Downsizing??? Really???

[JTL]

Originally Posted by ento-reefer

Hi Ron. I just finished reading through your thread and I loved your write up and your tanks. I am sorry to hear about your chiller mishap, but glad you are rebuilding your 125.

I found my way to your thread from the Reefbreeders forum. I have a 48" photon V 2 and was reading many of your informative advice on settings.

I just purchased a Cadlights Artisian 165 and I can't wait to for it to get here. Have you been happy with your tank overall? I had a 30g Cadlights tank many years ago that was great.

I will be moving the contents of my 95g reef into the new tank once it is set up and settled. This will be my first tank larger than 100g so it should be fun. I will be getting the AI Hydra 26 HD lighting as the tank comes with 3 of these. I am thinking I will also use my photon alsoonce I move everything over. Any tips on setting up the plumbing? Did you use everything that came with the tank? Thanks.

I have the Cadlights 100, but I chose to build my own stand to my specs. It has the modern European look and I built it from 3/4" birch plywood with no 2x4's. Sealed inside with 2 coats of clear epoxy. I think there is a pic in my profile. I also built my sump and sized it to completely fill the cabinet. Then I sealed around the edges. There is no way water can go any where but in the sump.

I also have the Photon v2. It has been running for 4 months but I am still messing with the settings, in fact I just raised the intensity last night.

I used the Cadlights metrc bulkheads but I modified them to accept 1", 3/4" and 1/2" pipe. I use the 1"for my drain, 3/4" for my return and the 1/2" for my safety drain. Ideally the safety should at least as big as the main drain but that was not possible. I divert some water from my drain to my refugium and some water from my return line to supply my carbon reactor. I also could dump some return water into my refugium but there is no need at this point. All of the flow is regulated by gate valves.

[ento-reefer]

Originally Posted by Ron Reefman

Congratulations on the new, bigger tank! I'm quite happy with the quality of the Cadlight tank and stand. I did make a couple of improvements though.

I didn't just screw the front supports into the base. I drilled out bigger holes in the stand and added metal threaded fittings. I had concerns about how well it would hold together if I had to remove the braces for work on the sump (which I'm upgrading now). I was also thinking that if the wood got wet, the threads in the wood could get soft. So it was just a small concern and it was easy to rectify with threaded inserts. BTW, my sump was a very poor design IMHO, but it looks like your bigger sump has a much more usable design. I'd be turning that center section into a refugium or moving the skimmer to the center (if it fits) and doing the refugium at the skimmers old section.

And I can't emphasis enough how much the 'drip tray' has been a good thing! I have a remote collection cup for the skimmer and it's inside the stand, but outside of the sump. It's overflowed a couple of times and the drip tray saved a mess. BTW, I'd highly recommend an auto top off for your system if you plan to use the Cadlight skimmer. Mine is VERY fussy about water height. Just slightly low water level and virtually no skimming at all. Slightly high water level and the skimmer runs like a fire hose! That's why my remote collection cup overflowed.

I didn't use any of the Cadlight plumbing as it's metric and I had way more plumbing to do than a basic set up. I have the second tank (50g cube), a chiller (yes, the killer chiller), a reactor for carbon or GFO and an outlet for a hose to pump water out of the system when doing water changes. The Cadlight stuff looks like real good quality, but I needed a lot more and buying metric is just out of the question. I also took the time to order gate valves from Graingers rather than ball valves from Home Depot or Lowes. They are so much better at control and they don't 'freeze up' like ball valves seem to do over time in saltwater systems.

The one thing I let others talk me out of, that I now wish I had gone ahead and done. is drilling an extra drain to feed the skimmer directly. I used one of the existing holes for an emergency drain and now I can pump water into the tank way faster than I can drain water out (without using the emergency drain). I've feed skimmers this way in the past. Not only does the skimmer work well (with a gate valve to control flow), but it adds drainage from the tank so I could circulate more through the system.

If you run into any issues or have any questions at all, feel free to ask here or send me a PM. I'm always happy to share ideas.

