350 gal Build

Well Im finally in a position to build my dream tank. I got a great deal on a used 240 gal Tenecor Concave setup.

What it came with:

5 foot Downdraft Skimmer
6 ft 3 x 175 watt Metal Halide Fixture
Chiller
Sander Ozonizer (need to figure out how to use this)
about 200 lbs of LR (in bad shape, presently cooking it)
Formica Stand (not sure if im going to use this or make it an in-wall tank)
about 7 gallons of sand (this stuff was nasty, 10 yrs old so I dunno if its useable)
4 Little Giant Inline pumps (cant seem to get any of them working)
10-12 pumps and powerheads, Rio 2500s, 402 powerheads

Pre-existing equiptment Ill use with the system:

75 gallon tank (my present reef, probably using this as sump)
2 55 gallon tanks (one presently my sump, the other is a remote 'fuge)
1 2week old Coralife 790-P High Pressure Pump (using it with the downdraft)
1 Red Sea triple pass XL skimmer w Turbo needle wheel pump
1 Koralia, 1 Tunze, few other powerheads
1 brand new Mag 7
1 Mag 5
1 Rio Hyper pump
125 lbs of live rock
60 lbs of Carib Sea/Fiji Miracle Mud
50 obs live sand

Equiptment on the way:

Geo 618 Calcium Reactor complete set up


What Id like to do is have both 55 gallon tanks flanking the sides on the display tank as remote overflow refugiums. The one im using now is actually split down the middle by a baffle. Origionally this was my attempt at a natural water treatment facility which halfway worked.. The first section is actually a rock fuge with species of Xenia (exploring thier contribution to nitrate reduction) and 3 large Worm rocks (xmas tree worms in Porites encrusted rock. Along with some feather dusters I was hoping it would help breakdown detritus and food from the MT but again I overestimated how much dusters contribute to water quality. In the end this first half just became a pretty cool species display. Heres a couple pics..




Zoom out shot


The macro section actually worked out great though. The baffle forces the water up through the cheato and all the organisms within it and pretty much strips the water of its nutrients and uneaten phytoplankton, rotifers and oyster eggs that I have to feed my worm rock. It wasnt long til the entire cheato area was packed and had to be harvested with no where left to grow but busting through the eggcrate divider.


So Id like to use this same fuge on the left side of the 240, but put the worm rock in the DT. If I do this Ill either have to get rid of my butterfly fish and possibly others or put a divider in the DT to keep the dusters free from predation. Id like to use the other 55 (currently my sump) on the right side of the DT. This will be a planted tank that will house my red Grape trees, Caulerpa's, Shaving Brushes and other macros.

Oh geez its late and I have work tomorrow. Will continue tomorrow. Im hoping this will be a great place to chart the progress of this project. Any comments and/or advice absolutely welcome

 

WOW! i LOVE your tank! amazing aquascape, looks beautiful already. This is going to be an exciting thread. What livestock are you planning on getting?

 

Thanks Pufferchick. Im pretty much kookoo for the those dusters, really really interesting and beautiful species 'es , i plan to put a few more in there and a couple other feather duster species.

So i was able to do a lil thinking today while performing the more mundane dutys of work. Scratch the two 55s flanking the tank. Good idea in theory maybe but the tank really would look better in another place where the flanking cant happen. See with the tank came a custom formica stand/canopy/enclosure that has some viewing panels for the sides. Having the system in that spot and having the 55s like that doesnt allow viewing from the sides. So its gonna be in a place along the wall that encloses my staircase. This way the filtration can be plumbed right next to it under the stairs and youd have plain view sight to the sides. Also this stair enclosure in the basement is exactly 7.5' long, which is what the tank is. It allows me to make a bookshelf type stand for the wall behind the stairs for the two refugiums.

So tanks will wrap around stair enclosure with the two fuges one on top of other. One overflowing back to tank, the other overflowing back to sump. I realize this lack of space between the two tanks will be a problem so the only way to make this work is to make a custom cabinet consisting of two parts. One tall and fixed frame for the top tank and for the bottom tank I will attempt to make a frame that slides inside tall frame on heavy duty rolling casters. Saltwater weighing around 8lbs per gallon x 55 = close to 500lbs. It doesnt seem impossible but if it were, I could maintain and access bottom tank after opening skirt and slowly rolling 55 out to get worked on. Its kind of a radical idea all of this but I think it'll work out very nice and my basement, now finished off will have a final touch of this aquarium system.

It took me a long time as a dedicated saltwater aquarium enthusiast to gather all this stuff and now its quite exciting to finally have the opportunity to do it. Will take alot of work though, luckily only minor purchases remain. As far as what Id like to put in it? A nice active community of fish, Tangs, Butterflys, Wrasses, my Mandarin most of which I have already crowded into my 75. Softies, a few sps and lps species, most of the corals will just be added slowly over time. The fuges ill have some fun with though. In the bottom tank ill move that whole duster scene over to the the unseparated 55 and the right half ill blend into a planted realm so Jim my seahorse can roam around picking off the pods. The tank above it that overflows into the MT will be the "cheato scrubber" in the right and the left im not sure what im doin now that the worm rocks outta there. Ill think of somethin. Being a true fuge and having no predation pop populations can grow and feed the DT.

Will try to get some pics up on da next update

 

is that yellow thing a christmas tree worm? if so how long have u had it? i heard they are hard to keep.
but so far lookin good !

 

Yep, all those colorful tree looking things are xmas tree worms. They are considered difficult to keep but if you have an environment that can keep itself stablized during the feedings they arnt hard at all.

 

great looking set ups Happy Gilmore

Steve