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Hi, 

 

So I am thinking about upgrading my tanks at work (2.5G Pico and 5.5G Nano) for after the contest finishes this year. I want to upgrade to a single system with a larger water capacity as the office shuts down for Christmas and I am not comfortable leaving these running unattended for over a week, even with DIY ATO. 

 

So I did what any respecting person would do while at work, trawl through EvilBay, I managed to find a tank in the size that I want Red Sea Max 130D, currently I am winning the bidding war online with this. I am attempting to win.

 

Red Sea Max 130D Tank

Tunze 6015 Wavemaker

Media Basket

Tunze 9002 Skimmer *** Most likely trade or sell this***

Powerhead

2x Stock Return Pumps

Cabinet

 

Ends 5pm on Friday, nice

 

So as far as I can tell I still need to purchase the below

 

Heater: I am thinking that I need a 200-300W heater for a 34 Gallon Tank? Entering British Winter now so will need more than moving temp 5 Celcius

Lights: Obviously I have my Chinese Black Box (168W) which should be sufficient for this tank, I have also put aside a small budget (£150) for lighting upgrades if required

Biofilter: I will need more Rock, thinking about going slowly with this build and seeing if i can get my hands on some Stax Rocks and Dr Tims and going dry start route this time

 

Next Question, something that has been on my mind for a little while now.

Lagoon, Penninsula, Bommie, what does this aquascaping names actually mean? 

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11 hours ago, seabass said:

34Gal... nice upgrade!  Gives you lots more options.

I know, it's almost out of Nano territory. I can actually look at fish in my LFS now 

10 hours ago, kimberbee said:

Fingers crossed no Richard's snipe it from you!!

Well I have set myself a limit, after that limit I may as well buy the tank brand new. I will walk away if this gets too expensive. Ends at 16:30 tomorrow, possibly can collect Saturday. Then well it will have to chill out in my home for the weekend. Hopefully the Mrs falls in love with it while it is there and I can have it as a home reef. 

 

So, I have been thinking about Fish. How does this looks for a stocking? Where are the glaring issues and no-no's?

 

Algae/Starry Benny

Fiji Blue Damsel ***

Royal Gramma

Purple Firefish

McCoskers Wrasse

 

*** Not 100% Keen on this but is the most popular fish in the office, even beats Nemo 🤷‍♂️

Yes I need to keep the office happy with livestock choices

 

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Potential lighting sourced. Fairly sure these are a Clone of the Kessil lights. Possibly the A80's looking at the PAR and Frequency Maps, but have the advantage of being full spectrum over the Kessils. Will know more tomorrow at 5pm my time omgomgomg

 

https://www.amazon.ca/KELO-AO-LED-Aquarium-Light/dp/B0192IVP2W/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?keywords=kelo+ao100+led&qid=1567683266&s=gateway&sr=8-1-fkmr0

 

Will be Ex Display, so 2x Pucs, 2x Goosenecks, Power Adaptors, Leads and WiFi Controller. £150.00 collected. 

  FullSizeRender_2__16467.1456100963_1280_1280.thumb.png.d94f1aa51da874b31597c0f1f5dd7a87.png20150125212523_67308__92781.1456101394_1280_1280.thumb.png.13aa01f25e78ba60948e7a1666d6c10c.png20150118010048_79864__96111.1456100955_1280_1280.thumb.png.9c7ff7fa0f66f3ed4cbf4b74f2166b0b.pnghqdefault.jpg.723a1819241ca3f1dc5eee72cd40823d.jpg

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6 hours ago, billygoat said:

Hold on, that seems extremely cheap! Is that £68 for all of that stuff you listed above? Can that even be right? 🤔 Seems awesome!

