About
Construction
History
Tips
The Tanks
The Fish
Chemistry Test
Changes
Resources
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I built it
The Stands
I built the stands as two sets of two pieces: A base, and the cabinet. I included
several novel design ideas to eliminate problems I had with previous bought
stands.
The base is the bottom plate. It makes contact with the floor via 1"
PVC piping mounted horizontally to both distribute the weight even, but
also to keep any material that may rot, rust, or otherwise do bad things
from contacting the flooring (In my case carpet). The piping is mounted
such that I have about 2" of air space beneath the base - which I learned
the hard way is the only way to allow wet carpet to dry. The base has
a 1/2" lip sealed to the laminate surface. While mostly water tight, this
lip gives me time to dry up most small spills before they leak to the
floor.
The cabinet is constructed of spruce. Door openings allow a full 24"+ height and 21" width. Like the base, the top surface of the cabinet is a laminate with a sealed lip (1/4") to help catch small spills. Three 1 1/4" holes in the rear of the surface provide access for power line, air tubes, and water returns.
When tanks are assembled, 4 stainless steel bolts attach the two cabinets together to increase the physical stability of the setup.
The Lights
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The lights consist of three parts: The tank mount, a glass separator, and the light assembly, all (but the glass) I built from acrylic and popular wood.
The bottom part of the lights is an acrylic extension to the tank. The clear lip extends about 1 1/2" above the top of the tank. This space provides a way to run all the plumbing and airlines in and out of the tanks, while maintaining a sealed system. The glass separator protects the lights and wood from the salt water.
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The lights are a combination of Actinic Blue, Corallife Trichromatic, 10,000K and 20,000K bulbs, driven by a conventional ballast. The design allows the heat of the ballast to exit through the top of the light assembly. The raised lid combined with the clear tank extension beneath the lights create a hi-tech look when lite.
The lights are controlled via a CP290 X-10 controller (Receiver is the cream box above).
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I run the lights about a total of 10 hours per day, a couple in the morning with the remainder starting in the late afternoon.
The Filter
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Water is returned from the tanks to the lower main filter by way of a double siphon flow box. The main filter is one that I built from a 15 gallon tank, and acrylic components I created.
The top of the filter allows water to enter, and outlets for water to be drawn out by the pumps. Water pours in onto a removable tray (Right Image: Top 2 inches, water splashing is seen behind and dripping beneath), which disperses the unfiltered water evenly across the surface of the remainder of the filter.
Water then passed through a mechanical filter (Blue color towards top). This gets cleaned every other week.
After mechanical cleaning, water drips through the chemical/biological portion of the filter. I use Chemi-Pure and PhosGuard filler bags, and have about 5 gallons of Bio-Pak balls, supplemented with a couple dozen Bio-Chem Stars and Bio Chem Beads medium for the biological filtration.
A powerhead mounted in the bottom cycles filtered water through a Sterilizer
and returns water at the top of the filter to insure water is continuously
running through the filter even when I'm doing tank maintenance.
A 300 watt heater is also mounted in the filter base.
The sump area of the filter provides about 5 gallons a spare water. The flow boxes on the tanks insure that the water level of the tank is constant.
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The Chiller
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For years I fought excessive heat in all my tanks. All my tanks
I purposely tried to limit the amount of evaporation by sealing
the filters, the tank tops, etc.. Until recently, I didn't know
that was the cause to my higher temperatures (Typically my tank
water would be 5-7 degrees warmer then room temperature). Evaporation
is a nature cooling mechanism, which I limit. The advantage to not
promoting evaporation is my salinity levels remain fairly constant).
I bought this Aquanetics 1/4 hp chiller April 97, and almost immediately eliminated variations in my chemistry. The tank has been extremely stable since the chiller addition. Well worth its cost.
Before the chiller, the best temperature I could maintain was 80-82°,
and that required running the A/C almost continuously The savings
of the A/C cost will easily pay for the chiller over its life.
The cabinet is kept cool with 4 4" fans I installed in the side (Partly visible
in the stand's photo). The normal temperature inside the cabinet
after the chiller has been running is about 90F.
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