Jump to content
Pod Your Reef

Recommended Posts

Alright so here goes the ultimate adventure!

 

Transfering my 15g tall to the new 20g Long I put together.

 

Shout out to Cromag who cut the acrylic I needed for this project.

 

3 Years ago... 

IMG_1909.JPG

11/22/20 - Orphek 15,000k filter


8BA7A353-AFD2-4562-9FA9-1820F8E6559D.thumb.jpeg.e7a3ef1e0126cbd3dda49f3854b4c763.jpeg


2/28/21 - Dino’s again 3 months strong (literally the next week after the photo above I had yet another annual outbreak. 
 

0E881178-E7DA-4593-A026-3601061BB09B.thumb.jpeg.50cf4f8bb383fb320aae9ea074665ee0.jpeg

  • Like 1
Link to comment

Part one - 

 

Ok so to start off... I had a 20g Long I wanted to put in the pre-built OceanBox designs version overflow... until I had a dream. 

 

I bought the Sicce and the Gyre first...IMG_1935.thumb.JPG.39aec106800a6585e08d2dfd42685d76.JPG

 

IMG_1936.thumb.JPG.9b92e960b37be660032f6bf221325f1b.JPG

 

Link to comment

I bought that stuff in October of 2016 and as time went on I collected everything I needed.

 

The toughest part being the return nozzle bulkhead. I ordered the return nozzle and 1/2" elbow fitting for the JBJ and they decided to send me something that doesn't fit together like the one on my existing (wrong parts).

 

I was at my LFS and ran across a beautiful 20 Long with black silicon. I had already bought black silicon and was intending on stripping the one I had, but time is money and I couldnt resist buying a pre-made black seams tank.

 

I decided to go with a 1/2" screw/slip bulkhead and my hole was too small. Bought a titanium step bit and went to town. Didn't end up working well after an hour of drilling but I finally got it so I could screw one end of the nozzle fitting, through the acrylic to the bulkhead on the inside of the main sump baffle. Not the greatest set up. 

 

In April I used WeldOn acrylic bond to attach the overflow wall to the sump baffle and finally in May I decided to use black silicon and on the acrylic sump baffle and set it into place, I then added the overflow baffle and siliconed in place. They're not kidding when they say use in a ventilated area, that stuff had me choking it was pretty bad. I let this cure for about 8 days. 

 

Pics below...IMG_1383.thumb.JPG.7acbd5c679e4701e3fb433c79a2f90c2.JPG

 

IMG_1376.thumb.JPG.88ab52dba1eb0f119cf5b7da921df4d3.JPG

 

Time for a water test!!

IMG_1504.thumb.JPG.f8af95ab215276dbbb8f5c7ef6f480b1.JPG

  • Like 5
Link to comment

Interesting.

So you have an InTank basket, or parts from an InTank basket in the DIY sump?

You should have enough room in the overflow/sump portion to fit that heater in there, shouldn't you?

I've always liked 20 long tank and am curious to see how this comes together. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
11 hours ago, Weetabix7 said:

Interesting.

So you have an InTank basket, or parts from an InTank basket in the DIY sump?

You should have enough room in the overflow/sump portion to fit that heater in there, shouldn't you?

I've always liked 20 long tank and am curious to see how this comes together. 

I've got the whole intank basket Nuvo 30 basket. 

 

I should have have enough room in the sump but the Nuvo Basket is massive. I originally tried to make 3 baffles in the back but with the pump and the protein skimmer the heater has to go in the display side!

Link to comment

let it run with water to check for leaks...

 

 

IMG_1385.thumb.JPG.263111241b878d1c64308280ceccc9e2.JPG

 

then em added sand a few days later

 

IMG_1768.thumb.JPG.0712faf3c7fd363a8b17d21ed4de49d5.JPG

 

let that hat run for a few days before I transfer everything from the old tank to the new one...

 

IMG_1716.thumb.JPG.4ef1ad27ebeed9efb852fa92da369e6c.JPG

 

Water is ready to go!!!

  • Like 1
Link to comment

Here's a shot of the overflow! 

 

I'm using filter floss, Purigen, Chemi-Pure Blue and Poly-Filter®.

 

Again this is the nuvo 30 InTank basket.

 

 

IMG_1953.thumb.JPG.c1d7859fff12cfc37598a965817d7675.JPG

 

Have had no problems with this Coralife Protein Skimmer. This thing skims wet for sure, but once you get some film on the fitting of the cup where it meets the bubble chamber, it will get some foaming to it (so much that I had to tape the lid on in my old set-up and it will remain taped shut on this set up.

 

Temperature is at 78.8F - a little higher than I'd like it. The donor tank ran at 77.8F and everything did fine. Hopefully we don't have a temperature bleaching of corals. 

 

IMG_1952.thumb.JPG.3efd946cc11a57706f75d0611f64af2e.JPG

 

Here's a view of the top, you can see really good that next to the Sicce and the skimmer, is a massive Nuvo 30 InTank Basket. It's something like 4.75" x 3.25" I can't remember the measurements... BUT this entire system was built around this basket!!

 

I wanted a basket with enough size that I could put proper filtration in, and the IM 10/20/25 baskets were WAY to small for what I want to do. And if anybody knows anything; we LOVE filtration!!

 

Unfortunately, InTank wasn't able to provide the measurement of the lip of this basket properly because the front legs are about a 1/2" shorter than the back legs (which doesn't make much sense to me).

