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My custom 18x18x18 inch cube in England diary


jemram

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if you are going to T your dosing pump to your ehiem's intake will it not draw from your dosing pump?

 

No because I'm going to use a peristaltic pump.

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Ya, that is the basic idea but for the Herbie method you don't need a standpipe on the drain, a naked bulkhead is fine. Also, no water goes down the second bulkhead (the one with a standpipe up near the top of the overflow). The second bulkhead is only there to serve as a backup or emerency drain in case the main one ever got obstructed (and if that happened, all you would do is open the valve all the way to clear the obstruction and then close it back down until you had the water level in your overflow where you wanted it. In the year that I ran mine though it never got blocked and the emergency pipe stayed dry as a bone.)

You are right though, in your design you would have to have the return plumbing in the overflow box as well and that would take up a little too much room.

 

- Chad

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No because I'm going to use a peristaltic pump.

 

so the peristaltic pump wont be effected by the ehiem's draw when its turned off. if this is the case you just solved my closed loop dosing problem. now i can get my 24x24x18 kickin.

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The tank is built and I'm picking it up tomorrow. I'll post some pictures tomorrow too, as I know you're all keen too see them.

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I picked up the tank this morning, and Paul from www.tankbuilduk.com has done a great job. It's hard to see in the pictures but the edges are really smooth and straight. It really is perfect. It doesnt look much yet, but once it's plumbed up and full of water I know it's going to look great.

 

The pictures were taken at my inlaws (excuse the wallpaper!). When it's all setup at home it's going to sit in the middle of the room on a custom unit.

 

The Tank:

t1.jpg

 

The holes:

t2-1.jpg

 

The fittings (and there's a couple more I need!):

t3-1.jpg

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Oh that's a beauty cube. It looks like the edges have been polished - very nice.

 

- Chad

 

The edges are polished. My wife says it's too big, but I think it's the perfect size :D

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The edges are polished. My wife says it's too big, but I think it's the perfect size :D

 

 

She IS referring to your aquarium I presume :D

 

How did you decide on the placement of the holes for the bulkheads?

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She IS referring to your aquarium I presume :D

 

How did you decide on the placement of the holes for the bulkheads?

 

I wanted them as central as possible to make them as easy as possible to hide in the live rock. So one is dead centre and the other is as close as it can be but set in a straight line towards one corner of the tank, to give as much room as possible.

 

I'm still not sure which of the holes will have the strainer and which will have the return from the pump. Until I get the tank setup and water test it I'm not sure what will and wont work.

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very nice, i'll be watching this one closely as its very similar to my tank.

 

Will you be relying on a canister for filtration? no skimmer?

 

No skimmer, no filter, no nothing. Just a circulation pump (900GPH), live rock and twice weekly 5 gallon water changes.

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I'm ordering the pump, heater, MH light and a few more fittings tomorrow. And I'm building the cabinet early next week. This is the plan for how I'm going to build the cabinet. It's going to be made from 1" MDF and all the joins are going to be filled and sanded where necessary so you cant see the joins then sprayed silver (i've made the drawing multicoloured so you can see each part clearly.. It will also have a door on the front. As my tank is going to be in the middle of the room it's going to look exactly the same from all four sides, other than one side having a handeless door. All of the equipment is going to be inside the cabinet with the power cable going through the bottom and power points inside. And the plumbing is going straight through the bottom of the tank.

 

Cabplan2.jpg

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That fixture isn't available in the US is it?

Not as far as I know and we have 220volt power over here, so it wouldnt work in the US.

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I've just taken these pictures.

 

These two show the colossal about of equipment thats going to be inside the tank. Thats it, the only other things that are going in the tank are sand, live rock, water and livestock :D

 

IMG_2819-01.jpg

 

IMG_2817-01.jpg

 

And this as the digital timer thats going to control my metal halide:

 

IMG_2825-01.jpg

 

IMG_2824-01.jpg

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I've now ordered the pump, heater, metal halide pendant, 10kg of salt (Tropic Marin Pro Reef), a new RO unit and a refractometer today.

 

And I also got my local wood yard to cut me the 1" thick MDF for the cabinet this morning. Guess what I'm doing this weekend :D

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Well the cabinet is built and painted. I've also fitted the bulkheads and the two valves so I can do a leak test. The tank is now full of tap water :D

 

This is where the tank is going to be in my lounge:

 

tank.jpg

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It looks akward in the middle of the room like that. Are you going to move the furniture around?

 

Yes. We are going to completly rearange the room and move the sofas etc.

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We have power :o:D

 

The pump, heater, RO unit and extra fitting arrived today. I've got it all plumbed in and tested the flow. With the valve on the ruturn bulkhead backed off about halfway I get this much water movement:

 

t10.jpg

 

The whole tank:

 

t11.jpg

 

And this in whats inside the cabinet. I've still got to fit the heater which will go in the thinner pipe and fit hoseclips to the thinner pipe too :huh: . It's 1/2'' hose stretched over 5/8'' hosetail, so it's not in a hurry to come off but I'm not leaving it unattended until hoseclips are on.

 

t14.jpg

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One thing I'm REALLY pleased about is with the door of the cabinet shut the whole setup is totaly silent. With the door open you can hear a very slight hum from the pump but once the door's shut it is silent. The only piece of equipment left to fit is the metal halide pendant and thats got no fans inside so that will be silent too. Silence was one of the important things with planning this setup as I've had some noisy tanks before and this one HAD to be silent.

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