470g build

[SS_Sean]

Okay.... Sump is almost done. I pick it up saturday... this was a tank that was cracked vertically both front and rear, on the main panels, and needed to be patched. So it was going to make a perfect candidate for a sump conversion. I am having this done at the local reef store/fish tank builder. He's good at this stuff....

[SS_Sean]

Went and got the sump today. I'm very pleased with the results. The tank was a repair peninsula display tank, that was converted into a sump as I had previously mentioned. The tank builder put a new top on the tank, braced the top, and incorporated baffles into the top braces for strength. He added two filter socks holders, cut out the water box, added plugs to the holes, glued the cracks, and added the patch panels, and did some polishing. The top of the baffles are 24" high.

I'll be continuing to work on the polishing this winter, so it looks half way decent.


I think ill need to be building a box for this skimmer. That's an SRO sss 6000int.

[SS_Sean]

Time to get this thing updated. I've made some good progress on the build, and I'm starting to feel a little more positive about it. I was able to get 210# pounds rock in, #60 live and #150 dry. I picked up a trashcan and got the live rock into the bottom, and was able to get about 80# of dry in there. I put a heater and a couple powerheads to keep things agitated. I'll let the rock cook until I'm ready to get the sump set up.

Here's the boxes of dry rock that came in:



Here's the live rock I picked up from a local reef store.



The trash can is set up:



Here's two boxes of the dry rock laid out. Very nice stuff.



Live/dry rock added to the trash bin:



Here's an old kalkwasser reactor I stripped down and rebuilt into a bio-pellet reactor. I'm using a danner 700gph. I need to get a valve on the correct side of the pump ... slight error in design. however, the unit is working really good wide open. Once the sump is up and running I'll run it wet, in the equipment chamber.



I picked up two frag racks out of a reef shop tear down. They are 48 x 24 x 7. They need a lot of TLC, but are salvageable. I'll be building a stand and adding them to the system.

[SS_Sean]

...update continued....

We're set up and rolling on the stand. We selected some good grade 4x4's and 2x4's. The stand measures 12' long, 24" tall, and 24" wide.



Getting closer:



Done:



Here's the stand inserted into the room, with the tank in place. I didn't bother to take pictures of the stand or tank going into place as the stand easily went in through the fishroom window with four people lifting it, and the tank also.



The beautiful Pacific Ocean from the bluffs of Bandon, OR. taken a couple days ago. Spring has sprung!





Next step will be shoring up the floor of the fish room, and the plumbing... Work will get in the way of this for quite a while, possibly until fall, so I'll update yall as soon as I can.

[SS_Sean]

Yeah, I had to do the obligatory sitting in the tank shot.

[SS_Sean]

Went ahead and set the rock into the fuge area and added sw. That's 210# of rock, btw. It sure doesn't look like much in that giant sump. I'm cycling from the left drain chamber to the right equipment chamber using an 800gph pump. The skimmer is up and running but I have it set to a really light skim so as not to completely strip the water. The tank will run in this setup for the next four months or so.

[A_CoupleClowns]

Awesome progress so far, keep the updates coming!

[SS_Sean]

Thank you very much.

[SS_Sean]

Okay, been a long delay. I got the sump up and running and cycled the rock for a couple months so the transition would be smooth. A friend and I spent three days getting the system plumbed in, finally. The run from the sump room to the display tank in the front room is 35 feet. we were figuring we'd have about 80 gallons of water in the lines at any one time. The plumbing under the house was handled by a LFS owner who is a friend. I can't go under the house due to claustrophobia. Another friend, and the head of our local reef club, handled the above ground build.

I bought a brand new dart hybrid gold, with the dual impellars. It comes with the 4200 gph impeller installed and I stuck with that. The pump ended up giving me all the flow I need. I ended up throttling the outlet pressure back by 50% in order not to blow the system away. Damn fine little unit!!

Getting the supplies laid in. Using 1.5" PVC for build.



Pulling all the equipment and sump out. The sump went in when the tank was installed on the stand. The only way we could get it out was to move the t.v. and take the end boards off the stand. We then reinstalled the boards.





The floor was drilled with a 2" hole saw since the outside diameter of the pvc was 1 7/8". I drilled the stand and fed the piping down to him under the house. There is main drain, emergency drain, and supply.



Ooooh pipes coming through!



Plumbing completed under stand. Came out pretty good. Only a couple of small leaks that stopped after a couple hours run time.



Here's the sump as we were making adjustments and purging air out of the lines. It took a while to do this, and then micro adjust the balance.



My buddy Leeds is very knowledgeable about these larger systems and I am grateful for his help. He came and stayed with me for three days to do this! This photo was taken at about 0400 hours.



Here is the sump a couple hours after we finished up. I have yet to install my dosing pumps, and get things permanently arranged. I have yet to move the saltwater mixing station and RODI into the fish room. I'll tackle that on Tuesday and update.



Here is the tank a couple hours after we were done. By doing the build this way I noticed no negative side effects to any livestock. Everyone is out and happy. One cool thing is the front room is now very quiet!! I had gotten so used to the sound of water movement, and three pumps in the sump, with the skimmer perculating that I didn't hear the noise anymore. I can turn the volume back down on the t.v. The only thing I hear now is the slight hum of the LED light fans.