NXE's Red Sea Reefer-S 1000 G2

[NXE]

More supplies arrived today!

Acrylic tube for my DIY kalk stirrer:

PVC foam board for mounting power supplies and a polycarbonate lid for the extension sump that I will be using as an ATO reservoir:

 

[NXE]

Equipment Selection
While I continue to gather supplies for the next stages of the build, I thought I would take a moment to set out my equipment selection for this tank. Some of the equipment will come from my existing tank where I have been happy with its performance, but other items will not be making the transition.

Return pumps: 2 x EcoTech Vectra M1 – I already have one Vectra M1 on my Peninsula 500 which has performed very reliabily and quietly. To take advantage of the dual returns on the S 1000 and handle the increased flow needed for the larger water volume, I have picked up a second M1 pump on eBay. The total cost for both pumps was under £300, which is less than the cost of a single new Vectra M2 (let alone an L2!).

Flow pumps: 2 x IceCap 4K gyres, 2 x Maxspect XF350CE gyres, Hyrdos WaveEngine – I already have the two 4K gyres and have been happy with the amount of flow they produce and with the Hydros app that controls them. My plan is to import a Hydros WaveEngine to control all the gyres together. The Icecap gyres will go on the back wall, mounted horizontally either side of the overflow and I plan to pick up two of the newer Maxspect gyres with flow directors so that I can place them as close as possible to the waterline on either end of the tank to minimise their visibility.

Mechanical filtration: Red Sea Reefmat 1200 – my current tank has a Clarisea SK-5000 which has performed fine in terms of filtering the water, but has several annoyances. Changing the filter rolls is a complete pain (I have never been able to get the dirty fleece off the roller as the instruction suggest, so have to cut it off or manually unwind it) and there are no notifications if the fleece is about to run out. I have only heard good things about the Reefmat, so I'm looking forward to the upgrade.

Protein skimmer: Reef Octopus 150-INT – this is my current skimmer and I plan on keeping it to begin with until my bioload increases to the point where it can't handle the load and I need a larger one.

Lighting: 4 x Red Sea ReefLED 90 – again, to begin with I am going to use my existing equipment. I have three ReefLED 90s on my current tank and picked up another one on eBay fairly cheaply. Once the corals start to grow out or if it seems like the lighting is insufficient, I will either replace or supplement them.

Controller: Robo-Tank running reef-pi – I am a big fan of reef-pi and the Robo-Tank contoller made by @robsworld78. I am going to keep my existing controller board (the early revision A model) and have ordered an expansion board and additional pH probe interface. This will handle temperate monitoring, ATO, pH monitoring, doser control and many other things.

Dosing: DIY kalkstirrer and DIY doser – I built a 4-head doser based off a Jebao DP-4S for my last tank (shown here: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/nxes-red-sea-reefer-peninsula-500.847535/post-11209797), which I will reuse. For this build, I also want to dose kalkwasser and am planning to make my own stirrer using some acrylic tube and a Reef Octopus automatic skimmer neck cleaner that I have.

Heating: 2 x Aquamedic 500W heaters, Inkbird ITC-1000 controller – I wanted to go with titanium heaters, having used glass Eheims for my last build. The Eheims were fine, but very long and titanium heaters are considerably shorter. They will be controlled by an Inkbird ITC-1000.

Water clarity: Red Sea Aquazone 200 Plus – I run a UV sterillizer on my current tank, but looking at the price and size of a suitable UV for the S 1000 I decided against it. I ran UV for water clarity rather than disease control, so started looking at ozone as an alternative. I found an old Aquazone ozone generator/controller on eBay which I plan to feed into my skimmer.

Nutrient control: DIY algae scrubber – I tried chaeto a few times in my last tank and could never get it to take off, so gave up and used carbon dosing to control nitrates and GFO for phosphates. I don't enjoy the mess that GFO makes of my sump (even running the outlet through a filter sock) or having to change it every month, so for this build I am going to try making an algae scrubber.

Power: Meanwell LRS power supplies, APC switched PDU – One of my goals for this build is to eliminate all power bricks and replace them with a small number of high-quality Meanwell power supplies. All DC power will be supplied by 12, 24 and 36V Meanwell power supplies. AC power will be controlled using an APC data centre PDU that can be controlled over the network.

If you've managed to make it this far, let me know what you think of my choices and if you have other suggestions!

 

[NXE]

Power Distribution

I got some time to work on the tank this weekend and tackled the most foundational element of any reef tank: electrical power.

The plan
For this tank, I really wanted to avoid the usual jumble of power bricks of sometimes dubious quality and instead use a small number of higher wattage Meanwell power supplies to power all DC devices. When planning this build, I categorised all my equipment by their required voltage and power consumption:
36V – Ecotech M1 return pumps.
24V – Lights, wavemakers, manifold pump.
12V – ReefMat, Robo-Tank controller, ATO and dosing pumps, cabinet lighting.

