Hello after a huge disappointment and frustration on my last tank, I stepped away for a bit and worked on other projects. Now that winter is approaching and I'm going to be stuck in the house for the next 4 months, its time to start a new build.
My last tank was a 280 (72x30x30) with a sump that was too small and a stand that was to confined. The straw that broke this camels back is when I messed up and got my two part mixed up and crashed the tank. After loosing $$$$ of SPS, I'd had enough. Lessons learned, biggest one is, plan ahead/stick to the plan. I had way to many impulse/its to good of a deal purchases for equipment. My lighting didn't fit the tank/skimmer was undersized/ ect/ect. Have learned a lot and trying to not make the same pitfalls again.
So this time the build is going to take awhile as I raise funds for the equipment I want and build it out correctly the first time.
Equipment list:
Tank is a acrylic with twin corner overflows and is 96x30x30 with three large openings on top. Overflows each have a 1.5 and 1" bulkhead and will be set up as a Herbie. I will be adding 3 1" return bulkheads to the back of the tank.
Stand is steel and made out of 2" .120 wall tubing and will be powder coated white. No door just panels held on with magnets. I want to have as much access as I can under this tank. Stand height is 38"
Lighting will be two 48" 8bulb ATI Sunpower fixtures, still deciding if I want to mount them in a floating canopy or not.
Sump is a old aquarium that will be cut down to 55x24x22tall separated into a sock chamber/large refugium/return chamber. Setting the refugium depth to 18" and return chamber to 8" gives me a total volume of 100gallons (80gallons refugium). There will be a Octopus Varios2 hard plumed to the sock chamber feeding the Skimmer and a reactor manifold.
Skimmer is a Octopus Diablo 300ext recirculating skimmer with a Varios4 upgrade. This will be feed via the above mentioned pump and return to the refugium chamber.
Calc Reator, Octopus CR200 with a Carbon Doser Regulator and 5lb cylinder
Return Pump, Reef Octopus Varios8 via 3 1" bulkheads in the back of the tank.
Flow in the tank, at this time looking at 2 Gyre pumps, 1 at each end of the tank.
Last but not least, tank will be Controled by my Apex Gold system along with a second DC8, a DOS, ATK, and a AWM
Will start adding pics this evening. At this point I have the tank, The Apex gear, skimmer ordered, getting bids on the stand. Budget set with my wife (THE BEST!!) for the equipment. Lucky for me my birthday and Christmas are both just around the corner
. Not going to be the fastest build, but the goal is up and running by Feb/March