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Drago's 75 Fringing Reef ???


drago55272

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Hello everyone,

Quick background on me: I was a college reefer with a 14g BioCube After college had to put my reefing hobby on the back burner and start looking for a job to start my career. Now that things have settled down a bit time to start the old hobby back up. Few weeks ago I found a 75g tank with stand and lights for 200 dollars at a garage sale which I couldn't pass up mainly because the 48" corallight MH fixture that was sitting on top of the tank B) .

So here we go again :D Time to start my new tank.


FTS 1/18/16

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Filtration

105 pounds cured live rock
80 pounds Samoa pink sand #0

Equipment

Emperor 400
Ecotech MP 10
Coralife 48 inch aqualight pro 2x150w MH + 2x96w PC

Coral

1-War Coral

1-Orange and Green Acan Echinata

1-Flamethrower Goniopora

1-Green Favia Brain

Fish

1-Misbar Ocellaris Clownfish

1-Black and White Ocellaris Clownfish

 

Inverts

 

6-Blue Hermit Crabs

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Just set up the tank have an emperor 400 in the tank to circulate the water while the tank starts its cycle. Currently have 100 pounds of live rock in the tank which I got for a steal at 2 bucks a pound. I am also waiting for 80 pounds of Somoa pink sand #0 to arrive from Petco's Black Friday sale. This is the current scape that I have come up with we will see how long it will last once I see it with sand in the tank :lol:.

 

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gulfsurfer101

That's a killer deal! Congratulations on it! The rock work though! Don't get me wrong here but have you thought about adding some dry rock to add some dimension! That way you can set up overhangs, caves and holes for your fish to swim in and out of! Not to mention detritus buildup might be a problem later on with the current set up. If you need some killer dry rock I can fill up a large flat rate box and ship you some nice pieces pretty cheap. I have about 100 pounds on hand I was going use and never got around to it.

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Hey gulf I think if I remember correctly I bought some softies from you years ago. And yes I am planning to do a lot more with the scape it just doesn't feel like a tank yet till I get the sand in ?. Thanks for the offer with the dry rock but I will see what I can do with what I got for the time being.

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gulfsurfer101

10-4! I don't recall but man if we got history just lwt me know if you need more rock or whatever. I'll be happy to help out with whatever bro.

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Decided on this final scape for my rocks yesterday cant wait sand will be in tomorrow afternoon :D . Also the first time I turn on the MH's for the photo.

 

 

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Pink Samoa sand not so pink ?. At least the pricing was not bad. Also getting my mp 10 out of storage hopefully on max the flow will be enough flow for this tank. Still researching a wet dry system for a non drilled tank that doesn't overflow on power outages any ideas?

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The sand has settled after about two days so now I can take a decent tank shot. Can't wait till this very very slow cycling period is over to get some type of movement in this tank. omgomgomg

 

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gulfsurfer101

How's the mp10 doing in there. I was using an rw8 for main flow and a wp10 for backup. My return also provided good flow internally. You can always look for a good hang on back overflow and add a sump.

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The mp 10 is struggling to flow to the other side of the it makes it about 3/4 of the way so I may have to add another to the other side or sell mine and upgrade to the mp 40. Ya I'm still thinking if I want to go HOB overflow because my area has been getting lots of power outages recently but I do have a 20L that I bought a few years ago that never has seen water. Just don't want to come home with a swimming pool in my living room the wife would have a fit haha.

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gulfsurfer101

I hear you on that. That's why we plan and test everything. If you need help getting something going I could help you out! If you needed something fabbed out I can help you as well.

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Sounds good gulf. I am going to have to weigh my options out for this build but if i go the DIY route will definitely be seeking out advice since this is a new breed of tank unlike my all-in-one :P that was pre-built for me.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The cycle is now over so I bought a pair of clowns to add to the tank to get some movement in the water. Also decided that will be pulling a brand new 20L out of storage and start work on a DIY sump for this tank I don't think I want a emperor 400 to be my main source of filtration :lol: . I will be buying all the equipment for the sump in JAN and keep everyone in tune with the build. :)

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Went ahead and bid in some auctions for my first test corals so far so good. Here is some images from the auctioneer my tank currently has only 10,000K MH so you can't really see the colors in my tank yet.

 

 

 

 

War Coral

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Orange and Green Acan Echinata

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Green Favia Brain

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Flamethrower Goniopora

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gulfsurfer101

That's some good looking stuff! My 75g is sitting empty atm. I'm holding everything in my diy 20l till I get it back up in a couple months. I had to get rid of most off my fish which really sucked.

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Can't wait to see what your going to do with your 75g. This is a lot different from a nano tank haha I bought 4 frags and they look like pimples in my tank. I almost got all the equipment for my tank's refugium: My wife bought me the hydor L40 for Christmas and I ordered a KollerCraft TOM RP3 Overflow box with a giftcard. While I wait for the box I think I will start the plans to cut sections for the refugium so it may time to start looking at designs :happy: .

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Just got all the glass measurements for the sump build so I did a 3D rendering just to make sure everything is going to look right haha. This design will be for my 20L that I am converting into my sump.

 

Chamber 1- Will be water from the overflow

Chamber 2- Water will overflow to two 4” filter socks

Chamber 3- Will be 7” compartment for a future protein skimmer

Chamber 4- Will will house about 8 ½” refugium area with macro algae

Chamber 5- Then a bubble trap leading to my return

 

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Got all the glass cut started putting them in so far 4 walls up and two more to go. Tomorrow should be the tricky part with the vertical wall for the filter socks. I cut acrylic for that part have to get a 4 inch hole saw for that tomorrow. Definitely a learning curve with using silicone to put these walls in made quite a mess of the first wall but I think I’m getting the hang of it. Haha it was a lot easier to do this on the computer than real life.

 

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Just finished my first attempt at a DYI sump it looks close to my 3D renderings. My overflow box came in the mail today and I found my aqualifter and ATO from my old tank so once the 48 hours for the silicone to be fish safe pass my sump should be ready to put into good use.

 

 

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CronicReefer

That sump came out really nice. I just started cycling my 75 two days ago myself and I'm really excited for all the space for corals

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Thanks Cronic it was a very interesting leap into DIY reefing :D . And that's great I will definitely be following your 75 it will be fun to have tank to follow that started around the same time as mine.

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Last night I installed the sump took a bit of handy work and a bit more water on the floor than my wife would like :P​ but it is now installed. Bought a clamp light at Home depot they were also having a sale on 65w flood lights 6 pack for 3 bucks :bling: . Had to remove the guts from the drawer so the light could fit also had put some Velcro on the outside part of the drawer so it would appear to still be in there and so the sump can still be maintained .

 

 

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