BTW, the tank seems to be doing much better now. I just ordered 12 zoas, 2 palys and 2 rook flower anemones from Cultivated Reef while they are doing their Black Friday Sale. My hope is that in a year I'll have a tank with zoas, palys, and anemones everywhere and the 50g cube will be full of growing sps and lps survivors from the Killer Chiller Fiasco!

Thanks for your tips Ron. I will be getting the AquaMaxx Cone-S Q-3 Protein skimmer with my tank. I have heard good things about it so I am hoping it will be an improvement over the Cad Lights skimmer. I will be using the Ice Cap ATO so my water level should stay fairly level in the sump.

I will probably just use the stock plumbing as my set up will be rather simple. I will run a couple of reactors and have a cryptic fuge I think. I have always wanted to experiment with that. I am planning to start out using kalkwasser in my ATO to manage calc/alk and see how that works over time.

I am glad to hear things are improving with your tank. It was your tank that got me looking into the Artisian line and I decided to go big! I'll do a tank
journal once I actually have the tank.

I appreciate all the time you take in helping others out on this forum. Thank you.

[ento-reefer]

Originally Posted by JTL

I have the Cadlights 100, but I chose to build my own stand to my specs. It has the modern European look and I built it from 3/4" birch plywood with no 2x4's. Sealed inside with 2 coats of clear epoxy. I think there is a pic in my profile. I also built my sump and sized it to completely fill the cabinet. Then I sealed around the edges. There is no way water can go any where but in the sump.

I also have the Photon v2. It has been running for 4 months but I am still messing with the settings, in fact I just raised the intensity last night.

I used the Cadlights metrc bulkheads but I modified them to accept 1", 3/4" and 1/2" pipe. I use the 1"for my drain, 3/4" for my return and the 1/2" for my safety drain. Ideally the safety should at least as big as the main drain but that was not possible. I divert some water from my drain to my refugium and some water from my return line to supply my carbon reactor. I also could dump some return water into my refugium but there is no need at this point. All of the flow is regulated by gate valves.

Thank you for the details on your plumbing. I think I am just going to keep things simple and use the supplied plumbing. I will have a couple of reactors but they will have their own pumps. I am looking forward to having more space to really let my corals grow out.

[nogascans]

Very nice build there Ron! I enjoyed your buildup and wife loves the aqua scape. We have been looking at upgrading from our 90 gal bow front to a larger tank, which besides the increase in footprint is also a considerable budgetary concern. I have been looking seriously at:

Red Sea Reefer 750XL at: 160 gallon/40 gallon sump (200 gallon total)

71" x 23.6" x 25.6" 34.7" tall stand

Cad Lights 165G Artisan II: Rated at 165G?? 50 gallon sump ( Total ??) *
71" x 23.5" x 21.5" with a 36" tall stand

* I was a little confused on the actual water volume on the Cad Lights units as it slightly smaller in dimensions.

Both use good glass but Reefer uses thicker front glass I believe.

Do you have any thoughts on your tank now that it has been set up for a while? Positive features? Any negatives to sump size as I was thinking of employing the Triton method.

thanks in advance.

Sincerely,

David

[Ron Reefman]

David, I'm at Sebring for the SCCA National Road Race and I'll reply on Sunday. Thanks.

[Ron Reefman]

Hey David, I don't know if you have moved forward with your decision yet or not, but here are some of my opinions. BTW, sorry for the long delay but life got in the way.

I did tank measurements and water volume calculations, but it was a long time ago and not really that important to me. If I remember correctly Red Sea doesn't take the water volume in the overflow into consideration and Cadlight (like everybody else) just uses the overall dimensions of the tank. If you use the Red Sea tank measurements and calculate the water volume it comes out at 185g not 160g.

