My Red Sea Reefer 250 Build

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jjh302

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Aug 8, 2013
Messages
347
Well I have been out of the hobby for a little over a year and decided it was time to jump back in.

Yesterday I gave my reef saver dry rock an acid bath and blew them dry with an industrial back pack blower and let them sit out on the porch all night and day today.

I've purchased a Red Sea Reefer 250 which was delivered today.

Here are the rest of the goodies I have for the tank;

2 - Radion xr15 Gen 4 Pro
1 - Vortech Mp40
1 - Apex controller (wow they are expensive)
1 - wxm module for Apex
1 - Apex probe holder
1 - Reef Octopus classic 110 skimmer
1 - Ehiem 3000 return pump
1 - 300w titanium heater
1 - Tunze ATO
Real Sea Blue Salt

I'm planning on ditching the included ATO and have a custom acrylic ATO tank built to fit inside stand. I'm going to try to use the included ATO tank as a refugium for harvesting pods.

My goal for this tank is to house a mandarin self-sufficiently along with a awesome sps garden.

Thoughts and suggestions so far?
 
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Things look solid, but why the need for the apex with all of the ecotech equipment?



Honestly, I bought the Apex before I was set on which lighting I was going to use. I like the idea of the apex because of the probes and the controllability of all of my equipment. If I went with the reeflink, that would only let me control just my lights and my mp40.

I like the thought of being able to set all of my pumps and powerhead to feed mode and such.

Would you suggest a different route of action? The Apex is still wrapped in plastic and could easy make the trip back to BRS. LOL
 
Also I believe I am going to purchase a second mp40 for this setup.
 
I like my reeflink, but was just looking for your reasoning. If you weren't going to be someone who was going to be using the probes to monitor the system, then it is an unnecessary money sink. The reeflink can be too, don't get me wrong, and I'm sure both are nice to have.
 
I will totally be following along, and if you don't mind me asking how much did this set up cost you? I'm going to be buying my own home shortly and this is almost the exact setup I want to upgrade to from my 29
 
I will totally be following along, and if you don't mind me asking how much did this set up cost you? I'm going to be buying my own home shortly and this is almost the exact setup I want to upgrade to from my 29



Well the tank alone was $1299. I looked around for a deal but this was the price at many vendors. Currently I'm about $5000 into it. I have everything for the basic setup now, but I will be doing some upgrading before I even get operational.
 
So here is a question. I acid washed some old live rock from a previous tank. The rock has been sitting outside under a shade tree for over a year. After I pulled it out of the acid bath, some of my rock is a solid orange, some is grey, and some is a murky yellow.... is this normal??
 
And I have been rinsing it in a 55 gallon trash can with garden hose water. Changing it every two days for a week now
 
Sounds normal to me. I have rock of all types of colors that came out of the Caribbean. One of my favorites, though not in my current tank, is all orange.



I'm so glad to know that! I have two that are completely orange and some that are multi colored. I'm guessing I used too much acid... the rocks are very brittle now.

I was a little concerned because I got 100lbs of reef saver rock from BRS and acid washed it and it all came out white for the most part.
 
Oh it's reef saver? Well then you def used too much acid. Just make sure you rinse it like nobodies business. Don't want the bath doing anything to the water column or affecting pH.
 
Oh it's reef saver? Well then you def used too much acid. Just make sure you rinse it like nobodies business. Don't want the bath doing anything to the water column or affecting pH.



My apologies. I bought 100lbs of reef saver rock and some acid and gave it a bath. Then two days of rinse cycles. Then blow dryer it with a backpack blower and left in the sun for a week now. It looks good.

I had a pile of old dead live rock that was sitting outside for a year. I bought all of this rock from a guy on Craigslist years ago and I have no clue what type of rock it is.

I had extra acid left so I decided to acid bath it. When it came out it was various colors and had me concerned. Lol.
 
So today I bought and stained a 3/4" oak plywood board to put under the stand. Will this help even the slightest bit with weight distribution? My house is old and I'm trying to take a couple extra steps to help with the weight. Granted this is only a 54 gallon unit, but it's going on the wall parallel to the floor joists.
 
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