ijnoj09's Cadlights 70G Artisan II Build

[ijnoj09]

FTS

[TylerVT26]

Looking good, love the scape! I might have to do the screen top light you did....

[imjedi76]

My Cadlights 100 doesn't come with the corner braces..it came with the cheap plastic to hold the glass cover..wonder where you can buy those

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by imjedi76

My Cadlights 100 doesn't come with the corner braces..it came with the cheap plastic to hold the glass cover..wonder where you can buy those

My tank came with those cheap plastic clips as well. They are cheap but it does its job holding the screen cover.

[imjedi76]

Originally Posted by ijnoj09

My tank came with those cheap plastic clips as well. They are cheap but it does its job holding the screen cover.

your clips look way nicer than mine.. the ones that come with mine are not corner clips, they're about 2 feet in length and you wedge it between the glass.. they're like the plastic that you connect to the end of the 10 gallon light cover and you have to cut out for the filters.. I like your corner clips

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by imjedi76

your clips look way nicer than mine.. the ones that come with mine are not corner clips, they're about 2 feet in length and you wedge it between the glass.. they're like the plastic that you connect to the end of the 10 gallon light cover and you have to cut out for the filters.. I like your corner clips

oh, I had no idea they made different clips for your tank... you might want to try contacting cadlights and see if what they can do. Hopefully they don't charge you an arm and a leg for just plastic clips. I called them to see about getting some bulkheads just so I have extra's in case I needed them and they were charging me $45 for just the bulkheads! Have you tried looking on ebay for generic ones?

[imjedi76]

Originally Posted by ijnoj09

oh, I had no idea they made different clips for your tank... you might want to try contacting cadlights and see if what they can do. Hopefully they don't charge you an arm and a leg for just plastic clips. I called them to see about getting some bulkheads just so I have extra's in case I needed them and they were charging me $45 for just the bulkheads! Have you tried looking on ebay for generic ones?

I tried ebay and amazon but not sure what they're called.. I tried variation of plastic clips but can't find it

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by imjedi76

I tried ebay and amazon but not sure what they're called.. I tried variation of plastic clips but can't find it

I did a quick search for "aquarium cover clips" and most of the clips are for tanks with thickness < 12mm. Since you have the bigger tank, I assume its probably thicker like 20mm so these won't fit.

[ijnoj09]

So after switching LFS for saltwater source, I did 2 - 40% water changes with this new water and the nitrates finally dropped to 5ppm.

Got a few frags from Reefapalooza that are doing well. Added a orange yuma and rainbow RBTA, some unknown zoa variety and some bam bam zoa's I got from member beanmachine.

[ijnoj09]

Shot of one of the new additions I picked up from Reefapalooza. It's settled in nicely in a deep crevice in one of the rocks.


RBTA

[dday80]

Lookin good! I really like the plumbing!

[champion6sigma]

Piping looks awesome. I'm getting a cad lights artisan II 50 cube. I need a lot of help. It comes in tomorrow.

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by dday80

Lookin good! I really like the plumbing!

Thanks!

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by champion6sigma

Piping looks awesome. I'm getting a cad lights artisan II 50 cube. I need a lot of help. It comes in tomorrow.

Thanks! How's the tank doing?

[champion6sigma]

I started a thread on mine. Any new pics of yours. I'm still ordering parts needed.

[champion6sigma]

Originally Posted by ijnoj09

Got a chance to work on the plumbing today. This was my first time working with PVC and it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. Just need to take your time and measure everything and test fit. I had a slight miscalculation on the T section to the ball valves. I didn't leave enough room to install straight barb reducer fittings as it ends up being too close to the the main drain piping. I'm debating whether to redo that section but I might just end up using 90 elbow barb fittings. Other then that minor error, I'm pretty satisfied with how everything turned out, just letting it cure and tomorrow I can hook everything up and fill the tank!

By cure do you mean you glued the pvc together????


How long does curing take?

I'm going to need to do plumbing like yours. My vectra pump used 3/4 inch pipe and I'm thinking I want the entire system PVC now.

[champion6sigma]

Originally Posted by ijnoj09

Thanks! How's the tank doing?

What are those straight barb fittings you mentioned?

I'm going to be getting parts this weekend.

How quiet is your setup? Do you hear the water in the pipes when the stand doors are closed?

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by champion6sigma

By cure do you mean you glued the pvc together????





How long does curing take?



