Downsized to a BC29 - Cranks Mods and Build Log

Mine is solid so far. Did you use inline one-way valves on the end of your hoses? I do per Steve Wright's suggestion. Holds it tight and doses exactly. Sorry to derail your thread though. I'll go PM with more questions if I have them.

 

No, I didn't. That seems like the best solution for the problem, though. Easy, cheap, effective and actually, kinda obvious. I wonder why I didn't think of that haha

I did try and find the replacement rubber hose for the heads at one point. I couldn't find just the hose part, though. Retailers were selling just the head assembly as a whole. Anyway, now that I know the 1/4" ID one way valves exist, I'll definitely pick a couple up for the Drew's dosers. Do they inhibit the way one flow at all?

 

Hi, Crank. Sorry to hear of your tank problems. I'm sure that must be quite frustrating for you. Hopefully the new tank works out better.

Nice DIY build with the LEDs. Looks great. I love the color combo too!

What jugs are you using for your dosing and where did you buy them?I'm looking for something similar for my ATO reservoir.

 

Hi Seano. Thanks - I'm really happy with how the LED's turned out. I like being able to adjust the color of the tank on the fly through my phone or computer rather than having to buy new T5 bulbs. :2thumbsup

Also, in a way I'm kind of glad I started over with a smaller more manageable tank. All my costs should go way down, less equipment to maintain and keep clean, less overall noise, less light bleed into the room and out the windows and to be honest, I came to a point where I would loathe looking at or thinking about my 55. Overall I'm really glad my girlfriend convinced to downgrade/start over instead of just giving up. It's renewed my interest in the hobby and I hope to start up my software development again for the RA.

Anyway, yeah, the jugs are called "space saver jugs". I got them from BulkReefSupply here: Thin 4 liter (1.05 gallon) Space Saving Ju - English . They're a little tall but super thin - something like 2".

 

Thanks. Those will work great for my DIY ATO in the college dorm. I'm going to try to hide it in a medicine cabinet, so space was limited.

 

Hood Fan!

Decided to start looking at how I was going to mount the fans to the hood. The door on the back of the hood was out of the question. It was much to small to fit them. The center of the hood has the lights/splashguard. That left me one option - the front feeding door. After eyeballing them initially, I didn't think I could fit both of the fans on the door. They might have fit but I don't think I would have been able to open the feeding door all the way so it stayed open on it's own. The way the hinge is setup I had to push the fans far to the front. It looked to be a really tight fit and the curvature of the front glass had me thinking I couldn't squeeze both of them in there initially. I decided to play it safe and go with just one fan. It might have worked but I didn't want risk tearing up the hood to find out. Oh well, now I have spare incase the salt water tears the one I mounted up.

Steps:

Cut the front lip of the feeding door:


Figure out how far you can possibly push the fan forward without hitting. Here you can see I drilled 2 sets of holes. I realized I could squeeze more room out up front allowing me to open the door further before hitting the filter guard. Once you have the location set drill out the shape of the fan. It doesn't need to be perfect - just close. Lightly sand the rough edges.

pro-tip. Hold the fan on the underside of the hood as close to the lip as possible. Use your drill to make the holes from the inside out. I didn't do that the first time and the holes were slightly off because of the convex shape of the hood. I was close enough the first time though that the holes are covered up by the filter guard. Crisis averted.



Mount the screws through the filter holder first, then the hood, finally the fan. Here's how I routed the wires. Most of the connections/voltage adjuster are made in dry safety of the splash guard. I drilled small holes for my zipties and ground down small divots for the wire to easily enter under the splash guard. I used the original hole in the back of the hood where the stock cord went through and I ended up taking out because I didn't need. The connector just barely fits out of it. Again, I'm able to quickly diconnect the hood fan from behind the hood for when I need to take it off for maintenance. Glorious.



All finished up:















With a bit of pre-planning this mod is extremely easy to do. Like with most DIY, a drill and dremel go a long way. The fan is extremely quiet. I set the adjustment knob to ~80%. It might be the quietest piece of equipment on my tank. Even more so than my heater.

More to come..

 

Started testing out the hood fan. It dropped the tank temp a degree in an hour. I forgot to turn off the heater though so for most of the time the fan was fighting with the heater. I think it could do 2 degrees in an hour. I'll test a little more in the coming days.

 

Very nice DIY work.

 

They do not seem to inhibit flow however they do require cleaning once and while there is some build up.

I just used the ones made for started airline for air pumps.

 

that thing looks great.