75g w/ 33g frag tank system

This is going to be an upgrade from my current 30 gallon mixed reef tank. There will be pictures coming, I just finished up the plumbing last night, I didn't want to leave a build thread hanging out here all summer unfinished. I started planning this system around February/March of this year and suffered some setbacks over the summer just being busy, getting sick, injuries...the usual I guess. But I'm now getting really close to getting saltwater in it so I'm finally going to post some stuff here.

Feedback welcome of course!

Display Tank (and general equipment)
75 gallon 48"x18"x21" Marineland corner overflow
Custom stand and canopy
Octopus Extreme 200 skimmer
40 gallon acrylic sump
Tunze Osmolator ATO
2x Vortech MP40w's
Aquacontroller 3 running the show

6 bulb T5 Reefgeek (Aquaillumination) retrofit, not overdriven, a combination of ATI and UVL bulbs

Eheim 1262 return pump T'd to feed both the display and the frag tank.

2x 300 watt heaters

Frag Tank (this will sit right next to the display in the same room)
33 long frag tank, 48"x12"x12"
Custom stand and canopy to match display tank
Assorted Koralias, maybe a maxijet mod, maybe an MP10 some day

Stock List
Fish (all sort of up in the air, just some ideas right now)
purple firefish (not sure this is going to work out)
mccoskers flasher wrasse (male)
2x mccoskers flasher wrasse (female)
melanurus or radiant wrasse (something in halichoeres genus)
kole tang or maybe a tomini haven't decided
Considering a small group of cardinals, longspine or orange striped or something similar if i can find them locally/healthy

Coral
Mixture of LPS/SPS/Zoas some transferred out of my current tank.

 

I'm thinking of aquascaping something similar to this, this was done months ago and will probably look somewhat different when I actually get it in the tank. I'm planning on using epoxy and potential some rods for structure/security.

 

This sounds AWSOME! Cant wait to see this baby up and running! best of luck!

 

Here are some pics of the stands/canopies with the tanks. The position will change from when this pic was taken but they'll both be on that same wall somewhere.
The frag tank canopy looks a little bulky for the size of tank but I wanted to have lots of room over the tank to work in there and also didn't want the lights too far down. I also hate having light spill from a fixture so I had to go with a canopy.






The backs of the canopies has a screen covering for them, it's just off right now while I'm working on them.


Adjustable light rack rails in the display tank canopy. This I'm hoping will allow me to do light level adjustment via height and also if I need to do maintenance on the tank I can either remove the lights entirely or just move them up and out of the way. The trick will be getting everything wired so it's easy to move around.


The sump area is pretty big. Big enough to take the skimmer out without having to remove the sump entirely.

 

And finally, after quite a hiatus over the summer for a variety of reasons I finally got back to plumbing for the last couple weeks. It took quite a long time for me to piece it all together and get it cemented, I had a pretty good plan but being relatively new to plumbing there are a lot of things I learned along the way. Also, even with a couple fans and open windows I don't get great ventilation in my apartment and this was a lot of cementing to do so I had to do it in 1-2 hour batches over the course of several nights after work.

I ended up putting a ball valve on every piece that required a gate valve for ease of isolating a piece of plumbing for maintenance purposes, I'm hoping this means re-tuning the gates isn't necessary, the bonus with the ball valves is they're true unions so I think that should make maintenance easier as well.

I almost ruined a pair of pants with PVC primer due to stray drop flying off unexpectedly, thankfully I had the clear primer and it dried up like nothing ever happened, I HIGHLY recommend clear primer (or wear crappy clothes).

I got it filled with tap water while I finishing up plumbing the last 2 nights and only found 2 issues under the display where I had a threaded connection I didn't tape/putty because it's right over the sump but it's too leaky so I'll fix that up tonight and then let it run for a couple days to make sure everything's working as intended.

If anyone has any thoughts or suggestions let me know, now's the chance to make any changes. I think I made everything modular enough that if something needs changing it shouldn't be too hard (or expensive) with the exception of one or two parts.

Display Tank plumbing
The return plumbing (right side of the picture) is split off to the frag tank leading off to the left. The other plumbing coming from the left is the 2 drains from the frag tank. I didn't take a picture of the 2 drains because they're simply 2 straight pieces from the bottom of the tank except the main drain has a ball and gate valve on it.


Frag Tank plumbing

 

cool. I have toyed with this idea as well as I currently have a 75 that is ready to get worked on and have a 30 gal running that I want to turn into a frag tank, but on the same system like you did.. I will follow this.. good luck

 

Thanks, hopefully it won't be too long, I don't have any major plans this weekend yet so who knows! I ran out of plumbing tape last night trying to fix a leaky threaded connection in the plumbing I didn't realize I could go through a whole roll of that stuff just on this tank.

I've gotta start making water pretty soon, I only have a 50gpd RO membrane right now, I think I'm going to upgrade to at least a 75gpd, maybe 150gpd if the pressure in my plumbing is good.

 

Looks awesome, all of it.

Good looking tanks. I like the same look between the two tanks other than the frag tank being lower and easier to work in.

Rock scape looks awesome. Lots of free swimming room and some good little caves.

Plumbing looks very well organized and efficient.

 

thats really looking good screwtape. nice and clean. plumbing looks good , and your whole layout and planning is very well done. looking forward to seeing the next steps in this build. thnx for sharing.

guy

 

Need more this is cool