Sure the Cadlight uses a thinner glass, but it's euro braced and not rimless which makes a huge difference to the strength of the front and back. I really wanted the rimless tank and didn't care for the euro brace design. But the cost difference was way too much for me to ignore, so I got the Cadlight. Now, just over a year later, I love the euro brace. I have 3 DIY tanks that are rimless and water getting over the edge on running down the glass is cut by 95% with the euro brace (BTW, I play in my tanks a lot!). Also, I like having the euro brace to use as a shelf when I'm working in the tank. I can pull stuff out of the tank, like a dead snail or a crab carapace, and just set it on the rim until I'm done in the tank. I also move frags from 2 tanks in a back room to the 2 tanks out front and I often use a small container so I don't drip water everywhere. The container sits very securely on the euro brace. It was also easy to make a DIY screen top to sit on the euro brace.

As for sumps, the Cadlight sump is bigger than the Red Sea. And the Red Sea is a tight fit in the stand as they section off about 25% to 33% for a dry compartment. The Cadlight stand is all open, but they don't utilize all the space. Personally, I don't like the Cadlight sump internal design. What is the small middle section for? Who uses sponge filter material anymore? So I am currently building a new sump that will fill the stand and have a bigger area for a bigger skimmer (I already own) and a refugium which I think is a very worthwhile feature on a marine aquarium system.

The Cadlight skimmer is good, although it's touchy when it comes to water depth, so an auto top off is well advised. The main return pump is a lot like the current Jebao 12,000lph return pump and runs very quietly and puts out VERY little heat.

I was very happy with the build quality of the stand, sump and tank. IMHO it's as good as Red Sea. I learned to like the euro brace. I love the open 'floor plan' stand so I can expand my sump. And both the Red Sea and Cadlight use metric fittings (a PITA if you ask me). The skimmer and pump are good, but you can delete them from your system and get a very fair reduction in cost.

Long story short, I like the Cadlight a little bit more than the Red Sea and it cost me about 30% less delivered.

[Ron Reefman]

MERRY CHRISTMAS to all and to all a good night!



I got this ceramic ornament at Bonner's Christmas Store in Frankenmuth, Michigan.

[oldhead]

As I read the first post all I could think of was for you to save the glass and build a whopping plywood tank. Would love to do this in my basement. Maybe something 14 ft long with two windows.

[Ron Reefman]

Actually I sold the 180g tank to a club member who was going to cut it apart, clean the glass and rebuild it. I'm kind of rare breed in this hobby. I've been around long enough to have gone up size from a 30g, to a 75g, to a 180g, to an additional 75g, to an additional 65g shallow tank and then start the trip back down with the 180g and 75g going away and replaced by a 125g and 50g. And soon the 65g shallow reef/frag tank will go away.

[Ron Reefman]

Yesterday my wife and I went out to the Lighthouse Beach on Sanibel and did some collecting. She collects shells and takes photos, I tear apart sponges looking for small critters. It was a fun day as we both have just started doing volunteer work for the Bailey Mathews National Shell Museum as Shell Ambassadors. We help the snowbirds and vacationers idea shells and explain the beach eco systems. I draw a lot of attention because I'm the only one tearing sponges apart.

Yesterday's collections:

4 yellow snapping shrimp (aka pistol shrimp)




3 green snapping shrimp




10-12 porcelain crabs in various sizes and colors






2 amenones




Finally a sea squirt tunicate that is a bit bigger than a golf ball



The tunicate in in my 65g shallow reef and has burried itself in the sand with just the tip of it's... it's... mouth(?) sticking out of the sand.

[Ron Reefman]

We did another beach walk Thursday. Low tide was 8:30am and the temperature outside was 37 degrees! Yikes!

I added a hitchhiker anemone, some macro algae and a 2nd sea squirt tunicate to the shallow reef.

All the new additions earlier in the week seem to be doing fine.

