Been wanting to get an Aquarium since forever and one day had a mid life crisis when I hit a milestone birthday and here I am, a proud owner of my very first aquarium ever (well I had a gold fish in a bowl when I was a kid), a Red Sea Reefer 350. Learned a lot from this forum being a passive participant and want to thank everyone for that. You all made my jump into this hoppy a lot easier.
I just started cycling my tank and will try to document what I did in the past and hoping to keep a live update of things going forward.
Equipment
Delivery
The tank was delivered to my house with no notice at all and left outside my garage. When I was trying to go out, noticed the huge crate siting outside my garage and was pleasantly surprised and also terrified that I did not get a chance to check for damages. When I saw some holes punctured through the outside cardboard box, I was readying myself to hours of customer service calls trying to prove it wasn't something I did. But fortunately, everything inside was intact and there was no shipping damage at all. Guess they are not calling to schedule delivery windows because of COVID.
Aquarium Build
The cabinet and the plumping wasn't too hard to setup. I went with the Red Sea plumbing and no upgrades/DIYs this time, since it's my first build. Definitely needed help to lift to put the aquarium on the display cabinet.
The sump was different story though and needed a ton of modifications since I wanted to use the ReefMat, refugium and also wanted the gravity fed ATO. I followed the recommended modifications from Red Sea and made a few of my own to get them all fitted together. Not sure if my hack job is stable or not, but will keep an eye out. Sorry, forgot to take a picture of the modified sump before I filled it up. So, here is a block diagram.
I just started cycling my tank and will try to document what I did in the past and hoping to keep a live update of things going forward.
Equipment
- Red Sea Reefer 350 V3 Deluxe
- ReefLED 90 x2
- ReefMat 500
- ReefWave 25 x2
- Apex Neptune Controller
- Apex Trident
- Cor 20 return pump
- Deltec 600i Skimmer
Delivery
The tank was delivered to my house with no notice at all and left outside my garage. When I was trying to go out, noticed the huge crate siting outside my garage and was pleasantly surprised and also terrified that I did not get a chance to check for damages. When I saw some holes punctured through the outside cardboard box, I was readying myself to hours of customer service calls trying to prove it wasn't something I did. But fortunately, everything inside was intact and there was no shipping damage at all. Guess they are not calling to schedule delivery windows because of COVID.
Aquarium Build
The cabinet and the plumping wasn't too hard to setup. I went with the Red Sea plumbing and no upgrades/DIYs this time, since it's my first build. Definitely needed help to lift to put the aquarium on the display cabinet.
The sump was different story though and needed a ton of modifications since I wanted to use the ReefMat, refugium and also wanted the gravity fed ATO. I followed the recommended modifications from Red Sea and made a few of my own to get them all fitted together. Not sure if my hack job is stable or not, but will keep an eye out. Sorry, forgot to take a picture of the modified sump before I filled it up. So, here is a block diagram.