I'm a little in disbelief myself. Meh find out tomorrow how it looks and works. But auction was for

 

Red Sea Max 130D Tank

Tunze 6015 Wavemaker

Media Basket

Tunze 9002 Skimmer

Powerhead

2x Stock Return Pumps

Cabinet

 

Decided to stick with my current lighting (168w black box) so looking for a temp controller and ATO. Probably use the current cube as the container. Still look to be good on £300 for a full set up

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I have been driving the other half mad today with talks of tanks, equipment, landscape and livestock. So I'll tell you guys instead

 

Random sketching, since I'm going with only a single light I'll have to be clever with PAR readings and placements. I want to use as much flat reef shelf rock as I can in the tank and have 3 or 4 terraces.

 

To increase biofilter i plan on rising these shelves somehow, orchid pots or whatever covered in rock rubble. Should give a decent area for bacteria to take hold and be a stable way to anchor the rockwork. 

 

I want the tank to have a lot of open area for swimming as well as looking full of corals so plan on using orchid planters in the sandbed to act as a pedestal for corals (fungias, Lobos, acans etc) I hope to fill the areas infront of the risers first to obstruct the view and then fill out. 

 

The primary reason for going budget set up is so that I can spend a bit more on the corals. I plan on spending well on large established colonies as a way to fill out initially. I have found decent colonies of Euphyllia (5+ heads) for 60-80 depending on number of heads. Bubble corals and other weird looking LPS oddities. After that I can spend on impact pieces and fish.

 

Livestock wise I'm thinking of combining into a single reef. I still want to keep the pico going and have a plan for it. Gobies stay in the Pico as well I think for now. 

 

Clownfish

Gold Streak/Two Spot Blenny

2-3 other fish.

Hermits

Snails

20190907_150549.jpg

20190907_150557.jpg

20190907_150601.jpg

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7 minutes ago, Ratvan said:

I have been driving the other half mad today with talks of tanks, equipment, landscape and livestock. So I'll tell you guys instead

Lol

 

This sounds really cool - definitely a lot of thought behind it - I'm super intrested/excited to see how this turns out   :]

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On 9/7/2019 at 3:49 AM, billygoat said:

Hold on, that seems extremely cheap! Is that £68 for all of that stuff you listed above? Can that even be right? 🤔 Seems awesome!

Missing lid and there fore t5s hence price... everything else included and in working order. It's now mine all mine. Air tubing needs replacing but that is about it

 

Got some Seachem Phosphate remover stuff as well..  also sumo full of sand and rubble so sort that first

 

 

20190908_145513.jpg

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4 minutes ago, Ratvan said:

Missing lid and there fore t5s hence price... everything else included and in working order. It's now mine all mine. Air tubing needs replacing but that is about it

 

Got some Seachem Phosphate remover stuff as well..  also sumo full of sand and rubble so sort that first

 

 

20190908_145513.jpg

It looks huge! 

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27 minutes ago, WV Reefer said:

It looks huge! 

Overall is L24 W20 H56 Inc stand.. but yes huge. 

 

As I was carrying it into the house all I could think of is "I'm not moving this thing again" funk me that was work. 

 

Do I really need a TV? Lol

 

So much I want to do.... oh it's also missing the pump to output pipe but I think I can handle that for the price. 

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4 minutes ago, Ratvan said:

Overall is L24 W20 H56 Inc stand.. but yes huge. 

 

As I was carrying it into the house all I could think of is "I'm not moving this thing again" funk me that was work. 

 

Do I really need a TV? Lol

 

So much I want to do.... oh it's also missing the pump to output pipe but I think I can handle that for the price. 

So that means its staying at the house😊

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Anyway all cleaned up and random FW LED for illumination. So I could clean and take photos

 

Small amount of damage and scratches to glass and stand. 

 

Sump area was full of what I have decided the victims of the previous owners crash.  

 

Spares and other bits

 

And a few different shots

 

IMG_20190908_163528.jpg

IMG_20190908_163546.jpg

IMG_20190908_163634.jpg

IMG_20190908_163617.jpg

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25 minutes ago, Ratvan said:

Shes home in 1.5 hrs. I need to come up with a better plan then I will buy you a TV and wall mount it....

