TJ's Bust'em Up Custom Reef - Big News!

[spectra]

Tank is looking good! and sorry for your loss.

[metrokat]

Sorry to hear about your grandfather TJ. Are you alright?

[TJ_Burton]

On Wed Apr 12 2017 at 5:40 AM, metrokat said:

Sorry to hear about your grandfather TJ. Are you alright?

 

I'm alright. Particularly tough having been very close with him, and also being the first immediate family member I've lost. It is a part of life though, so that fact helps logic keep things on track while emotions are losing their cool in the background.

[Christopher Marks]

Sorry to hear TJ  

 

I lost two grandparents earlier this year. It always feels like we have limitless time, it's tough to come to grips with. Just keep sharing your memories of him with friends a family, it helps to reminisce about the good times together.

[TJ_Burton]

Seeing the family for Easter was a nice pick-me-up after a particularly tough week. Also managed to finish filming my Nanobox unboxing/review which should be up in a few hours.

 

Hopefully have some spare time today to get the auto dosing system operational so I can stop dosing capsule every day.

 

Also have a couple of new SPS on hold at the LFS that I'm looking forward to picking up! 

[TJ_Burton]

Not nearly as refined without Brian (video producer). Doing everything myself is hard... and also never turns out perfect hahaha.
 

 

[spectra]

Looks sweet and nice video! Going over the fuge with a little frag rack down there ? 

 

I run a Tide on my fuge and works great so far.......

[TJ_Burton]

2 hours ago, spectra said:

Looks sweet and nice video! Going over the fuge with a little frag rack down there ? 

 

I run a Tide on my fuge and works great so far.......

 

Sump is going to essentially have a drag section instead of a fuge. Had it designed around that idea. Also why I decided to go with a Chaeto reactor.

 

Just in the final review process of the technical drawings for the sump, and then it should be ready to go. So soon!!!

[DCUEVAS74]

8 hours ago, TJ_Burton said:

Seeing the family for Easter was a nice pick-me-up after a particularly tough week. Also managed to finish filming my Nanobox unboxing/review which should be up in a few hours.

 

Hopefully have some spare time today to get the auto dosing system operational so I can stop dosing capsule every day.

 

Also have a couple of new SPS on hold at the LFS that I'm looking forward to picking up! 

Thoughts and prayers are with you and the fam buddy.  Sad to hear about your loss.  We just had one ourselves and it's a roller coaster to say the least.  Glad you had some time with the family for Easter.  Great vid btw, keep em' coming!

[TJ_Burton]

Browned out across are starting to show promise when you get a close look at them, but from FTS distance are still very brown. I picked up a nice plain gold maxima today, along with a couple more SPS (this time bleached) which are at the bottom left corner of the tank on the substrate for recovery. They were very inexpensive due in part to their current condition, but show some pinks/reds which is why I took a chance on them.

 

One of these days I'll grab some nicer stuff from a hobbyist or two in the area.

 

[TJ_Burton]

The sump is finally built! It should ship tomorrow, and I suppose it will arrive early next week

I have seen a preview photo of it, and man am I stoked! It is going to be PERFECT!

[TJ_Burton]

Guess what finally showed up!

Just a quick preview of the sump; both naked, and filled with equipment and fake frags to show what it looks like stacked up!

I am going to use a different skimmer, controllable DC return pump, etc. etc. so its just filled up for fun  

 

[Lula_Mae]

14 minutes ago, TJ_Burton said:

Guess what finally showed up!

Just a quick preview of the sump; both naked, and filled with equipment and fake frags to show what it looks like stacked up!

I am going to use a different skimmer, controllable DC return pump, etc. etc. so its just filled up for fun  

 

That sump is wild!  Is that what the Nano Box is going over?  Looks super cool!

[TJ_Burton]

2 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said:

That sump is wild!  Is that what the Nano Box is going over?  Looks super cool!

 

Yeppers! The nanobox will be going over the frag section

[Lula_Mae]

17 minutes ago, TJ_Burton said:

 

Yeppers! The nanobox will be going over the frag section

Going to look very cool once it's all put together!

[TJ_Burton]

Starting to come together!

Need to grab some plumbing from BRS and I can start getting everything dry fit outside the stand in prep for the switch.

