Triplemom's and Jwin's 90 Gallon Upgrade

sure and steady steps!

 

Grats on the upgrade. I will be following this...

 

More progress to report! We went off to the good ole hardware store and bought the plumbing parts, some nick nacks, and some vinyl tubing.

We have decided on using vinyl tubing for our return line, because of it's flexibility, ease of removal, and noise reduction. The distance between our pump and the tank is minimal, so we thought vinyl tubing was best.

I've started playing around with PVC bits but unfortunately cannot fully cut and dry fit everything until we have the sump under the tank.

HOWEVER, I did manage to cut all of the acrylic baffles for the sump today myself I'm very proud of the outcome, I had never worked with acrylic before. But we were tired of waiting to hear from glasscages.com and local cutting shops, and home depot had the 1/4 inch acrylic and a 200 tooth table saw blade just asking to be bought.

So I took the chance with the blade and managed to do a pretty darn good job on this acrylic. Because we are using silicone to put the baffles in, I knew the cuts didn't have to be perfect, they just had to be good enough. Unless you are just an awesome person, I highly recommend getting acrylic cut by a professional for you for anything other than just sump baffles.

So far the upper baffle of the bubble trap as well as the refugium wall are glued in, but there is a book holding the bubble trap baffle 1" above the tank bottom, and I'm afraid to take it out to glue the other baffles in until the silicone sets. So the rest of the sump will have to wait until tomorrow.

Hopefully I can have the plumbing glued up and the return ready on Monday, and sometime this next week we should see a full fresh water leak test

 

Unfortunately the 46 is a tad dirty from being left to it's own devices over Thanksgiving. Oh well. It will have a new home soon!


Here's a dry fit of the sump baffles. Plus our first fuge inhabitant.

 

One last update, I trusted the middle bubble trap baffle enough to take the book out from under it, and now the other two baffles have been siliconed in Definitely not pretty, as there are silicone smudges everywhere, but this thing is going under the tank and out of sight so I don't mind. All baffles are curing now and we should have a sump water test monday, and if that goes over well I should have all of the plumbing glued up monday as well!

 

Very awesome! These sorts of updates have to be getting you folks more excited!

 

Sweet job on the sump. That was my 1st DIY in this hobby, was pretty proud of my self! You should be too...

 

Apparently I suck at working with silicone It sure made a mess of things. However, once it cures, hopefully everything is waterproof and good to go It really was a sticky, smelly mess though. Not my favorite part of the build, that's for sure.

 

K9 approved I see!! My dog is the same way. Bravo on your part for even attempting baffles and all that..

 

Awww, Mr. Snow Head looks happy in there! Maybe he should stay ;D

Maya is very nosy, as you can see! =Jwin= has done a fantastic job on the sump so far. We're hoping to do a freshwater trial run in a few days!