Lol .. good luck.. when I got my reefer I had to : extend my side yard by building a fence a gate, build a planter box , run drip irrigation,  run power for a fountain,  haul in 3 yards of gravel and 1 yard of mulch, build a little short picket fence.. I kinda got screwed on that deal... but my tank still cost quite a bit more🤐🤫

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9 hours ago, WV Reefer said:

It looks huge! 

She never said that, put your glasses on girl!!

 

You can polish those scratches out with cerium oxide. KEEP IT WET WET!!! Heat is your enemy when your polishing glass. As I stated before it's a damn shame that Red Sea uses such shit glass in their tanks. It's the main reason I never bought one of their larger tanks.

 

As for the different types of scapes, a bommie is like a pillar in the middle of the tank, a lagoon would be a U shaped scape and a peninsula would be something that sticks out. Bommies work really well in this tank.

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8 hours ago, StinkyBunny said:

She never said that, put your glasses on girl!!

 

You can polish those scratches out with cerium oxide. KEEP IT WET WET!!! Heat is your enemy when your polishing glass. As I stated before it's a damn shame that Red Sea uses such shit glass in their tanks. It's the main reason I never bought one of their larger tanks.

 

As for the different types of scapes, a bommie is like a pillar in the middle of the tank, a lagoon would be a U shaped scape and a peninsula would be something that sticks out. Bommies work really well in this tank.

Well most of the scratches came out last night by scrubbing with toothpaste 😄 There is a tiny amount of small scratches but unless I am looking for them around the edge of the tank i do not notice them so calling this part of the maintenance good to go. I plan on getting topless this evening so will do a final glass check after that, I do need to pick up a couple of things to do this (new hacksaw blade etc) So that is my lunch time sorted out. I can now see what you mean about the glass, but all in all I cannot really grumble too much for the price. 

 

Thank you that makes a certain amount of sense, looks like I will be going the "Bommie" style, however that is mainly due to how I will have to position the lights over the tank (at the minute I do plan on upgrading as Birthday in November and also Xmas is coming) trying to utilise the maximum amount of space that I want to give to rock work (about 40%) plus the PAR readings. Looks like I will have a central "column" and lots of space on the sandbed to place pretty things on pedestals 

 

 

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1 hour ago, Snow_Phoenix said:

Congrats on the new tank! Can't wait to see it all filled up. :happy:

Thanks, i have placed an order for the rest of the equipment (minus glass lid and sliding feeding hatch) so now have the following

 

Tank: RSM 130D                                              £70.00

Heater: Unbranded 300W Heater                   £15.00

Heater Controller: Chinese Inkbird Rip Off    £30.00

Lighting: Chinese Black Box 168W                 £80.00

Pump 1:  "Stock" 350 Gph                              £Owned

Wavemaker 1: Tunze 6015 Wavemaler          £Owned

Wavemaker 2: Jebao RW2 Wavemaker          £Owned

ATO Container: 5.5G Cube from "Indo Pacific Biotope"

ATO: AutoAqua ATO                                        £50.00

 

Total for Build £245.00 so £55 left for Pump Upgrade if required or glass lid once rimless mods are complete, hopefully this evening........

 

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Yeah this is great! Seems like a pretty good-sized tank now that I see it all set up and running like that. I can't wait to see what sort of hardscape you put together to utilize that space. Congrats on this huge and very cheap upgrade!

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So I have been thinking about the display and filtration. I want to have an uncluttered display tank as far as possible. I am aware that I will need to place one maybe two powerheads/wavemakers within the display. Apart from these I don't want any equipment in sight, 

 

So I have been thinking about the "sump" area of the AIO. I am currently thinking of filling the back chamber/s with Live Rock Rubble and/or a Ceramic Media Brick. I will still have Live Rock within the Display but plan for these to be shelves. 

 

Anyone have experience of running things this way or used the below before?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/CerMedia-MarinePure-Plate-Bio-Filter-Freshwater/dp/B00HT2AS1S/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=bio+filter+media+plate&qid=1568102956&s=gateway&sr=8-3

 

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