Sail195 36g Bow front Build

Ok so I got my 36g bow front up and running finally!!! Woot woot. So for starters here is the equipment list:

36g bow front and stand
Aquac Remora skimmer with mj1200
2 koralia evolution 750 power heads
Aquatic life T5 HO 4bulb unit with 4 lunar leds
Fluval 200w heater
19lbs of live rock
20-25lbs of base rock
40lbs of arga-alive
Walmart Ro water
Instant ocean salt mix

Not hooked up yet:

Reef angel
1/10 chiller

Thursday night i masked the tank off and but about 10 coats of black krylon fusion paint on the back of the tank and gave it a few days to cure.

Saturday I took the tank outside and water tested it and everything looks good.

So Sunday morning I filled a tub with the walmart water and dropped the heater in and then headed off to the lfs and got the salt mix, live rock, live sand. Got home and mixed the water all up. Than put the live sand down and then did the aqua scape, I am going to head back to the lfs to find one or 2 more pieces of rock to make one more arch. All and all I think it came out well…. The project for the weekend is to get the reef angel up and programmed and get the wires in the cabinet cleaned up. I also still need to order the rest of the pluming for the chiller if home depot does not have it


yup i defiantly used Christmas wrapping paper for this project


All set ready to be filled


water much?


water mixing


sand!


Rock


Aqua scape


Filling


Full


Full after about an hour!


Next day

 

Looks great, nice job.

Brian

 

Looks like your off to a good start! Will be following along.

 

thanks everyone!! also going to be building an auto top off within the next week or two also!! I did a lot of reading before i did this as its my first tank but still have a lot to learn

 

thats a great start Sail195

nice job on the aquascaping IMO
cleared very nicely in the 24 hours

Steve

 

You def. did your homework! Looks really nice. What are your plans on inhabitants(after it cycles of course)?

 

thanks everyone! First in the tank will be some cuc, i have a friend who got some turbo snails for his biocube and there bulldozing his coral so i am gonna take a few of those get some hermit crabs don't know what kind yet... I also want to get a shrimp.... The show piece of the tank is i want to get a pair of gold banded maroon clowns and eventually after 5 or 6 months a maxim clam or 2.... also i want to do some corals i really like the look of the neon green variety and some bright reds...


I am still very open to suggestions as that's just from my research what has appealed to me!

I also am hoping Sunday (if not too hung over from jimmy buffet on Saturday) to get about a 8 to 10 in piece of flat live rock and and build one more arch on the left side when your looking at it from the back corner to the middle. Also i need to solder in some extensions and hopefully the reef angel will me up and running, I have it getho rigged right now and its working awesome!! And lastly i am going to move the heater into the return of the skimmer as it will be one less thing in the tank

 

Also quick question, this wont be as much of an issue once the auto top off is running but I got from this am form a working 36 straight knowing i would need to ad some water, I checked the salinity first and it was high about 1.028-1.029 I added about a gallon of ro water and the tanks is back to here it was on sun when I filled it but the salinity is still reading 1.025 which i know is ok but is still on the high side right? any thoughts


fyi i am ruining open top at the moment because i am an idiot and accidentally steeped back onto the top on Sunday when I was adjusting power head

 

Tank looks great! Salinity at 1.025 and open top sounds good to me,it's actually preferred by many including me.Your'e off to a good start equipmentwise but I would deffinitely look into buying an ro/di so you can stop lugging home the walmart water.To alot of people starting up a tank it seems like an unnecessary cost,but it will pay for itself in not much time and you'll love the convenience.BTW,is 195 your sail number?

 

Haha no I actually live off of rt 195 lol... but i have been sailing since i was 9!