[brad65ford]

crazy to think i have to look all around the internet to find someone that lives a town over for questions/answers lol. I have a redsea 525xl like you mentioned has similar size as your system. I to have had a battle with ideal LED coverage. had two ophek's and that didn't cove it then added kessil then switch and added multiple coral moon box led's. Very frustrating since i like a blanket of light covering everything similar to t5 but done with led's. Wanted to purchase 2 50 Photon V2's since i don't want any shadowing but i have concerns with the side since the fixture is 47.5 while the tank is 59. Please I'm not sure how the 100 degree angles look like. Love corals growing on the back glass and stuff, not sure if two of these will give me what i'm after. I'm up possibly purchasing 5 more moon box led's to match my other 5 cmb's which will give the coverage I'm looking for since they have 120 degree angle lens. Crazy what we do to have the type of light we want. BTW nice setup, you have some skill with building tanks. Impressive glass work! Hope to see you at the swfm club, only went to a few frag swaps, need to go to the next one. Best regards, Brad

[Dsekula]

Originally Posted by brad65ford

crazy to think i have to look all around the internet to find someone that lives a town over for questions/answers lol. I have a redsea 525xl like you mentioned has similar size as your system. I to have had a battle with ideal LED coverage. had two ophek's and that didn't cove it then added kessil then switch and added multiple coral moon box led's. Very frustrating since i like a blanket of light covering everything similar to t5 but done with led's. Wanted to purchase 2 50 Photon V2's since i don't want any shadowing but i have concerns with the side since the fixture is 47.5 while the tank is 59. Please I'm not sure how the 100 degree angles look like. Love corals growing on the back glass and stuff, not sure if two of these will give me what i'm after. I'm up possibly purchasing 5 more moon box led's to match my other 5 cmb's which will give the coverage I'm looking for since they have 120 degree angle lens. Crazy what we do to have the type of light we want. BTW nice setup, you have some skill with building tanks. Impressive glass work! Hope to see you at the swfm club, only went to a few frag swaps, need to go to the next one. Best regards, Brad

Just happened on this post... If you really know the light you like you can try rapid led.. they make solder and snap together kits that allow you to make your own lightsetup. It's very very easy, you can pick spectrum of every bulb, lenses, etc. Their coustomer service was very helpful in sizing the correct ballest and electrical kit for me. I have used their night kits and grow lights for fresh and was impressed. Just an honest suggestion I don't have any affiliation.

Sent from my E6810 using Tapatalk

[Ron Reefman]

Originally Posted by brad65ford

crazy to think i have to look all around the internet to find someone that lives a town over for questions/answers lol. I have a redsea 525xl like you mentioned has similar size as your system. I to have had a battle with ideal LED coverage. had two ophek's and that didn't cove it then added kessil then switch and added multiple coral moon box led's. Very frustrating since i like a blanket of light covering everything similar to t5 but done with led's. Wanted to purchase 2 50 Photon V2's since i don't want any shadowing but i have concerns with the side since the fixture is 47.5 while the tank is 59. Please I'm not sure how the 100 degree angles look like. Love corals growing on the back glass and stuff, not sure if two of these will give me what i'm after. I'm up possibly purchasing 5 more moon box led's to match my other 5 cmb's which will give the coverage I'm looking for since they have 120 degree angle lens. Crazy what we do to have the type of light we want. BTW nice setup, you have some skill with building tanks. Impressive glass work! Hope to see you at the swfm club, only went to a few frag swaps, need to go to the next one. Best regards, Brad

Originally Posted by Dsekula

Just happened on this post... If you really know the light you like you can try rapid led.. they make solder and snap together kits that allow you to make your own lightsetup. It's very very easy, you can pick spectrum of every bulb, lenses, etc. Their coustomer service was very helpful in sizing the correct ballest and electrical kit for me. I have used their night kits and grow lights for fresh and was impressed. Just an honest suggestion I don't have any affiliation.

Hi Brad,

The Rapid led idea is a good one if you have the time and desire to make your own fixture. Personally, I don't have the time or desire even thought I enjoy building things.

You are welcome to to come over and see my tank I'll send you a PM with my email and phone #). The 50" Photon V2 does a pretty good job of covering the 60" tank at the ends. I wanted more fron to rear light and added the 2 led strips at the front and back and I'm very happy with the look. I can grow sps corals on the back glass and on the end glass.However, I'm currently moving away from so much sps and lps and more toward zoas and anemones (rock flowers and RBTA).

