filefish949's 7.5 gallon SPS cube

[filefish949]

I am thinking about adding A fish... I have no idea what I can put in there

[filefish949]

phosban reactor build

 

I received a TLF phosban reactor for Christmas with which I was none to pleased. the first thing that was apparent to me was the elbows, did not fit and would be prone to leaking, this was confirmed within seconds of powering the pump. I decided to do a little experiment to see just how tight they fit as apparently there are many who think these things are just great. I connected the elbow to the reactor lid a and affixed a bucket to the elbow with a ziptie then proceeded to fill the bucket with sand to see just how many pounds of pressure were required for this to fail

 

 

I tried this with both elbows supplied with the reactor and coincidentally they both failed at 4 pounds 5 ounces which happens to be 3 ounces less than is required to pull the trigger on my kimber custom carry II

 

 

obviously this needed to be fixed, I tried zipties and they helped a lot, though to be effective they had to be pulled very tight which contorted the elbow, this combined with the fact that my sump is very crowded with my newly acquired ASM mini-G I decided to manufacture a pair of U tubes. the first step was to fill them with sand so they would not collapse when the radius was applied

 

 

Once the tubing was filled with sand and packed tightly I plugged each end with some crumpled paper and applied heat with my heat gun. if you do not have a heat gun, this step I do not know what heat or time to use, you would have to play with it but you could probably use an oven. when using heat gun, I needed to be careful to keep the heat moving so as not to burn or excessively heat one area. once the tubing was "floppy soft"

 

 

I formed a radius, in this case I used a glass. the tubing needs to be held in place until it cools, It helps to "over radius" it as it tends to relax its radius about 10% after cooling. Spraying the tubing with water while on the former helps to speed up the cooling

 

 

Here is the finished tubes installed, I may add zipties, but they fit tight enough that they are no longer necessary

 

 

 

The next thing that was not ready for prime time was the pads or sponges. The holes in them were simply too corse, and with no manipulation, GFO would fall right through

 

 

After taking the picture, I was surprised to see that this much had fallen through, by simply picking the pad up

 

 

Instead of waiting to order a new set of pads that may or may not be better, I decided to make my own. The foam I had available was moderately finer however I decided to cut the pads twice as thick. I used your every day snap n sharp razor to cut the foam off like slices of bread

 

 

I found that it was best to error on the side of too big as it is easy to go back and trim to fit with a set of scisors. I used the red disk as a template to cut the foam circle

 

 

to be continued

[filefish949]

Phosban reactor build part dux

 

once that was done, I thought I may want to sue the reactor in sump, and since the label was made of paper, I did not want it polluting my tank, besides, we are getting to the point where it is not really fair to call it a a TLF phosban reactor any more, so I attempted to peal the sticker off but this was an exercise in futility as it had gotten wet for a few minutes and had already begun to deteriorate and just sort of fell apart as you tried to peal it leaving lot of glue residue

 

 

This was easily fixed with a little zap from the heat gun, again being careful not to apply too much heat to any one spot for too long a time, once heated, it came off like a debutant's bra on prom night

 

 

Another little deficiency that needed addressing was that the top plate and tube did not seal at all, it was actually so loose that you could spin it when resting on the bottom tube, this was fixed with 3 1/2 wraps of teflon tape

 

 

And here you can see my finished DIY reactor installed. Notice that the hose was trimmed to length so that the pump rests on the sump floor and the ball valve is on the input side as the original instructions state that the reactor will leak of the output is restricted

 

[Kirin1]

Another tight DIY!

 

I really enjoy your frustration with the quality of off-the-shelf gear and the mods that result. Keep up the good work.

[filefish949]

I have been neglecting this thread, and the tank a bit, but the SPS are oing well in it.

 

in the last few months I have:

 

added a cooling fan controlled by the ACJ.r big improvement

 

replaced with an ASM-enstine, a mini-g with recurculating mod and upgraded to an euroreef SP2 pump

 

put in the 70 watt astro-lux <sp> halide lamp

 

 

I will need to take some photos

[SPS20]

I have been neglecting this thread, and the tank a bit, but the SPS are oing well in it.

 

in the last few months I have:

 

added a cooling fan controlled by the ACJ.r big improvement

 

replaced with an ASM-enstine, a mini-g with recurculating mod and upgraded to an euroreef SP2 pump

 

put in the 70 watt astro-lux <sp> halide lamp

 

 

I will need to take some photos

 

Keep the pics coming, I love the intricate DIY work.

 

Neat tank.

[lakshwadeep]

I am thinking about adding A fish... I have no idea what I can put in there

 

Stick with Trimma or Eviota gobies. Their size (1") will be perfect for a 7.5g. You could put something clown, but IMO it is better to have small fish that create an illusion of a miniature reef.

[filefish949]

tang police aleart!!!

 

I put a 1" blue tang in a few days ago, seems very happy, this is a temporary mesure to deal with some nusance alage, then back to the LFS

[Matty1124]

bump for FTS! your DIYs all look great

[ash71089]

You said it had alot of diy projects, and now i believe you.

 

The tank looks great!

[filefish949]

TY very much. there a re a lot of very nice DIY projects here on nanoreef and a lot of very smart people, these are just ones i did. this particular nano was specifically to be a QT tank while I restocked new tank after my crash. my current tank is fully stocked and growing, so to took down the nano, I was not giving it the attention it deserved

[CarterNichols]

I really like the tank, and those DIY are really cool..i wish i was that handy.