Long Overdue Pictures

Well, that was a relaxing twenty-month break from posting. Thankfully, there's been some progress in the meantime.

Anyhow, I posted some photos to the photo page, and updated the info on the inhabitants page. Here's a small sample of what I've got going in the tank.

Check them out!

Tank up!

The tank is on the stand!

It took a crew of six men and two hoist lifts to get the tank from the garage to the home office and onto the 40" high stand. There were, naturally, some nerve racking moments, but thankfully, no incidents. Now it's time to start plumbing and water testing.

And the world's slowest tank build continues ...

More Tanks

The RO/DI water storage tank, and the NSW mixing / storage tanks have been delivered!

Fortunately, I found a local manufacturer of polyethylene tanks, Custom Roto-Molding, Inc., so I was able to obtain these beauties without incurring enormous shipping charges.

The 310 gallon tall tank is for RO/DI storage, which will gravity feed the two 100 gallon tanks for new salt water mixing and storage. I'll plumb the two 100 gallon tanks together near their bottoms with a ball valve, so that I can empty one into the other, and use the empty tank to mix new water. Once the new water has settled, I can open the valve between the tanks to provide a single 200 gallon storage container for the automatic water change system to draw from.

Time to get plumbing!

We've got water!

... in the quarantine tank. While I wait for contractors to finish renovating the home office so that I can install the new display tank, I've set up and began cycling the quarantine tank in the laundry room. I'm using a 40 gallon breeder tank, with a Penn Plax Cascade 600 Internal Filter for biological filtration and water movement (it's got a nice spraybar that fits perfectly across the top of one side of the tank). I'll be cycling the tank without a fish (since there's no way I'm putting any damsels in my display tank), and will keep the first fish I buy here for a good long while (where my 3-year-old daughter can easily see it) until the display tank is installed, cycled and cured.

Yesterday I got tanked

With apologies for the quality of the iPhone photo, I'm happy to announce I got tanked yesterday! There the tank sits, in all her glory, next to a GMC Yukon XL for scale. This thing is huge (and heavy)!

I was a bit disappointed to find that My Reef Creations neglected to drill two of the bulkhead holes in the front panel of the overflow. They assure me that it will be easy for me to do it myself. All I have to do is buy a hole saw, and locate the center of the overflow, and start cutting away without doing any harm. :-/

The tank will have to sit in the garage for just a little while longer -- while the tile floor in the office is largely complete, as is the drain line, I still need my electrician to run a dedicated 20 amp branch circuit to the wall behind the tank before I move it into place. Speaking of moving it, I think I'll need to hire a local moving company to help with that. It's still on the pallet used to ship it, and can be rolled easily enough with a pallet jack, but lifting it onto the nearly 40" stand will be a task for more than a few people.

Payment complete!

Well, I just paid the balance and freight on the tank. Can't wait to see it!

Fabrication complete!

At long, long, (very) long last, the tank has been built! Just as soon as I can get a freight quote, I'll make the final payment and the tank will be on it's way!

Here's a teaser picture to keep you (and me) holding on:

Fabrication (finally) underway!

I received word today, that fabrication has begun! At this rate, I'll have fish swimming in time for (next) Christmas! :-)

The final design

After much communication back-and-forth with My Reef Creations (passed, back-and-forth, through Southeast Aquariums), we have arrived at a final tank design. The external dimensions have not changed, but due to spacing requirements the amount of plumbing inside the overflow has been reduced. In this final design, there will be six 1.5" bulkheads in the floor of the overflow (one closed loop input, three drain lines, and two return lines), with two more 1.5" bulkheads in the front panel (to pull water from the display and feed it to the closed loop input in the floor of the overflow). Six additional 1.0" bulkheads will be located in the floor panel of the display area, for closed loop outlets.

Hopefully fabrication can begin soon on this, the most drawn-out tank build ever.

Much assembly required

The lighting build continues, slowly, as I grab an hour here and there to solder. I don't think I've screwed anything up too bad -- all eight breakout boards are all assembled, and the LED strings are lighting up as they should as I finish soldering each one. At this point, though, I only have four strings wired up on one of the 48" heat sinks. Each 48" heat sink will have 12 strings, and each 24" heat sink (which finally arrived via UPS today) will have 10. So, not counting the PCB assembly, I've got about 9% of my soldering done.

Some things I've learned along the way:

• Molten solder is hot
• Molten solder sometimes goes flying into the air for no reason
• Eye protection is a good idea when soldering
• The surface of your eyeball doesn't have any nerve endings (thankfully)

In other news, My Reef Creations (MRC) doesn't provide final design schematics for review and approval. They will, however, talk through your design over the phone to confirm it, so if you can foresee any unforeseen problems with the design at that phase, they can't ensure they get corrected. :-/

Time for a leap of faith, and to hope I designed my glass box well.