up a Lettuce Nudibranch and a Scarlet Hermit with the point reward system they have.

I asked him to setup my old 55 gallon tank next to my 150 gallon, it will be attached to the 150g sump and I am going to use it to acclimate these fish since some are picky eaters want to make sure they are eating mysis and other prepared foods prior to releasing them in either of the big tanks since it is almost impossible to get fish out of. I'm also going to try and gauge what kind of appetites for my corals the angels have before making the judgment call to put them in my tank or gift them to my Dad (in which case he might have to forgo having a reef tank like mine and be happy with an angel tank lol). The 55 gallon will come down once we are out of this transition stage between tanks.

So as of next wednesday my livestock list should be:
Regal Angelfish
Juvenile Emperor Angelfish
Flame Angelfish
Copperband Butterfly
(2) Red Sea Purple Tangs
Blue Hippo Tang
Sailfin Tang
(2) Green Mandarin Dragonets
(2) Bangai Cardinals
Sixline Wrasse
Royal Gramma
(4) Occelaris clownfish
(14) Green Chromis
Yellowtail Blue Damsel
(2) Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
Rose Bubble Tip Anemone

Although I'm sure I've forgotten about something.

Also he picked up the Reeflux 20k 250w SE bulbs I ordered today, I'm hoping he'll have a picture for me tonight. There are currently 10k bulbs in there for growth.

The tank is looking real good!

Yep, the tank looks awesome!!!

I was worried the two might fight but it appears they are quite happy with each other!

Added some more fish today

Sweet angels!

Thank you! I'm really hoping they will be model citizens with the corals.

I updated the first post with a livestock and equipment list, to the best of my memory.

very nice, tank!
i love the two tangs

O.O so awesome!!

Thanks guys!

The angels have been doing well with all the corals, I'm very pleased and hope it continues.

I love the way your tank is set up

was that a juvenile koran or emperor angel?

Juvenile Emperor

Thanks guys!

My Dad has a 255 gallon tank at his office he had setup a couple years ago. Seeing it setup really sparked my interest in this hobby and is when I started researching and learning. A few months later I setup my own tank which has evolved into the 150g tank and system you see in this thread.

Unfortunately his tank crashed last week, 5/18/2010. I'm not sure what exactly caused it but he has been fighting a losing battle for the last year. The way the company set it up works if you have their weekly service contract, but it has quite a few shortcomings (no baffle for the skimmer so the water level constantly changes, no auto top off either, no live rock (they would switch out the coral skeletons with clean ones weekly), bio balls, an undersized skimmer (rated for 180g on a heavy stocked 255 gallon), used tap water, among other things). When the skimmer broke it took them 8 months to replace it. He canceled the contract, was doing weekly water changes with RO water he brought from home, switched to live rock and removed the bio balls, switched out the crushed coral substrate for live sand, etc. but last week something caused the nitrogen cycle to become upset, nitrates were off the chart and ammonia/nitrites were up above 0 (I forget what).

He lost half his fish, including my old flame and bi-color angels I recently gave him. In total he lost his show french angel, powder blue tang, purple tang, yellow tang, heniochis butterfly, royal gramma, flame angel, bi-color angel, occelaris clownfish, 6 yellow tail blue damsels and I forget what else.

Luckily since he has let me take over a good portion of his house with my own fish tank stuff while I'm away he has been able to save his queen angel, one occelaris clown, six yellow tail blue damsels and the two skunk cleaner shrimp I gave him. Primarily because I have a lot of "old" tanks and equipment I need to sell but haven't been home to be able to. (from transitioning from a 10g to 29g to 40g to 55g to my current 150g).

On the "plus" side now the live stock isn't affecting our options/decisions on how to fix his setup. Now we can drain it and start from new, before we could not. It is not really a plus but any aquarist who has experienced this kind of loss knows how defeating it feels and how discouraging it is. I think if it were not him taking care of my setup he would have exited the hobby for a while.

A couple months ago I asked him to setup my old 40 gallon breeder and fill it with the old water from water changes on my 150g. I was having him do this for two reasons, to use the tank to cure live rock and so he would have a quarantine tank in case something bad happened. For the last 5 days his fish have been in this tank.

There is nothing wrong with his fish, the deaths were water quality related, not bacterial/disease. They've spent a week in quarantine and look and act fine so I recommended he attach my old 55 gallon reef ready tank to my system and keep his fish in there. This way they have excellent water quality and he doesn't have the additional maintenance with the 40g running (potential cycle, fresh water top offs, setting up filtration, forgetting to feed his fish because they are in another room, etc) and stressing his fish in it (his queen is too large for a 40g breeder for more than short term). Attaching the 55g to my system to keep his fish in removes any time pressures while we redesign his tank.

Additionally my protein skimmer is rated for 700 gallons lightly stocked, 400 gallons heavily stocked and I'll be right around 250 gallons with the 55g on my system. I also have a 100lb dry rock order coming in and having the 55g setup works two fold because now he can put the rock in there and still have it seed instead of making a huge temporary rock pile in my display tank lol.

He has new water mixed and up to temp, as of right now the only thing left is finishing the plumbing for the return pump.

Here is the 55g in place




Here is the overflow plumbing from the 55 gallon to my sump


I had him use my mag drive 7 as a return pump for the 55 gallon. I originally bought it for my 29g but have since been using it for water changes.


He is using the return piping I had on my 29g setup. It was laying in the garage and already has anti-siphon holes drilled. It is going behind the tank, he just sent me this pic to show me what he is doing

Oh man that stinks

I'm glad you're resurrecting the 55 though.

I went home for Memorial weekend and got some stuff done



larger version of the full tank shot here







New full tank shot after redoing the rock work and adding more dry rock I ordered

larger version of the full tank shot here

It sucks to lose some livestock, but if that is the spark needed to empty the tank and do it the right way then that crash was a blessing in disguise. Good luck with the redo, you should start a thread on it!

Your new rock looks good!

Loving the new style!!!

Thanks!

Those SPS frags look awesome.

Thanks a bunch! I'm really excited I've reached the point where I can actually afford and keep them successfully. Although admittedly I need to get a calcium reactor on the tank, or some sort of supplementation. The growth I've had so far the past few months has been amazing but I can't help but wonder how much more explosive it would be if I had calc/mag supplementation. Being across the state it has been impossible to do water tests/etc. My dad has just been doing 6 week water changes with my Tropic Marin Pro Reef salt for me but the bucket ran out last week

Expensive I'm tempted to switch back to Instant Ocean because I can get the buckets for almost 1/3 the cost at my LFS but I think I'd better stick with Tropic Marin one more time.

8/24/2010 update of my 150 gallon SPS Reef





kind of a rough idea of what the whole thing looks like... from one angle, there is a huge valley in the middle you don't see from this side

I'm really liking the tank.

Things grew a lot!

Thanks!

I just ordered a bunch of parts to get the calcium reactor going and 100lbs of dry rock (reefcleaners.org had a sale today).

I haven't done much with the tank, I imagine I'll start tinkering more when the rain comes back.

What calcium reactor?

Geo 618

Cool

I want to get the AquaC RX-1 (i think it's called that )

I love your Potter's Angel!

I picked up two pinnate batfish yesterday They will have their own tank once I complete my next build out.







Thanks!

Unfortunately he has developed enough of an appetite he won't be going back into my SPS tank when I finish my new system. I'm planning on having a FOWLR (well actually probably a softies reef) angel tank.