I'm going to need to do plumbing like yours. My vectra pump used 3/4 inch pipe and I'm thinking I want the entire system PVC now.

Curing is letting the pvc glue to set and dry for a permanent bond.

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by champion6sigma

What are those straight barb fittings you mentioned?



I'm going to be getting parts this weekend.



How quiet is your setup? Do you hear the water in the pipes when the stand doors are closed?

Barb fittings allow you to connect hose to pvc pipe. http://aquarium.bulkreefsupply.com/r...arbed-Fittings

When the stand doors are closed I don't really hear the water sounds. My setup is fairly quiet.

[ClownReef®]

Amazing! Im about to order the same set up!!

Truly inspiring.. Thank you so much for posting ijnoj09

Would you mind sharing your PVC shopping list?

[champion6sigma]

Originally Posted by ijnoj09

Barb fittings allow you to connect hose to pvc pipe. http://aquarium.bulkreefsupply.com/r...arbed-Fittings

When the stand doors are closed I don't really hear the water sounds. My setup is fairly quiet.

Hi ijnoj, thank u for responding. I've so far got some pvc glue that works for abs, sch40 and sch80 pipe. I hope it's OK, there are quite a fewglues available. I've got a bunch of sch 80 parts on hold across town at aplumbing specialty store, and some grey 20 ftsch80 pipe. Only way I can keep everything grey. I hope it works. Schedule 80 is ok?

If you did not use any tubing, why did u want xbarb?

I've gotten a little discouraged lately, seems I'm just not making progress, my health is making me tired, I've got a lot of measurements to do so that pipe from pump goes to bulkhead nicely and snug. I may need to buy a saw so I don't have to runtostore for adjustments.

[champion6sigma]

Originally Posted by ijnoj09

Barb fittings allow you to connect hose to pvc pipe. http://aquarium.bulkreefsupply.com/r...arbed-Fittings

When the stand doors are closed I don't really hear the water sounds. My setup is fairly quiet.

IJNOJ

I see the xbarb connector now - where you must be using a hose to your pump, like chris does. I'm sorry for all my stupid questions.

Everyone has been more than kind, I'll get everything figured out with all aforementioned data and pictures.

Look forward to seeing the progression of your tank. That rock does look great.

EC

[ijnoj09]

Originally Posted by ClownReef[emoji768

;24129067]Amazing! Im about to order the same set up!!

Truly inspiring.. Thank you so much for posting ijnoj09

Would you mind sharing your PVC shopping list?

Honestly I don't even remember what I bought and actually used. Most of the stuff I purchased from Bulk Reef Suply but I also ended up going to Lowes and having to buy additional parts that I needed that I didn't purchase the first time. It took a lot of trial and error and numerous trips to Lowes to get everything I needed. If I was going to do it over again, I probably would do some things differently.

The most important stuff is getting the metric to standard adapter unions, it's the only way to connect standard sized pvc to the metric bulkheads supplied by cadlights.

You can get the metric adapter unions from flexpvc.com and these are the parts:

8697-040 1.25 inch x 40mm DIN UNION
8697-020 DIN 20mm x 1/2 US Unions

The 8697-040 will convert the main drain from 40mm to 1 1/4". The 8697-020 will convert the emergency drain and return line from 20mm to 1/2". Then just get the appropriate pvc pipes, couplers, fittings, ball/gate valves, etc to fit the pvc piping (1 1/4", 1/2").

Depending on how complex or simple you want to run the plumbing you can get all the rest of the pvc parts from your local hardware store. It just takes some planning, diagramming it on paper helps.

[ClownReef®]

Thanks for the input!

Hope you post updated pictures soon!

Thanks again

[champion6sigma]

ijnoj, I just noticed something maybe you haven't....the corner brackets that come with our cadlights, if you look closely they have pieces on them which look flexible. Do you believe that they are meant to be broken off (merely bent back and forth should do it) and then those two individual small pieces on each corner are meant to be used for support to the longer lengths of the edges of the tank to hold the weight of the glass that cadlights includes? I'm going to call them tomorrow, not that I might get a true response, since I have not much faith in their ability to tell the truth. Take a second look at your braces, I think you'll see what I did, that they were meant to be broken off to actually truly secure the glass in multiple places. My tank comes with two glass pieces and so I thought it was dumb there was no additional support in center. The overflow box helps on the back end but there was nothing in the front...thank for your feedback