Hookup's build.

[Hookup]

Some weekend progress....

Fish sitting on the floor waiting for their new home













More coming sooner than later.. Sump room, holes in floors, fun fun...

[sniggir]

Keep up the good work... this is gonna be a fantastic tank! oh and for people that wanna see what a little resurch and hard work will do keep and eye on this build.

[gvv]

What are you using to attach the walls to the glass?

[Hookup]

The materials used for the walls were all researched, mainly from threads on RC.  They are all reportedly reef-safe from more than one thread(source), however as none of the sources where phd's in biochemistry you take your own risks.  All times where the products were referenced had at least one reference of the walls being in the tanks for 1yr or more.   The hardest one to find that level of "reference" for was the epoxy... but I did find it.

Egg Crate and Zip Ties for the Rock.  I would recommend using small pieces, the size of the palm of your hand, not including your fingers... I don't like how far out (horizontally) some of the pieces are stuck into the tank.  Not a big deal, but it is a tip.  also, I would get bigger rock and smash it with a hammer and chisel then use the smashed bits.  I did this towards the end to use some bigger rock and the result was better than expected.  The smashing process made much more interesting shapes.  I would also recommend creating "feet" for your wall to stand up with.  This has nothing to do with the tank but so many times when "crafting" i was able to stand the project wall up on its own feet and work for one wall that had feet and it was easier than the other wall that constantly needed to be balanced.  Working with a friend would be an option i guess. haha

Foam used was the Home Depot Good Stuff  (red can with yellow cap).  The tip here is to use it to throw down a covering layer quickly.  Cover everything with about 1/2 inch or 1/4 inch of foam... you'll get the feel for it quickly.  You're looking for the foam to expand within the first 20seconds to fill in the entire working surface.  You're not going to use too much unless you try... but using less was the goal i guess... either way...   I used a back and fourth painting motion for the large open areas of egg-crate.  This did look like it was going to create ugly ridges for the end-project but it does not... do not worry.   Be sure to get in under and around the rocks to get them lots of support.. you can easily break and rip off excess later and it looks fine after it is covered with sand.  The second tip here, and the most important one as far as I'm concerned, is to come back after ~20min when there is a good surface crust on the foam.  If you touch it and it sticks to your hands it's too soon... you need to touch it and not have anything stick to you, then you know you are ready to work it...  You want to start to flatten the air out of the foam at this point.  Smush the foam flat, push in around the rocks, down into the egg crate, etc... This is why I'm saying you cannot really use too much foam when spraying it on.. but be conservative to make your $$ stretch.  I used 4 cans on this project.  I wanted flat walls with rocks on them.. if you want thick walls, use more rocks and still flatten the foam.  I've hear of people having issues with walls floating... doing this there is almost no way the wall will float... My walls were about 20lbs each.. no way they float.

After 24hours...

Get some z-poxy finishing resin from zap glues.  I got mine at Dynamic Hobbies here in town.  They are of Colonnade Rd. ~$20/box and 1 box did my project with some left over... not much though, plan your sqr footage and assume that one box will cover about 10 sqr feet..  10 srq feet / box will give you a good safe-zone to know how much to buy.  Unopened/undamaged boxes can be returned to most stores.

Anyhow, mix equal parts of the resin as directed (ok there were no directions in the box so I just took some tinfoil and made a "blob" of hardner and then tried to make a similar sized blob of resin beside it... Using a 1" paint brush, and it is critical that you get a 1" paint brush , mix the two blobs together and goop/slop/spread the resin onto your project walls.  I was working about 1 sqr foot sections at a time as the product has a 20min working time.  Blob/slop on the resin then holding the brush straight up and down, push down and swirl the resin into every crack and crook... obviously you need this junk everywhere you want sand to stick... I wanted to be ultra-safe and painted the resin for about 2-4min then started throwing and pressing in hand-fulls of sand (substrate).  I really loaded lots and lots of sand onto the project knowing that 90% would fall off.  Which it did... but I only had to go over the project with one coat of sand/epoxy.  Take your time and cover up zip-ties, and foam, etc... I also  covered some areas of rock, but mainly cause I was playing around...  The sand is for you, not for the aquarium... within 12months it should all have coralline algae or similar encrusted all over it... but who wants to look at yellow foam for 12months? yuck.

3hrs later...

Ok, now your walls are finished... and if you are just like me you realize that you forgot to cut holes to mount your pumps to the walls.  Good luck.  I used whatever I could to cut the holes including drills, side cutters, hole-saw, jig saw... you name it... (and I would have given this tip above, but just like during build I forgot to type it up there as I forgot to do it in that first step... don't be a dummy like me, don't forget to do this first!)

Anyhow, now that the walls are ready for your tank, which has been cleaned and dried.. get yourself some silicone from Home Depot.  It's about $5.00/tube and I used 1 tube per wall... I do not think you can go "overboard" on the silicone here... get it stuck good and goopy to the walls to avoid dead-spots of water/detritus being created behind the walls.  Home Depot sells several different kinds of Silicone.  The one you want is a BLUE TUBE with TYPE I on it.  Not the Red Tubes, not the Gold Tubes, not Type II (that is bad for aquariums and says so on the tube)... you want the BLUE tube TYPE I silicone.  It does NOT say that it is safe for aquariums, however it is... and the Home Depot guy even pulled out a manufactures guide to the product and showed me that the manufacture even recommends aquarium usage for the BLUE TUBE TYPE I silicone.

