Tim's 75 Gallon reef build

[spoonman]

Well, I got the rock from the guy this morning. In case you haven't seen it on my other thread, I bought this set up for $500 with 100 pounds live rock, live sand, tank, overflow, eight bulb t5ho and 40 gallons sump. I am picking up the rest of the tank and stand and everything tomorrow. I am going to take it to my local fish store and have them drill the bottom of the tank and put in a Durso standpipe. All the rock has been cured so I have it in buckets in my garage with salt water and power heads to keep the water moving. Is it okay to not have heaters in with the powerheads in the live rock? Here is the original craigslist ad and some pictures of the progress so far.

75 gallon Salt Water Fish Tank


Here is the rock








Here is the eight bulb light








4 x 10000k and 4 x actinics. Will have lots more pics tomorrow of the picking up and dropping off at the LFS.

[spoonman]

The rock is going to be in my garage in the buckets for a couple weeks. Do I need to put heaters in them or will they be ok without? I have powerheads in them. It gets down to about 50 degrees at night here right now.

[Hondatek]

Yes put a heater in there.

[spoonman]

I got the sump and the rest of the tank stuff today. I dropped off the tank to get drilled and will have it later this week. My question pertains to the sump. Pictured is the way he had it set up.




He had the water from the tank going into the left side with no filter socks or anything. Water then flowed through the middle refugium part with the skimmer on the outside of the refugium pulling water from the fuge area. Then over the top and into the right compartment with the return pump back to the DT. I am thinking to move the 2 baffles on the left side about 3 inches to the right and putting the return pump in there. This would put the water coming from the DT in the right side through filter sock and will also have the skimmer in the sump in that same section. Then through the fuge and on to the left side which would be the return pump section and back to the DT. Make sense? Is there a better idea? Please help me out with this. I want the skimmer in the sump, not hanging off the side. Thanks all!

[spoonman]

I think I am going to take all the dividers out and cut them down and reuse them. Here is my new design. Is this good or should I make some changes? I am going to get the materials and start building it tomorrow. Input will be appreciated. Thanks!

[carey]

make sure you have enough space for the skimmer. it looks like 10 x 10 now? Thats barely big enough.

[spoonman]

The skimmer/filter sock section will be 10"x14" and 10" deep. The tank is 36"Lx14"Wx18"H.

[spoonman]

Any other opinions on the sump? Gonna start putting it together tomorrow.

[spoonman]

This tank is going to have a 1" drain out the bottom of the tank and a 3/4" return. I have a 1100gph return pump. Is this going to be too much? Should I put an inline ball valve on the drain or return to tune the sump system?

[mfdrookie516]

A 1" pipe is rated at about 600gph. I'm not sure why they do 1" on these tanks... my 72 has the same setup. You can either go down to about 550 gph max after head height, or you can use the return bulkhead as another drain as well and add a few hundred gph to the overflow capacity, then bring the return up over the back. I think that's how I'm going to do mine. A ball valve is definitely a good idea though. I'd put a check valve and a ball valve above the return pump no matter what. Even if you don't need to restrict the flow, its good to have in case you do. The check valve ($6, $7 from home depot) will restrict the flow some, but it'll also keep water from siphoning back when you kill the pump. You still want to drill a couple safety anti-siphon holes in the return line just below the surface, but I love having the check valve to keep it from draining off the few gallons it would otherwise (unless/until it fails).

[spoonman]

Cool, thanks rookie. I have no experience at all with this. You are a big help. So, you think I can do this with the return pump that I have? No need to buy a smaller one?

[spoonman]

I also think I am going to completely hard plumb the whole thing. Have to work out how to connect to the return pump though. I think I will have to have a short section of flex hose.

[carey]

I have about 80% hard lines on my 90g setup, the rest is tubing since it was so much easier to work with. lol

[spoonman]

Do you have a quick pic by chance?

[carey]

Believe it or not I do have a pic. lol I used the flexible hose at where the drilled holes come into the sump then went with pvc. I have one small section on the intake to add to but after that it's mostly pvc. I even have the pvc all ready to go in, just been lazy. lol I also have a check valve and ball valve on the return line too.

[spoonman]

Thanks carey! That is exactly what I needed to see. I was thinking ball valves in both directions also. That way I can completely shut both down and remove the sump if I had to. I got the baffles siliconed into the sump today and will leak test them tomorrow. Will be picking up the tank this weekend and then start on the plumbing. Excuse the sloppy silicone!

[mfdrookie516]

You can see in mine that I just have a short piece of flexible tubing on mine -





What kind of return pump do you have exactly?

[spoonman]

Here are a couple pics of the return pump. It is 4000 L/hour, so about 1000gph.

[mfdrookie516]

I'm not recommending you do this, but if it were me, I'd replace that with a mag 9.5 or quiet one 4000

[spoonman]

Because it is a cheap one from Taiwan? Or you think it is too powerful?