The JMAL Family 75G Build Adventure

11/17/2010
I figured I would start a new thread to document this new project we've taken on. Since we started the 46Bow 6-7months ago, it's become a huge addiction for me. It has also been a crazy adventure and a ton of learning too. We learned the wrong and right things to do with the tank, who not to go to as in an lfs,(roughly $600 later with that shady lfs), and intern who to go to for help. Now that we have a decent handle on the first tank and recently coming into a good deal on a 75, we decided to take the plunge and go bigger.

Tomorrow, 11/18/2010, we should have our new tank which is a 75g, deepblue, rimless and a marineland monterey stand in expresso. This will actually be our replacement tank because the first came in looking super poor but our lfs took care of us and got them to send us a replacement right away.

We are now making ourselves crazy looking for the "right" fixture and so far just end up frustrated at the end of the night with there being so many options. The misses really wants a fixture with moon lights and so do I but I'm willing to purchase moon lights separately where she wants it all in one.

We do want the best we can get but then run into the issue of heavy cost with some of these super expensive fixtures. We've got some really good info from a few of you reefers but still are not sure what to do. We don't want to run into the issue of not having enough light but don't want to cook our coral either. I've read a ton on others experiences and unfortunately it's been a little bit of mixed experiences for others with 75's. I am hoping by today to have chosen one and have it ordered so we can possibly have it by the weekend.

We are going to eventually build a larger sump but we are hoping that our current 20 high sump will work fine and not overflow. My plans are to build a 30 or 40g sump with a larger fuge area and a section next to it to grow pods. I'd like to put sand in the fuge this time and plant the mangroves so they aren't just held up by the loose rocks in the fuge. I am also debating on possibly doing a small turf area since it sounds interesting to have one and I'm tossing up a few ideas on how to get less detritus and keeping random particles out of the fuge which always seems to get caught up in the chaeto.

This time around we are not going to mess with tap water and I've asked a friend to help me with ro/di water and I would help him buy some membranes at least until we get our own ro/di. We will be using some of our current water so that hopefully it won't be a huge shock on our fish when we do get them transferred over. We are also switching from the black sand to white because the misses would like that better and as my brother would say, "happy wife, happy life." I do plan on recycling the black sand and using some for the new sump and then the rest will probably go into my future frag tank.

Now all we have left is to get the lights, some rock, sand, ro/di water and then we'll be doing the transfer. We are super excited and once we get the stuff in, I'll start working on pictures and updating on the project.

Thanks again for all the advice! We appreciate it all!

 

I can tell you from experience that if you get a top of the line T5HO with top of the line bulbs that you will fry your corals with a 6 bulb unit especially softies, LPS and encrusting/plating SPS unless they are placed low. The softies and LPS will need some shade. A current USA Nove Extreme Pro will be OK with 6 bulbs. If you go TEK or ATI then you will want a 4 bulb unit.

 

So we ended up with the Icecap 6x54 t5 with tube moonlights. For bulbs we got all ati - 2blue+, 2aqua blue, 1 purple+, 1 true actinic. Hoping that set up will work well with growth and give us a sweet blue glow

 

Nice choice in bulbs. Off to a great start in my opinion.

 

Thanks reefbruh. We are excited.

Anyone have experience with this fixture?

 

If you only knew half of it. Maybe the 3rd tank will be right, huh.

 

Lmao! Yea, I haven't had the chance to update on that yet. Long story short, the last 2 rimless tanks we ordered were both messed up. This is our third, 3 weeks later, and we should have that sometime this upcoming week. Fingers crossed that this one will be perfect.

 

I got a 4 bulb tekII retrofit with reflectors, fried the shiz out of my softies. my cabbage coral, open brain, frogspawn, acans, all bleached. I had to raise the lighting fixture 5 inches. IMO, 4 bulb is sufficient if you stick with the good brand kits.

 

How high was it from your tank and where is it now? Is it better now?

 

I have a 4 bulb T-5 TEK over my 29 gallon and I haven't had anything bleach with the lights being 2 inches from the top of my tank. I guess everyone has different experiences.

Maybe I got lucky.

Who was the shady LFS?