Jyeef
New Member
Hello all! Just a log for my first actual reef build. Its not there yet but hopefully soon I'll have some coral. Been taking it slow! Here's my 75 gal tank and 25gal sump, I'm estimating 80gal water in the system:
Design parameters: As silent as possible, no chance of electrical deaths in the main tank, as automated as I can make it, open sump area, and able to house my dream fish the Flame angel.
I started back in April '23 by ordering a Planet Aquarium external overflow 75 gallon 4' wide tank. Flame angels need some swimming room so this was the smallest I could go. I then ordered the stand for it, metal off Amazon, thinking it could hold a 20gal long in the bottom of it. Completely wrong, its 1/2" too narrow to do that, so the 20gal long that I have has been recommissioned into an ATO RODI tank that feeds this one and a 37Gal freshwater aquarium in the vicinity.
Upon finding out that the 20gal long wouldn't fit, I started thinking "how hard can it be?" and decided to order some 1/4" glass and make a rimless sump that exactly fits the bottom. First go at using black silicone and it was heavily ridiculed online how bad I made it. Fortunately it had a leak, so I ripped it all apart, cleaned the glass which took forever, and then did it again with tape in the corners for clean lines. Voila its much better!
Next I set in on the overflow plumbing. Its a triple pipe from the overflow to the sump, so the main is on a gate valve, the 2nd has a bean style I think, and the 3rd is a straight pipe with minimal bends that's loud as hell if water goes through to alert me to a problem. It took some doing as I've never used hard pipe before, but got it all squared away. I'm really glad its tunable with the gate valve, and right now its tuned perfectly silent. I realize this may change as gunk builds in all the systems.
Sump design: 2 chambers only. Pipes feed into the main large chaeto area, amazon grow light on a timer above it, 2 heaters (with inkbird controller) in that area, as well as ATO and eventual dosing. Then I siliconed in a double wall with room for carbon bags if needed into the return pump area. Has 2 return pumps and a skimmer in there now. The sump has large acrylic top that holds the light and keeps the evaporation down.
Returns: two returns for redundancy and because we have power outages. One of the returns is a Sicce AC return, the other is a Sicce DC pump that also runs through a 15w UV. All of the return piping is flexible black tubing, I'm expecting on changing this out every couple years.
There's 100lbs of live sand (fiji pink) and a lot of rock, probably 75lbs, I didn't weight it. Most of it is mortared together but the bridge piece and a couple others are just set in there. Base rock is flat on the bottom glass because I have sand sifters.
Wavemakers are MP40's. One I bought used and that's the loudest thing on this whole system. The other I got on a great sale, love that they are tunable. I hope to one day upgrade the older one but its working for now and that's good enough. Simple reef lagoon modes day/night and a shorter nutrient transport mode before the lights go out to get everything down to the sump.
Lighting and top: Orphek OR3 on OSIX controller - Reef day in the middle, Blue reef day and UV on the front side pointed in. I saw a few things online about growing corals towards the glass so we'll see what that looks like. I could easily change it all around if I need to, and the whole light setup rotates up and back against the wall if I need into the tank.
Other tank oddities:
I wanted there to be a top of sorts to stop jumpers, but also open for air exchange. So I crafted an acrylic top from some spare acrylic. Its 8" tall and works great! I also put some stained plywood under the tank and used composite shims to level the whole thing out. Also working very well. I will likely put a clear acrylic piece on the front so I can still see the sump area, but keep a dog out if we get there. All the electronics are inside and on the left side. Labeled in case I need to talk someone through something if we aren't home. Tank has been up since October, did a month or so cycle, moved in the clowns and the royal gramma, and have gone up from there.
Inhabitant list:
Royal Gramma
2 rescued clownfish
Firefish
Candy cane pistol shrimp/Highfin shrimp Goby
2 Banggai Cardinals
Wish - 3 Pajama Cardinals, One spot foxface, Flame Angel (in that order)
Lots of various inverts and a cleaner shrimp
Coral wishlist: Green Frogspawn, Colorado Sunburst BTA, other random things as I get better with coral.
I know the flame angel is with caution on coral and I'm figuring out a plan now. I've never tried coral and am excited so get there with this system! The whole patience things is pretty rough, but it seems to be working well. The only parameter I'm really concerned about right now is that my Phosphates have been hovering at around 0.30 for the last month but things seem to be working well so far, so I'll keep trucking along. Next addition will be the pajama cardinals, then a month later the foxface, then sometime after the flame angel. Hopefully by the time a year arrives on the tank order!
