My 180g tank build, starting from scratch

Still waiting to pull the trigger on the whole set-up. I spoke to the guy at reef-mania today and he is quoting me $400-$450 for a custom sump, so I may just go that route instead of daisy chaining to smaller sumps together. This will also give me a good spot for a fuge and reactor incase I want to use them later (which I most likely will).

As for the tank and stand, I've seen a couple pop up on craigslist that I hadn't seen before. There's a 210 and a 220, and I could save a ton of money with either of these, so I hope to get a good look at them this week. If they are no good, I should be pulling the trigger this weekend. Thanks again for all the info.

Scash

 

Quick update. Looks like I found the exact tank and stand I was looking to buy brand new, used. Wont be broken down for 2 or 3 weeks, but I am pretty stoked. It's going to save me a ton of money, and it already has the custom canopy that I was going to build anyways. And now with that, I'm just going to retrofit the lighting into the canopy, saving me like $800 on the light fixture as well. So, as long as the tank gets broken down and sold to me I hope to be up and running within a month. I'll update with pics and stuff as I start getting the stuff. Thanks again everyone for all the advice.

Scash

 

So after about a month of researching, planning and scouring craigslist, it looks like I will be taking a LFS owner's 180g tank, stand, canopy, sump, skimmer and box, live rock and dosing pumps. It's a pretty nice deal and he'll be helping me set it all up as well. So that will make things really easy. I'll be getting the 300ish pounds of live rock over on Wednesday, and then we'll bring everything else over a week from today thursday. I'll be buying everything else I need this weekend in preparation for the tank next week. I'll post pics as it all starts coming together!

Scash

 

Ok, so I finally pulled the trigger. This week I will be getting my tank, stand, canopy, sump, skimmer and box, live rock and a bunch of other things from a LFS owner that is breaking down his 180g. I really lucked out that he has the exact set-up I was planning on buying brand new. It'll be nice to save a little scratch on the deal. Here's some pics of the stuff I wasn't getting from him and picked up this weekend.

Here's the RO/DI unit I installed


Here's the AC3 controller I picked up


My T5 retro and my dual vortecs I will be running


Mass salt...


The 100g rubbermaid bin I borrowed from the LFS to get ready for the live rock


And the sand for the bed


Can't wait to get everything over here Thursday, will update with more pics once the move happens!

Scash

 

Awesome!

 

Day one of the move. We got all 300-400 lbs. of live rock over to the house and in the temporary tub. Man this rock looks good. Tons and tons of feather dusters all over, and like a ton of star fish as well. The majority of this rock will be for the sump, but there are some really nice display tank pieces here too.

Here's the big tub full



Some nice coloration on these pieces



More close ups



Here is the canopy. Not looking forward to moving the tank and stand tomorrow



More pics tomorrow after it's all set up!

Scash

 

lookin forward to that scash. nice lookin rock too. best of luck.

 

Ok, so day 2 of the tank move is finally at an end. Although I'm not sure why I'm so tired. Li from Saltwater Empire did all the work. Although getting the 450 lb tank out of Li's basement and then into mine really really sucked. Especially since it was just me and him, and one 90 lb friend of mine. Luckily my brain is always searching the easiest way to do things, and I came up with the "lets slide it down the carpeted stairs" idea. Luckily it worked without incident. Anyways, heres some pictures as it's running the 24 hour freshwater test. Only 1 leak so far due to one pesky grain of sand in a bulk head thread. After fixing that, she seems to be doing just fine. If all goes well, I'll drain it and fill with RO water tomorrow evening.

Here's the thank all set up. She's very sweaty since the water is freezing and it's like 90 degrees here



Here's the dart pump and some plumbing



Here's the sump



Skimmer (Octopus Xtreme 350) and Skimmer box



More plumbing coming through the wall to my fish room



My very nervous jack russel named Lee-loo. She doesn't know what to think yet



More to come this weekend!

Scash

 

So ran into a minor setback today. I was filling a 50 gallon plastic bin with RO water in preperation of getting the tank set up, and turns out that there was a hole in the bottom of it. Ended up putting about 40 gallons of water in the carpet... That sucked. Had to have the carpet guys come over and get it all up. Anyways...

The freshwater test went well, so I have now drained the tank and I'm filling it with RO water as we speak. should be done tomorrow. Then I can finally get the aquascaping done and get ready to add my first fish.

More updates soon!

Scash

 

Finally! I'm happy to report that I have transferred all the rock into the tank and it's up and running without any issues! It's been a long week of forgetting to grab one small thing that stops you from moving forward, but I'm just about done. This weekend I was able to finally able to drain the fresh water and get the tank filled with R/O water. Once that was done, Li from Saltwater Empire and I assembled the light fixture (I mostly watched and handed him whatever he asked for) and started wiring the ballasts. We were stumped to find I only had 11 endcaps, which meant we had to wait until today to finish. Once that was complete got the dosing pumps and the auto top off done as well. Installed fans on the lights and put the pumps in the sump. Lastly, I set up the controller to make life a little easier when it comes to lights, heating, fans, etc.

Once all of that was done, I was finally able to move all of the rock out of that ugly 100 gallon rubbermaid bin, and into the tank. Most of the little rock went into the sump for now. The big pieces I put in the display tank and I'll aquascape when I get back from vacation (leaving for 9 days on Friday). So this all got done just in time. Since all the rock came from an existing tank, I'm hoping it'll be ready for my first fish/coral when I'm back. Here's some pics of what it looks like. Keep in mind, I haven't aquascaped yet. Although I've always been kind of a fan of just random piles of rock.

Here's a full frame tank shot:



Without the flash



Some awesome yellow sponge growth on a big piece of rock



I'm not sure what this is, but it looks awesome with just the actinics on



Lots of rock in the sump, still figuring out what Im going to do with it all



Here's the full shot of the tank, stand and canopy



And here's the pic of the sweet light rack Li built, ready with fans and rollers to move the lights to either side. This thing rocks



Welp, it's been a long week but it's finally done. Cant wait to see this tank mature a bit. Will keep pics updated often.

Scash