 

The depth of the cuts between the teeth in the overflow was measure exactly to the length of the InTank basket based off of the front leg dimensions. This makes the rim of the basket higher than the depth of the gaps between the overflow teeth.

 

So in the picture below you see I have cut several 1" lengths of air tubing to help guide water into the basket. The lip of the basket is higher than the overflow cut out. 

 

Why care?

 

Well there's  about a 3MM gap between the edge of the basket and the sliding door up against the wall, water will flow into the teeth and straight down in front of the basket. Because the front of the basket which is basically the media door, does not sit flush with the edges of the basket....  get the picture?

 

I'll draw a diagram. 

 

IMG_1954.thumb.JPG.08a2f8e68684c5450df6f884459854f5.JPG

 

Not really the biggest deal in the world, but the majority of water flow is going right past the filter and it's a disadvantage for a lot of the fine detritus that I want to trap out of my system. Hopefully the little tube water channels work out... we'll see. DIY to the max... there's no such thing as perfect. 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
On 8/9/2017 at 0:59 PM, yungKitten said:

Great breakdown. Pretty elegant in my opinion.

 

Thanks, I've put about a year into making sure everything would be right!

 

Soooooo.... disgusted by this flow issue with the design of the InTank basket* I decided to mash my head against the wall until it clicked.... 

 

Take the airline tubing, slice it down the center and slide it over the edge of the basket and the soace between the basket wall and the overflow wall should be filled by the tube by creating a "bumper."

 

IMG_2059.thumb.JPG.5e8d3faa6dee92cdd0b3b60ecf84c0ae.JPG

 

It works pretty darn well.

 

Card is just there to stop the flow because the tubing bumper is seemingly invisible with water flowing over it.

 

IMG_2058.thumb.JPG.e4276073d69499af7a162562d6d20f93.JPG

 

the yellow lines in this illustration show that the tubing does in fact block the gap as calculated and allows the water to come cascading into the basket!

 

As a side note, so each morning before lights in, my PH test is 8! Might not need the chaeto. But someone suggested a light that works so well on chaeto that he has to fight "too low" nitrate levels.

 

more to come...

 

*im not bashing the InTank basket. The creator and the product are absolutely awesome! 

  • Like 4
Link to comment
On 8/8/2017 at 6:32 AM, Weetabix7 said:

Interesting.

So you have an InTank basket, or parts from an InTank basket in the DIY sump?

You should have enough room in the overflow/sump portion to fit that heater in there, shouldn't you?

I've always liked 20 long tank and am curious to see how this comes together. 

 

I need a comment so I can post more pics lol

Link to comment
6 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said:

Or do what I do and just post pics anyway lol.

Lol it only lets me post 6mb of pictures until somebody else posts then I can post another 6mb of pics. And each pic is about 2mb

@cromag08 yoooooooooo Cromag!!!! Check out my all in one!!

  • Like 1
Link to comment

Ok so it's been a little bit since I've updated this. I got some awesome frags from a buddy here locally. Check these out!

 

 

 

IMG_2116.thumb.JPG.5c12479b122cd4b5ba48ee2f6f38a741.JPG

 

 

Fruit Loop Zoa's 

 

IMG_2118.thumb.JPG.1966533b5b805d9451c972a253024975.JPG

 

 Sunset monitpora, montipora spongeodes and tubbs stellata montipora

 

IMG_1981.thumb.JPG.ae81964444192d5637e79ff6162a42b1.JPG

  • Like 6
Link to comment

Epic. I made one of these.. never got to test it out other than leak testing.. going in a different direction. Yours is badass. Way better than how mine came out!

  • Like 1
Link to comment

Tank update... looking good!

 

IMG_2216.thumb.JPG.7b302f8785ceb7b53b3ae87db923323f.JPG

2 minutes ago, GregEmmitte said:

Epic. I made one of these.. never got to test it out other than leak testing.. going in a different direction. Yours is badass. Way better than how mine came out!

Hey thanks!!! This was a year in progress... now I'm battling placement options! I need more rocks!

  • Like 2
Link to comment
21 minutes ago, GregEmmitte said:

Make a shelf and put a nem on it..

I'm having anemone migrating issue at the moment... this was him the week I transferred this all over.

 

IMG_1784.thumb.JPG.9f809353b098bfb28d952ceac06ab609.JPG

 

This is was him last Monday - mind you heading to hundreds of dollars of corals lol. This was my prevention effort. A piece of acrylic... Worked pretty well!

 

IMG_2133.thumb.JPG.720945e9464d388d373203996080f47f.JPG

 

I can't post the next pic until someone else comments, but yeah he's trying to find his home lol.

Link to comment

I use the biocube skimmer too, and have same issue with the firm bubbles popping the lid off. Especially at night. If I hold the lid down, bubbles come through the breather hole. So I decided to make a skimmer, and eliminate the cup altogether. Going to try and make a reef glass clone, and run it all to a bottle. If I like the concept enough and works better than the biocube one, I'll buy the real one. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
2 hours ago, I'm Batman said:

Lol it only lets me post 6mb of pictures until somebody else posts then I can post another 6mb of pics. And each pic is about 2mb

@cromag08 yoooooooooo Cromag!!!! Check out my all in one!!

Try using a service like Flickr to host the pics. ;) Don't use photobucket, they disallowed image hosting for 3rd party websites.

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recommended Discussions

×
×
  • Create New...