Thanks for joining me on this tank build, where I will attempt to document and answer as many questions as possible along this journey. I am excited to join the Innovative Marine crew with a 200 EXT. Before I jump in with all the juicy specs such as equipment & stocking lists and of course pics pics pics, I’d like to start off with a few comments regarding current state, drivers behind the upgrade, and my progression through the hobby over the last 20 years.
Current State:
I live in upstate NY close to Saratoga, but I’m not originally from the area. My wife and I moved out this way 15 years ago from Boston so I could attend grad school. We lived in an apartment for several years and then moved to a house in 2010. With kids on the way I knew we would outgrow that house so any tank upgrades would have to wait. In 2017 we moved into what I refer to as the “forever” house. Plenty of room to grow, equidistant from both sets of parents, kids are all heavily involved in school, church, activities, & sports, and my wife and I have great work from home jobs. The roots have grown, no moves in sight, time for a large tank!
I purchased my current tank, the Red Sea Reefer 525XL, from my LFS in 2018 and it first saw salt water in January of 2019. Over the last 3+ years its been a great tank (mixed reef probably 40% softies, 40% LPS, and 20% SPS). I’ve had a lot of success stabilizing parameters, learning new techniques & using equipment I’ve never used before, and overall some very healthy coral & fish growth. However, there have also been many struggles. Like the bacterial infection (at least I thought it was) that systematically wiped out all of my acans from one side of the tank to the other. Or the time when my AWC new water line clogged with salt sediment to the point where only the waste line was operating causing my ATO to empty 20g of RODI into the tank before I figured out what the problem was. But hey, that’s reefing and life in general right? Run into a problem, analyze, correct, move on (spoken like a true engineer).
February 2019:
November 2022:
Upgrade Drivers:
There are a few different factors motivating the tank upgrade and I’ll try to be as neutral as possible in my examples.
First, off like many people have said, you should always go as large as you can, because eventually you’ll want to upgrade. When the 525 first entered the house, holy cow I thought, this thing is huge. But now its not as intimidating as it once was, plus I have invested a lot of time and money into automation which has simplified its operation immensely.
Second, I was also concerned about the floor taking the weight of anything bigger and I didn’t want to get involved in shoring up floor joists from the basement. Fast forward to today and after a few hours of research, no big deal, but at the time I had enough on my plate doing plumbing for the first time, cooking Pukani rock, figuring out the Apex, etc.
And lastly, I’ve lost confidence in the structural integrity of the Reefer’s stand. I’ve been aware of the silicone seam issues a small percentage of the population has experienced and I by no means have the telltale signs of weakened seams. However, it did cause a few sleepless nights, so I decided to do the paper test. Not only did an 8.5”x11” piece of paper slip between the tank and the stand, but a thicker business card did as well. This prompted me to break out a large framing square and sure enough I have some good deflection going on there in the stand. I’ve read countless thread and Facebook posts on this topic, even found statements directly from Red Sea that the paper test doesn’t automatically result in seam failure, some deflection is acceptable, and no structural fix is needed for the 525 even though the 625 and 725 got one. There are so many things to worry about in this hobby, and I know it could happen to any tank manufacturer’s product, but I want leaks and stand integrity at the very bottom of my worry-list.
Hobby Progression:
Like I mentioned earlier, I’ve been in the reefing hobby for 20 years now. I had to just look it up, but I first joined the other forum in March of 2002. Wow where has the time gone? OK, ready for a good laugh as I look back at the tanks and milestones that got me to where I am now?
March 2002: First Tank
15g hex. HOB aqua clear filter w/ carbon. I was drawn to the hobby by the “blue” look of the water, so for lighting I used a 9” actinic power compact mounted in some enclosure I cobbed together with limited power tools. Notable livestock was a scooter blenny which quickly died due to starvation and a Condylactis anemone because I liked the way it swayed with the water movement. Sorry, no pics of this one. I've searched high and low, but couldn't find a thing.