Wait 72 hrs for the silicone to dry/cure and bleed-off all of the nasty ammonia.  WAIT 72 HRS.  Drink beers, watch the epics (godfather 1-3, starwars 1-6, spiderman 1-3, etc..) Just wait... 72hrs ... wait... really, i think you should wait 72... even though the bottle says 24... wait 72hrs... 72hrs, not 24.. 3x24 = 72....

Um... You have to find ways to "push/hold" your project to the walls while they dry (first 24hrs).  Using 2x4's or scrap wood is an option... but difficult to engineer.  Basically there are no "easy" & cheap ways of doing this... figure this out when you dry-fit and test your walls into your tank.

One last thing.. My walls were 24" tall, by 26.5" long.  You can use that as your reference for how far the materials can get you. 4sqr feet each (ish)

Um... i cannot think of any other tips and/or tricks... the project was incredibly simple and easy... it was fun... I would love to do it again, however other than helping someone else out I doubt I'll get the chance... I think I covered everything here but if you have any questions thrown down here and I'll do my best to answer...

[gvv]

Wow! This was one nice reading!

[Hookup]

Below are some new photos from tonight.  Just about everything has been complete.. NOT!

The sump is running... YEAH!  The new return pump will be in this weekend and the flow rate will be over 50gph...lol...  16feet of Head Pressure is a lot...

The new Skimmer, Octo Pro 300 (i kinda giggle still when I say it), will also arrive this weekend. (yeah again!)

The RO/DI unit will also arrive this weekend.. No more buying water or bumming it off of friends /winks at redbelly...

I also, obviously, added some corals...  The Elegance is my fav.  Or my CandyCane...  The Hammer Coral is not doing well.. too much stress from moves... hopefully it'll make it...

Added a blue sided fairy wrasse, a red fin wrasse and a cleaner wrasse. I've not seen the cleaner wrasse since it was released from the bag... it's been a week (i think) but who knows...

Most of the aquascaping is almost complete, there was a stage before this that didn't get photo'd... but it was when I did it on my own... this version my wife helped with so we like it better... There are additional "problems" with the aquascaping, but they are nothing that a hammer and chisel cannot fix... lol...

Anyhow.. will keep ya progressed...

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[redbelly]

Nice Bonsai aqua scaping Hookup!
Especially once those zoanthids are off the sand bed.

[Hookup]

Thanks.  There are still some rocks that I am not happy with, and the bowfront/photo does not really show the depth of the scaping, it looks very flat.  However, if you look really closely in the middle of the tank you can see the cleaner shrimps antenna.  He has setup is cleaning station under that big ledge dead-center of the tank and is always visible... it's super cool, because he is so centered and visible that he forms a show-piece all by himself.  Of course, as of yet i've not seen any fish going in for a cleaning, but that'll happen in time... maybe the new convict tank will get a buff and wax...

[Hookup]

Just some updated photos. 
Full tank, above, left and right sides...  More aquascaping to do.. will attack it tomorrow... and post updates.  Also, this is day 2 of starting the ULTRA-LITH system... apparently by week 3 there are bigger differences in sps's. 


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[groan]

WOW! great progress! That is a tank to be proud or.
Congrats!

[Julie]

Nice aquascaping - looks so nice in the bow.

[Fishhead89]

Looking amazing!

[Hookup]

Thanks Julie, Groan and Fishhead89!  I've changed things around a bit, the photos above were 90% final, now it's done.  The last of the epoxy will set tomorrow and it'll be a solid rock mass.

I'll update and post new photos shortly.

Thanks for look'n

[gauthier613]

Hookup did you just use like a coral epoxy for the rock work?  Like the stuff you kneed when attaching corals?

I love your design.

[Hookup]

Yep, that's the stuff... and zip-ties where need and pegs..  Mostly it is peg & epoxy putty

[Hookup]

Was messing around with the camera today... Thought i'd post.

And yes, I tweaked the colors, this are not "scientific" shots, they are my shots.  However, in my opinion, they are very close to the actuals... I just slightly boosted some of the secondary colors, and in alot of cases decreased the primary color and balanced for the crazy actinic lighting.

Anyhow... Here they are.



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[Hookup]

A few more

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[audioslave_36]

Wow those are awesome shots, I can't wait to get my tank finished so I can have such beautiful creatures in my tank.

keep it up guys !

[Hookup]

Thanks AudioSlave.. The tank itself has a long, long, long way to go.. waiting for corals to grow out, system to continue to mature...

I got some new tech kit... controller, dosing pumps, probes, etc... will post pics as i get it setup... I will be running the Balling method to keep things spot-on and ultra-lith dosing to boost the colors...

[Hookup]

Here are some photos of the lighting, the canopy is now almost complete.  Two more bulbs (T5's) to install and then tear-it down for paint.  Doors went in today, finally.. no photos of that yet... Anyhow, for those thinking about a corner tank here's my take on lighting.







Once the last two bulbs are in I should get the light distribution i'm looking for and the coloration as well.

Thanks for tagg'n along.