 

[Lula_Mae]

1 hour ago, TJ_Burton said:

Starting to come together!

Need to grab some plumbing from BRS and I can start getting everything dry fit outside the stand in prep for the switch.

 

Those colors!  Where'd you find the colored airline?  I saw some bright pink on clearance at PetSmart once but other than that just clear, transparent blue, and black lol.

[jbb]

1 hour ago, TJ_Burton said:

Starting to come together!

Need to grab some plumbing from BRS and I can start getting everything dry fit outside the stand in prep for the switch.

 

Man that looks so awesome !! 

[lkoechle]

Nice! I just saw this on reef builders in my FB feed. lol 

[TJ_Burton]

54 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said:

Those colors!  Where'd you find the colored airline?  I saw some bright pink on clearance at PetSmart once but other than that just clear, transparent blue, and black lol.

 

eBay! They have lots of sizes actually, so I am going to change out the Skimmer's air hose as well as the ATO etc.

 

20 minutes ago, jbb_00 said:

Man that looks so awesome !! 

Thanks!

 

2 minutes ago, lkoechle said:

Nice! I just saw this on reef builders in my FB feed. lol 

 

Yeah, we decided to actually make this sump available because we were getting a lot of positive feedback on it.

I sent it over to Jake knowing they enjoy being the first to blog about a new product

[lkoechle]

2 minutes ago, TJ_Burton said:

Yeah, we decided to actually make this sump available because we were getting a lot of positive feedback on it.

I sent it over to Jake knowing they enjoy being the first to blog about a new product

 

Well you're right because @skoechle and I have wanted something like that when we do our big build but didn't want to make one ourselves. lol

[TJ_Burton]

1 minute ago, lkoechle said:

 

Well you're right because @skoechle and I have wanted something like that when we do our big build but didn't want to make one ourselves. lol

 

Only one place to get them at the moment, and they should be in stock within the next 2-3 weeks tops.

https://www.bigalspets.com/pro-clear-aquatic-systems-frag-fuge-reef-sump-26.html

 

Managed to swing the $300 price tag we were hoping for as a sale for the first little while.

[DaveFason]

TJ - The sump looks insane. The Tide and sump nearly match perfectly! 

[TJ_Burton]

Sooo I am tossing around some ideas...

One of which is to actually shut the tank down for the sump switch, move the livestock to a holding tank while I switch over, and reboot the tank once I am done with the plumbing.

Reason being that it will be much easier to do the fancy pants plumbing if I can just move the tank around freely. I am also intending to heat and bend the pipe rather than use elbows, so that is something that I will need to finesse with as much room to work as possible.

I was also considering redoing the scape completely, using TLF Stax dry rock when I can get my hands on a couple boxes. I have some ideas in mind that I think that rock would work really well for. I do however like my CaribSea Liferock scape that is currently in there, so I am still on the fence with this particular thought.

 

 

That being said, I am just waiting for the sale this weekend on BRS' website before placing my plumbing order. Should give me enough time to figure out exactly what I want to do. 

Decisions, decisions!

[TJ_Burton]

This is where I think I am headed with the plumbing.

I want to try and quiet the system up as much as possible, so I am going to utilize the aux drain and use a gate valve on the main drain to try and keep air out of the drain pipe (herbie method). Since I only have one hole drilled in the tank, I am going to tee off from the main drain, loop up and back down, and that should allow any backed up water to overflow down the aux drain rather than overfilling the tank.

 

The XAQUA INOUT accepts 3/4" tubing on its return fitting, so I am going to hard plumb half way, and have a barb to allow for soft tubing the rest of the way. The valve on the return is in case I want to add a reactor etc to the system without adding another pump. My eFlux 1900 DC pump is turned up less than half way as it is, so plenty of power left on that to run other things. I am also using a check valve there to prevent unwanted back-siphoning.

 

For looks, using 3 colors of pipe. Violet, Grey, and Orange to keep the theme going. 
Purple - Main Drain

Grey - Aux Drain

Orange - Return

 

Diagram isn't exactly to scale, just a general map of what I will be doing. All bends are done by heating the pipe similarly to how @Scorched did his system (which was the source for inspiration on plumbing this system). I've been practicing on some extra PVC pipe I had laying around, and am confident I can get all of these bends done (even the really tight 90s on the Aux drain).