Vic's 120 gallons of rimless starphire goodness. - Pics updated: 9.26.08

[Withers]

Since I'm ditching my 75 in favor of a starphire tank, I figured, why not upgrade a little?

 

So here's the plan:

 

Tank

48"x24"x24" 3 sided rimless starphire tank

 

Light

36" Tek T5 fixture

 

Bulb selection:

ATI Blue +

ATI Aquablue Special

ATI Pro Color

ATI Blue+

ATI AquaBlue Special

ATI Blue+

 

Sump

20 gallon long with a 10 gallon refugium gravity feeding into it

 

Filtration

Grey Seas Aquatics Shorty 45 (recirculating needlewheel, rated for 135 gallons heavily stocked)

8 watt UV sterilizer (soon to be beefed up)

80ish lbs of Live rock

 

Flow

2x Tunze NanoStream 6045's

2x Modded Maxijet 1200's

 

Goal

This tank will be a shallow reef setup. It will be SPS dominated and I may use it as a Philippines biotope

 

Here's some rough sketches of the setup:

Stand:

 

All together:

 

The tank comes in on the 17th of May. I'll update this again at that time

[dtfleming]

who's making the take for you? NAGA

[Withers]

who's making the take for you? NAGA

 

Glass Cages. NAGA built my last tank but he won't work with glass, only acrylic. Based on Chris' and danskim's experiences with them I decided to take a chance

[dtfleming]

cool, danskim tank is awesome,

[wav3form]

Looks good. Lemme know if you need any help moving the tank around.

[Wawawang]

I just read a post about bad experiences with glasscages.com. The post is somewehre on the forums. You may want to do research before you go with them.

 

Link to thread

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...p;hl=glasscages

[Roc!]

Why a 36" fixture over a 48" tank?

[Uhuru]

I just read a post about bad experiences with glasscages.com. The post is somewehre on the forums. You may want to do research before you go with them.

 

Link to thread

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...p;hl=glasscages

 

I guess you didn't read through the thread yourself . . .

[Withers]

Why a 36" fixture over a 48" tank?

 

I've already got the fixture.

 

I'm not overly concerned about the extra 6 inches on each side of the tank not being covered by light, I don't think it's worth the extra expense to replace it with a 48" fixture.

[abe]

Why a 36" fixture over a 48" tank?

who says you can't put sofites on the side of a tank? T5's dont really have any spotlight effect anyways, it should be able to light up the whole tank.

[wav3form]

I thought you had a Euroreef skimmer Jason? You getting a new one?

[Withers]

The pump on it crapped out, so I took the opportunity to upgrade It's a good thing I did since I'm going to a 120 gallon.

[wav3form]

The pump on it crapped out, so I took the opportunity to upgrade It's a good thing I did since I'm going to a 120 gallon.

 

I need to get a new one soon too.

[wav3form]

Is your new tank still on schedule for this week? You must be getting anxious.

[Withers]

Is your new tank still on schedule for this week? You must be getting anxious.

 

As far as I know it's supposed to come in on Saturday. I'm definitely anxious to get it just because I can stop worrying about the quality issue at that point, but it'll still be a few weeks before it's actually set up. I'm still finalizing a design for the stand, so hopefully that'll be the next project. I'm also picking up a 40 watt UV sterilizer this weekend, so that should be fun

[Rocket]

I'm curious why a sterilizer? I have a 36w turbo twist laying around and was about to sell it.

 

I thought sterilizers are bad because they kill the microorganisms some corals/fish eat.

[Withers]

I'm curious why a sterilizer? I have a 36w turbo twist laying around and was about to sell it.

 

I thought sterilizers are bad because they kill the microorganisms some corals/fish eat.

 

That's why they're good They kill all parasites that pass through it. They also help clear up the water tremendously and if they're big enough they cut down on algae too. The only micro-organisms that it would kill would be various types of pods, but none of them really get transferred from the sump to the display anyway if you think about it. They're not free-swimmers, so the amount that gets sucked into the return is pretty minimal in my experience. The pros far outweigh the cons IMO, at least on large tanks.

[Rocket]

Great, Now I have to think how I'm going to plumb my Sterilizer into my new tank setup.

[wav3form]

Did you get it yet?

[Withers]

Yeah I got it, it looks good

 

Right now it's sitting in my parents garage while I figure out where to put it till I'm ready for it, I'll take pics on Wednesday when I transport it to my place.

 

The only issue with it is that the acrylic overflow cover doesn't fit at all, it's way too big, but thats easy enough to fix

[Fishfreak218]

PICS!!!

[Withers]

How it looked when it first came in:

 

Back painted:

 

I've only got one complaint:

 

It's kind of hard to see, but there's a half inch gap between the actual overflow and it's acrylic cover. It's easy enough to fix, but wtf, don't they do quality control checks before they send these things out?

 

Overall the build quality is pretty good. The silicone is a little sloppy, but for what I paid for it I think I got a good deal. We'll see in a month when I can water test it, lol.

 

Before anyone says anything, it's not going to sit on that contraption for long, I'm moving it tomorrow to a more stable position.

[Uhuru]

sounds like you came out a winner! I don't mind some sloppy silicone if it's going to save me hundreds of dollars.

 

how is the thickness of the glass?

 

I'll wait and see how the water test works out, this may help me with my final decision... though if I were you I would water test that thing as soon as possible. Isn't their warranty pretty short?

[Withers]

I'm not allowed to put water in it for at least 3 weeks to give the silicone time to properly cure, at least that's what I was instructed to do by them. If that puts me past their warranty period I'm going to raise some hell.

 

But yeah, for $607, I can handle a little sloppy silicone work

 

I'm sure it'll hold water just fine, it looks pretty well built. The thickness looks to be 1/2", but I'll measure it to be sure. It's thicker than I expected considering who made it.

[wav3form]

Once you get it filled up with rocks and coral you wont notice any of the minor problems. Looks real nice.