June 2002: Friends tank breakdown forced an upgrade from the 15 Hex
Standard 29g. This time I did slightly better with filtration, using a maxi-jet for flow and an Aqua-C Remora Pro skimmer. I also upgraded the lighting to 220W of power compact. That’s a ton of light over such a small tank, but it did surprisingly well. Livestock included a pair of mated clowns and a tiny Hippo tang. I can see everyone cringing now, but I will say there were no casualties during my ownership. A move forced the tank breakdown in November of 2003.
June 2004: After a short hiatus due to travel I decided it was time to reef again.
15g tall (what is it with me and 15g tanks?). For flow I used an Aquaclear 500 which was fitted to grow chaeto using a clip on 9w desk light. This is where I started to really get into corals and began using a 150W Current USA metal halide fixture with the dusk to dawn LED’s (Take that watts/gallon). I also began using the Kangaroo 324 peristaltic pump to dose kalkwasser. The first inhabitant I had was a yellow watchman goby that was with me from 2004 until 2013 and a clown fish I got in Feb of 2005 which I still have today.
August 2007: My wife and I moved from Boston to upstate NY, so I setup a new tank prior to the move.
30g Oceanic cube w/matching stand. This was my dream tank at the time. I loved the dimensions and I think a lot of people still do based on the number of nano’s produced today of a similar size. The MH was transferred over to this tank and I used an Aqua-C Remora. This was my first tank using Tunze products. For flow I started off with a 6025 and quickly added a controllable 6055 with the 7095 controller. Around 2016 I scrapped the MH light in favor of my first LED the Hydra 26. Very cool tank it served me well and was moved into our first house in 2010.
February 2017: Moving tanks is stressful, so when we moved a mile down the road to our “forever” house I had a tank waiting.
40g breeder. I’ve always wanted this size tank. Again, very cool dimensions with its front to back depth. On this tank I used 2 Hydra 26’s, a Tunze skimmer, and I had a Gyre 150 for flow. This tank was finally taken down after I moved all its inhabitants to the current 525XL.
What a walk down memory lane. Enough with the past, let’s move on to the present and future with the build out of the IM 200 EXT...........
Current State:
I live in upstate NY close to Saratoga, but I’m not originally from the area. My wife and I moved out this way 15 years ago from Boston so I could attend grad school. We lived in an apartment for several years and then moved to a house in 2010. With kids on the way I knew we would outgrow that house so any tank upgrades would have to wait. In 2017 we moved into what I refer to as the “forever” house. Plenty of room to grow, equidistant from both sets of parents, kids are all heavily involved in school, church, activities, & sports, and my wife and I have great work from home jobs. The roots have grown, no moves in sight, time for a large tank!
I purchased my current tank, the Red Sea Reefer 525XL, from my LFS in 2018 and it first saw salt water in January of 2019. Over the last 3+ years its been a great tank (mixed reef probably 40% softies, 40% LPS, and 20% SPS). I’ve had a lot of success stabilizing parameters, learning new techniques & using equipment I’ve never used before, and overall some very healthy coral & fish growth. However, there have also been many struggles. Like the bacterial infection (at least I thought it was) that systematically wiped out all of my acans from one side of the tank to the other. Or the time when my AWC new water line clogged with salt sediment to the point where only the waste line was operating causing my ATO to empty 20g of RODI into the tank before I figured out what the problem was. But hey, that’s reefing and life in general right? Run into a problem, analyze, correct, move on (spoken like a true engineer).
February 2019:
November 2022:
Upgrade Drivers:
There are a few different factors motivating the tank upgrade and I’ll try to be as neutral as possible in my examples.
First, off like many people have said, you should always go as large as you can, because eventually you’ll want to upgrade. When the 525 first entered the house, holy cow I thought, this thing is huge. But now its not as intimidating as it once was, plus I have invested a lot of time and money into automation which has simplified its operation immensely.
