Two tank upgrade-170 ext and 6 ft frag tank

[bradreef]

I wanted to start a thread with my latest projects.

Display upgrade
I recently upgraded my 75 gallon tank to an innovative marine 170 ext. The 60 x 30 footprint fit my location perfectly. I ordered the tank in August expecting to get it 4-6 months. After around a week I received an email stating a tank was available in California and would ship within a couple of days. I had to start planning and preparing much faster than anticipated.

Frag system upgrade
My wife had been wanting to get a "nicer" frag tank as she is planning on working at a desk near the setup. I knew the 170 was coming and a frag tank came up for sale on a local Facebook group for $400. 6x2x12" custom acrylic tank with an aluminum stand. My friend had purchased one that originated from the same person for $600 more just a few months prior. After some thought, we reached out to the seller and arranged to pick it up.

 

[bradreef]

Here is the tank delivered. I had scheduled a time from 1 to 4 pm because I was at a business lunch at 11:45. At 11:50 I get an alert that someone was at my front door. Luckily my wife ran home and they were able to load into the garage.

 

[bradreef]

The current 75 gallon was in the spot where the 170 was going to go. I came up with a plan to take most everything out and place it

on sliders to move it to an adjacent location. I didn't want to take all of the water out and minimize disturbing the sanded.

 

[bradreef]

I expected the tank to struggle but for roughly 3-4 weeks the corals did really well. I did lose 1 frag in the move, but, that is expected.

This is the previous location and the new support plan I had. After speaking to an engineer and being extra cautious, I ended up adding blocking between the 2x10 joists and adding a support jack. It's in a guest room underneath that probably gets less than 10 days of use per year.

 

[bradreef]

Frag system
While the 75 was settling I picked up the new frag tank. I wanted to make it look as good as possible as it would be in an open area in my basement with filtration through a wall in a closet.
As you can see it was a bit hazy. A couple hours of 3 novus stages and it turned out great.
Before

After

 

[bradreef]

The plan for this tank was to use 2 gyres from my 75 and the two g4 xr 30s on both sides. I had a 24 inch aquatic life t5 fixture so I wanted to put that in the center for medium light coral. I'm using the gyres 330 gyres at up to 60% which gets to the middle, but not to crazy. That way I have higher flow at each end and higher light.

 

[bradreef]

Display

So I needed to run a larger sump because my 75 was running a 20 gallon diy sump. I got an old eshopps Ar-300 but I had to make some changes. I hated the small return area and I had to plug a hole for the previous external return.
Here is my plan on flow. I blocked the small refugium hole and cut a slit to turn that into a return section. Now I'm running two jebao return pumps which gives me some safety.

 

[bradreef]

This has worked out great. I used a small piece of acrylic. Weldon 3 , and then Weldon 16 over the edges of the patch. I tested it to hold water and it flowed through the sump perfectly

 

[bradreef]

Now it was time to prep and get the stand built. The process of building an IM stand wasn't bad. It took less than an hour and looks great. I like that the sides open as well.

 

[bradreef]

Meanwhile, the 75 was just humming along and doing great

 

[bradreef]

Here is the general look of how the plumbing is under the 170.

Equipment list for the 170
Lighting
3 A8se, I decided to try these out on here
Flow
1-mp 40
1-dmp-40
2-slw 20
Skimmer
Siimplicitly 240 (had this around)
Return pumps
2 jebao 3000
Dosing
I am using an old aqua medic 4
Cal, alk, phos, nitrate(I don't really dose nitrate much as I daily add ammonia)


Current levels
Cal 380
Alk 8
Phos.02
Trate 3

The nutrients are a bit low due to the giant water change of increasing the size. I typically run nitrates in that system 15-20 and phos I like around .1.

 

[bradreef]

Display lighting
I ordered an A8se a little while back and liked it. I decided to run these on this tank. I'm running them sideways and the levels are roughly
White 20%
Red 15%
Green 15%
3 blue 80%
Here are some par measurements I took yesterday.

So far I'm happy with the look and we will see if they grow coral. The par numbers are plenty for my taste.

 

[bradreef]

Back to the frag tank
I haven't been collecting or adding frags for a bit since I knew I would be swapping the tank. Here is the messy tank with the g4 s on the sides

 

[bradreef]

The center light has 2 popular grow bars in the middle. I had to raise this up because I wanted Par to stay in the 150-250 range for lps.

 

[bradreef]

Because the tank is 30 inches wide, I wanted a 2nd wavemakers to mirror the mp40. Here is a video I did on the jebao DMP -40

Jebao/Jecod DMP-40 review video

I received this wavemakers almost a week ago and have been very impressed with it so far. Here is a video of the unboxing and the pump in my tank. Let me know if you have any questions.

www.reef2reef.com

 

[bradreef]

This the par meter I used to measure par on both tanks. It's nice to be able to confirm the numbers and take that doubt away.

 

[bradreef]

In the closet behind the frag tank I also grow phyto and pods. Just 2 types of phyto right now, but the 3 common pod types.

 

[bradreef]

Took some more par measurements in the frag tank before the par meter goes back to a friend. Seems just where I want things with a good variety of levels

 

[bradreef]

This morning I stopped by a material recycling business. They have no clear acrylic sheets for cheap normally. I bought 1/4 and 3/8 2' by 4' sheets for around $10 each. I used the 1/4 to make a list for my 20 gallon ato reservoir. I typically add a little bit of kalk into this to add to the ph and levels. It's orange, but it will work. Just a small notch for the cord/tube and it fits nicely.

 

[bradreef]

Stocking the 170.
Currently I have
Clown
Damsel
Baby purple
Bristletooth tang
One spot fix face
Mandarin dragonet
Silver belly wrasse
Purple firefish

Fish I want to add
Leopard wrasse
mysteri wrasse
Sand sifting goby
Flasher wrasse

Maybe
regal angel
Last fish- powder blue tang ( I go back and forth on this)