Most equipment on the market uses these voltages (e.g. most large DC return pumps are 36V and most LED lighting is 24V), so the same power supplies can be used even if I change my equipment in the future.

I went with Meanwell LRS power supplies as they are inexpensive, come in all of the required voltages and are readily available. I ordered one 350W 36V psu, two 350W 24V psus and one 100W 12V psu. The 36V and 12V supplies should be all I ever need, but when I upgrade to more powerful lighting I will add one or two more 24V PSUs.

Everything will be mounted on a piece of PVC foam board that will be bolted to the back wall of the cabinet, since the back wall itself is too thin and flimsy to mount anything on. This also means that all the wiring could be done outside of the cabinet, which made the task much easier.

While this route necessitates more work than simply using the manufactuer-supplied power bricks, it should lead to a much cleaner and hopefully more reliable setup. Many of the power bricks supplied by manufacturers are of unknown quality or are pushed to their rated limits (the power bricks for my ReefLED 90s run very hot, which seems to be a common issue). It will also make swapping equipment easier, as the new equipment can simply be plugged straight in to the existing supplies.

 

[NXE]

Import Disclaimer: I am not an electrician or electrical engineer and nothing I say should be taken as advice, instructions or guidance. Working with electricity is dangerous and potentially fatal and should only be attempted by those with suitable qualifications and experience. I do not assume any responsibility for the information in this or any other post.

DC Power
The starting point was to install a strip of DIN rail, on which I mounted an AC breaker (left), distribution blocks (centre) and AC step-down transformer (right):

The distribution blocks are great. They are made by a company called Phoenix Contact and are push-fit, so made hooking everything up very smooth. I crimped ferrules onto the ends of all wires for a secure connection:

I got the PSUs mounted using some brackets that I designed and 3D printed. The 36V PSU was delayed in shipping, so will have to be added later. I also left space to add up to two more 24V PSUs in the future.

With everything hooked up and labelled:

To ensure a secure connection, I crimped ring terminals onto the ends of the wires running to the PSUs.

And finally installed into the cabinet:

 

[NXE]

AC Power
All of the AC powered equipment in the tank (skimmer pump, heaters, kalk stirrer, turf scrubber lights) is going to be run from an APC switched PDU:

These are designed for computer datacentres and are very expensive when new, but I found a used one on eBay for about £60. The PDU can be controlled via serial port or over the network and can switch each outlet individually. It also supports schedules for devices that only need to run at certain times (e.g. the kalk stirrer and turf scrubber). It has a high output rating and is designed to run computer servers, so should be able to handle the load of my 2 x 500W heaters.

I mounted the PDU on the slide out control panel that came with the Reefer-S:

 

[NXE]

Cabinet Lighting
Now that we have power, I can turn on the cabinet lighting that I also installed.

I bought a pack of four of these 12V strip lights from Amazon:

And two PIR sensors that will turn the lights on when I open the cabinet doors:

I installed the lights using the supplied double-sided tape, which seems fairly strong so hopefully will not fall down in future:

The fixtures give off plenty of light and will make working in the cabinet much easier for the next steps of the build.

That was all I had time for this weekend. Next steps will be working on the ATO container and hard plumbing the return pumps, as well as more cabling!

 

[zirky]

WOW that looks sophisticated. I can’t wait to see your kalk stirrer are you going with a dc motor. I’m starting to fab one myself and would love to know. How your powering yours.

 

[NXE]

WOW that looks sophisticated. I can’t wait to see your kalk stirrer are you going with a dc motor. I’m starting to fab one myself and would love to know. How your powering yours.

Thanks @zirky ! I am actually planning to adapt a Reef Octopus automatic skimmer neck cleaner that I have decided to take off my skimmer (too difficult to clean). The neck cleaner motor looks to be the same or very similar to the one used on the Reef Octopus kalk stirrer – I just need to extend the shaft and 3D print a stirrer attachment. The neck cleaner looks like this:

I bought some acrylic tube that is the same diameter as the skimmer cup, so the neck cleaner should just slot on top. It uses a 24V AC motor, but were I to be starting from scratch I would use a geared high torque DC motor.

 

[NXE]

ATO Reservoir

I didn’t have much time to work on the tank this weekend, but did make progress on the ATO reservoir.

I am using the extension sump that comes with the Reefer-S as my ATO reservoir as I won’t be running a fuge and will have a separate frag tank. It will hold around 90 litres, which should be plenty.

To make a lid for the reservoir, I ordered some polycarbonate sheet and 3d printed some corner brackets to hold it:

The lid fits securely (still has the protective wrapping on):

I drilled holes in the lid to fit some 1/4” push-fit bulkheads for inlets and outlets, as well as for my float switch:

This 400mm vertical two-way float switch that I previously used on my Peninsula 500 build fits perfectly in the extension sump:

The float switches will be controlled by reef-pi and will be used to notify me when the reservoir runs low and to stop it overflowing when filling.