Second, I was also concerned about the floor taking the weight of anything bigger and I didn’t want to get involved in shoring up floor joists from the basement. Fast forward to today and after a few hours of research, no big deal, but at the time I had enough on my plate doing plumbing for the first time, cooking Pukani rock, figuring out the Apex, etc.
And lastly, I’ve lost confidence in the structural integrity of the Reefer’s stand. I’ve been aware of the silicone seam issues a small percentage of the population has experienced and I by no means have the telltale signs of weakened seams. However, it did cause a few sleepless nights, so I decided to do the paper test. Not only did an 8.5”x11” piece of paper slip between the tank and the stand, but a thicker business card did as well. This prompted me to break out a large framing square and sure enough I have some good deflection going on there in the stand. I’ve read countless thread and Facebook posts on this topic, even found statements directly from Red Sea that the paper test doesn’t automatically result in seam failure, some deflection is acceptable, and no structural fix is needed for the 525 even though the 625 and 725 got one. There are so many things to worry about in this hobby, and I know it could happen to any tank manufacturer’s product, but I want leaks and stand integrity at the very bottom of my worry-list.
Hobby Progression:
Like I mentioned earlier, I’ve been in the reefing hobby for 20 years now. I had to just look it up, but I first joined the other forum in March of 2002. Wow where has the time gone? OK, ready for a good laugh as I look back at the tanks and milestones that got me to where I am now?
March 2002: First Tank
15g hex. HOB aqua clear filter w/ carbon. I was drawn to the hobby by the “blue” look of the water, so for lighting I used a 9” actinic power compact mounted in some enclosure I cobbed together with limited power tools. Notable livestock was a scooter blenny which quickly died due to starvation and a Condylactis anemone because I liked the way it swayed with the water movement. Sorry, no pics of this one. I've searched high and low, but couldn't find a thing.
June 2002: Friends tank breakdown forced an upgrade from the 15 Hex
Standard 29g. This time I did slightly better with filtration, using a maxi-jet for flow and an Aqua-C Remora Pro skimmer. I also upgraded the lighting to 220W of power compact. That’s a ton of light over such a small tank, but it did surprisingly well. Livestock included a pair of mated clowns and a tiny Hippo tang. I can see everyone cringing now, but I will say there were no casualties during my ownership. A move forced the tank breakdown in November of 2003.
June 2004: After a short hiatus due to travel I decided it was time to reef again.
15g tall (what is it with me and 15g tanks?). For flow I used an Aquaclear 500 which was fitted to grow chaeto using a clip on 9w desk light. This is where I started to really get into corals and began using a 150W Current USA metal halide fixture with the dusk to dawn LED’s (Take that watts/gallon). I also began using the Kangaroo 324 peristaltic pump to dose kalkwasser. The first inhabitant I had was a yellow watchman goby that was with me from 2004 until 2013 and a clown fish I got in Feb of 2005 which I still have today.
August 2007: My wife and I moved from Boston to upstate NY, so I setup a new tank prior to the move.
30g Oceanic cube w/matching stand. This was my dream tank at the time. I loved the dimensions and I think a lot of people still do based on the number of nano’s produced today of a similar size. The MH was transferred over to this tank and I used an Aqua-C Remora. This was my first tank using Tunze products. For flow I started off with a 6025 and quickly added a controllable 6055 with the 7095 controller. Around 2016 I scrapped the MH light in favor of my first LED the Hydra 26. Very cool tank it served me well and was moved into our first house in 2010.
February 2017: Moving tanks is stressful, so when we moved a mile down the road to our “forever” house I had a tank waiting.
40g breeder. I’ve always wanted this size tank. Again, very cool dimensions with its front to back depth. On this tank I used 2 Hydra 26’s, a Tunze skimmer, and I had a Gyre 150 for flow. This tank was finally taken down after I moved all its inhabitants to the current 525XL.
What a walk down memory lane. Enough with the past, let’s move on to the present and future with the build out of the IM 200 EXT...........