I don't have any experience with the coral box leds. But I'd like to see your set up some time.

Ron

[mrsixstrings12]

great read from start to finish! I don't recall seeing this and I apologize if I missed it but, are you still running the crossflows? How are they holding up?

Looking forward for more updates on the tank!

[Ron Reefman]

Originally Posted by mrsixstrings12

great read from start to finish! I don't recall seeing this and I apologize if I missed it but, are you still running the crossflows? How are they holding up?

Looking forward for more updates on the tank!

am still running a Crossflow on the main DT (the 125g Cadlight). It's holding up OK but the Crossflow motor doesn't have much torque and therefore needs to be cleaned more than other powerheads. I have a Maxspect Gyre and it has the same issue. Even after they have been cleaned, you need to be quite careful with how you put it back together and get the paddle wheels and cages aligned with the motor or it still won't run.

I have replaced 2 Crossflow motors in the unit I had in my 165g shallow reef which I recently tore down and sold. I would NOT buy a Crossflow or a Gyre again until they start using stronger motors. But that's just my opinion.

[scottbapilot]

Hi Ron,
could you please tell me how you plumbed the CAD125, I also have one but the metric plumbing is driving me crazy. I would love to change it all out but I dont know where to start.

[Ron Reefman]

A half inch bulkhead works in the small hole (snug) and a 3/4" fit loosely in the big hole. Personally I was sorry I didn't drill a hole to create an emergency over flow outside the overflow box.

[JTL]

I have a Cadlights 100 and was able to modify the metric fittings so I could have a 1"drain pipe, a 3/4" return and a 1/2" safety drain. The options are limited. Like Ron, I considered drilling the tank but decided against it because it voids the warranty and Cadlights CS sucks anyway and would use any excuse possible to get out of warranty issue.

[Ron Reefman]

Well, after nearly 15 years of getting bigger and bigger tanks as well as more tanks, it's time to really downsize. I have already sold off my 65g shallow reef and my 20g frag tank along with the 120g sump and stand.

Now I'm working on re-setting my 50g cube with the anemones and a few corals I want from the 125g DT. Once I get that done, and get the last of my current algae issue resolved (it's almost gone after 3 months of work and changes) I'll be selling off the extra corals and the 125g tank, sump and stand.

For starters, I have to ID some of my big zoa colonies. Anybody able to help ID this zoa? And yes, those 2 neon green things are 2 of my baby rock flower anemones. Two of my big ones had about 12 babies... that I've found so far!





I think I know what it is, but I'm looking for confirmation. Thanks.
BTW, if you are in SW Florida and interested my corals, send me a PM and we can talk.

[JTL]

Wammin Watermelons?

[Ron Reefman]

OK, I'm selling off corals from my 125g tank. And I'm looking at replacing my 50g cube (24"x24"x20") with a tank that fills the small stand. So the new tank would be 36"x24"x20". I'll be building a new sump as well. This is the cube I want to replace.



I'm going to build the tank and sump with 3/8th glass. I've made 5 other aquariums with black RTV silicone. But I'm considering doing these with 3M Co 5200 adhesive. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

My stand is gloss white and the tank will be 36"x24"x20" and rimless with a white back glass. I think the white 5200 adhesive will look good with the stand.

I'm 95% sure that 3M 5200 will hold the tank together at least as well as RTV silicone. Anybody have any thoughts on that point?

[JTL]

Personally, I would stick with the RTV it is tried and proven. I think the black on white would look just fine. I also think you are making a good choice by going a little bigger. It is a nice compromise from your 125.

[Ron Reefman]

I just heard from 3M Co (I used to work for 3M) and they said 5200 should work better than RTV silicone and can be bought in white or black versions (I intend to use white). They recommended that the areas I want kept clean should be taped off. The 5200 that squeezes out of the joints can be wiped off with a damp rag for longer than RTV silicone can as 5200 has a slow cure time (24-48 hours to tack free). They also said trying to scrape it off the glass after it cures may well prove VERY difficult.