And Bob the hermit crab is our most famous invert:
Design parameters: As silent as possible, no chance of electrical deaths in the main tank, as automated as I can make it, open sump area, and able to house my dream fish the Flame angel.
I started back in April '23 by ordering a Planet Aquarium external overflow 75 gallon 4' wide tank. Flame angels need some swimming room so this was the smallest I could go. I then ordered the stand for it, metal off Amazon, thinking it could hold a 20gal long in the bottom of it. Completely wrong, its 1/2" too narrow to do that, so the 20gal long that I have has been recommissioned into an ATO RODI tank that feeds this one and a 37Gal freshwater aquarium in the vicinity.
Upon finding out that the 20gal long wouldn't fit, I started thinking "how hard can it be?" and decided to order some 1/4" glass and make a rimless sump that exactly fits the bottom. First go at using black silicone and it was heavily ridiculed online how bad I made it. Fortunately it had a leak, so I ripped it all apart, cleaned the glass which took forever, and then did it again with tape in the corners for clean lines. Voila its much better!
Next I set in on the overflow plumbing. Its a triple pipe from the overflow to the sump, so the main is on a gate valve, the 2nd has a bean style I think, and the 3rd is a straight pipe with minimal bends that's loud as hell if water goes through to alert me to a problem. It took some doing as I've never used hard pipe before, but got it all squared away. I'm really glad its tunable with the gate valve, and right now its tuned perfectly silent. I realize this may change as gunk builds in all the systems.
Sump design: 2 chambers only. Pipes feed into the main large chaeto area, amazon grow light on a timer above it, 2 heaters (with inkbird controller) in that area, as well as ATO and eventual dosing. Then I siliconed in a double wall with room for carbon bags if needed into the return pump area. Has 2 return pumps and a skimmer in there now. The sump has large acrylic top that holds the light and keeps the evaporation down.
Returns: two returns for redundancy and because we have power outages. One of the returns is a Sicce AC return, the other is a Sicce DC pump that also runs through a 15w UV. All of the return piping is flexible black tubing, I'm expecting on changing this out every couple years.
There's 100lbs of live sand (fiji pink) and a lot of rock, probably 75lbs, I didn't weight it. Most of it is mortared together but the bridge piece and a couple others are just set in there. Base rock is flat on the bottom glass because I have sand sifters.
Wavemakers are MP40's. One I bought used and that's the loudest thing on this whole system. The other I got on a great sale, love that they are tunable. I hope to one day upgrade the older one but its working for now and that's good enough. Simple reef lagoon modes day/night and a shorter nutrient transport mode before the lights go out to get everything down to the sump.
Lighting and top: Orphek OR3 on OSIX controller - Reef day in the middle, Blue reef day and UV on the front side pointed in. I saw a few things online about growing corals towards the glass so we'll see what that looks like. I could easily change it all around if I need to, and the whole light setup rotates up and back against the wall if I need into the tank.
Other tank oddities:
I wanted there to be a top of sorts to stop jumpers, but also open for air exchange. So I crafted an acrylic top from some spare acrylic. Its 8" tall and works great! I also put some stained plywood under the tank and used composite shims to level the whole thing out. Also working very well. I will likely put a clear acrylic piece on the front so I can still see the sump area, but keep a dog out if we get there. All the electronics are inside and on the left side. Labeled in case I need to talk someone through something if we aren't home. Tank has been up since October, did a month or so cycle, moved in the clowns and the royal gramma, and have gone up from there.
Inhabitant list:
Royal Gramma
2 rescued clownfish
Firefish
Candy cane pistol shrimp/Highfin shrimp Goby
2 Banggai Cardinals
Wish - 3 Pajama Cardinals, One spot foxface, Flame Angel (in that order)
Lots of various inverts and a cleaner shrimp
Coral wishlist: Green Frogspawn, Colorado Sunburst BTA, other random things as I get better with coral.
I know the flame angel is with caution on coral and I'm figuring out a plan now. I've never tried coral and am excited so get there with this system! The whole patience things is pretty rough, but it seems to be working well. The only parameter I'm really concerned about right now is that my Phosphates have been hovering at around 0.30 for the last month but things seem to be working well so far, so I'll keep trucking along. Next addition will be the pajama cardinals, then a month later the foxface, then sometime after the flame angel. Hopefully by the time a year arrives on the tank order!
And Bob the hermit crab is our most famous invert:
