crvz's hole in the wall

[crvz]

New location for the tank means a new build thread. I've had a 150 gallon setup for a number of years, but we're moving and I tore it down. The new location will bring a lot of changes, so I thought this would be a good place to get great advice.

What I've got is a room in the garage that will be a dedicated fish room. It's the back end of a tandem bay in the garage of a house we're building (currently being framed) and shares a wall with the breakfast area of the kitchen. The room will be about 14'x10'. There's room for an 8'x4'x3' tank, but I don't imagine I'll go that large. I may use the current tank (5'x2'x2') for a while, though I surely won't look forward to swapping it so I may wait to finish everything until I can get a larger tank in place. I'm leaning towards a 90"x30"x24" tank at the moment.

Accommodations in the room include a pair of dedicated 20 amp circuits, utility sink, and I'll add air conditioning (a mini-split setup is preferred, but I may settle for a portable unit). Other than the main display, I'll have a 100 gallon frag setup, the sump, and maybe a a couple species tanks. No firm plans just yet.

Here's a quick sketch-up that I've got in the works, which shows the fish room. The orange wall is something I'll add once the house is finished, and the two exterior walls are not shown in the picture. Location for the door and frag tank are up in the air, and this image shows the tank I currently own (the 150) in place. The utility sink will be next to the tank like that, however. The white area around the tank shows the size of the opening in the wall (8'x3'). That part is already framed up, so I'll try to get some real-life pictures in the next few weeks.



Questions and tips are welcome!

[crvz]

Managed to poke into the house today, so I grabbed a picture of the hole. Kind of hard to make everything out with the framed wall on the other side, but as mentioned earlier it's an 8'x3' hole. The header is made up of two 16" boards running the span. I considered cutting the hole out after we got the house, but I'm glad I had them do it since that's a load bearing wall. And they'll have to get it approved through inspection.



More news to come. The schedule on the house sets us about 3 months from closing, but there's obviously a lot to do.

[Hop]

Looks like a good start to me I didn't even know you were building the house yet...

[jthomps123]

Nice. Tagging along. I liked your 150, im currently setting up a 150 of the same dimensions myself. Good luck!

[crvz]

Thanks, guys! After watching the dollar signs creep up with all the other things that come along with a new home, I think I'm resigned to keep the current tank for the time being. I'll probably build the stand to support the setup I'll want in the future, but that will be about two or so years later (unless something just falls in my lap). So to further elaborate on the system, it will be a 150 display, 100 gallon sump, and 110 gallon frag setup. At a minimum, we'll have 300 gallons in the wet room, but I'll probably finagle some sort of water change system.

[mixer911]

Sweet, joing the ride... You think like me, build the stand to accomadate the future upgrade

[crvz]

Good to have you, Rick!

The tank will be set up with quite a few different requirements than when I first put it together. For the last few years, it was important that this tank be a stand-alone, energy efficient, quiet system due to the limited amount of space available. While energy efficiency will still go into many of my decisions, the other needs are very much relaxed. Having a fish room, space and noise concerns are greatly alleviated, and I imagine I'll make a few changes as a result.

The first of which is lighting. I have been a T5 guy for the last 5 years or more, primarily due to space concerns. I first bought hardware to implement in a 58 gallon oceanic hood, which gave me about 6" of clearance. Metal halide wasnt an option. When I upgraded, I had all the hardware I needed to run T5 on the new tank, all I needed was new bulbs. And because space and cooling was still a concern, the decision fit. With an in-wall tank, and 5' of height above the tank, the aesthetic superiority of metal halide has me primed to make the change. Energy wise, my T5 setup was pulling 660W of power, so a pair of 250W metal halide bulbs and a couple T5 for morning/evening supplementation is pretty much a wash. I have acquired a trio of lumatek 250W ballasts (one is a spare, or I may use it on my frag tank), so I'll be shopping bulbs and reflectors over the next 6 months.

Other hardware that I have available for the build includes;
- 4x Tunze 6100s and a multicontroller
- Aquacontroller 3 with a DC8, breakoutbox, PX1000, and a number of X10 interfaces
- MRC CR-2 calcium reactor
- EuroReef CS250 skimmer with eheim 1262 pump
- 1/4 hp JBJ chiller (which I don't expect to need)
- A number of 5 gallon buckets full of heaters, pumps, powerheads, and other junk collected through the years

[Leonardo_]

Great opportunity to start over and even improve things more I will follow this! Good luck with the build.

Leonardo

[GlassReef]

Gonna be a great project! I agree with Leonardo - a new start is the perfect opportunity to get everything done perfectly, without the mistakes you made the first time.

[crvz]

Originally posted by GlassReef
...without the mistakes you made the first time.

Or the second time, or the third time...

[Dejavu]

Looken good. Are you going to finish the rest of the basement before you setup the tank?

[crvz]

Originally posted by Dejavu
Looken good. Are you going to finish the rest of the basement before you setup the tank?

Ah, to have a basement. Alas, the water table is like 8" under the slab here in Houstonia, so no basement for me. This is part of the garage, and it will be finished (though the floor shall remain concrete).

[crvz]

Staying in the theme of lighting for now, how would you mount a light setup (let's assume for now it's just one structure that I've mounted the reflectors to)? Zoomed into the picture above gives a little better impression, I have 4' above the tank to deal with and I'd like to mount the ballasts somewhere too.



I'd love to have 2 degrees of freedom on the lights; up and down (primary) and sliding left/right. Thoughts?

[crvz]

Anybody use anything like these bike hoists for light mounts? I think it gives a good amount of flexibiltiy for adjustment. At $15 on amazon, seems like something I can play around with and retrofit to a light rack. I could even put the ceiling mounts on a track to move it left/right or front/back.

[crvz]

I ended up getting one of those bike hoists, I think it will work well. Also, because there arent nearly enough pictures in this thread to warrant attention, here's a top down of some of the zoanthids I have brewing in the garage. I've got about 30 or so corals in a small tank that represents all that remains of the 150 gallon tank of days past.

[crvz]

creeping along...

The house is moving slowly, but for good cause and it's still on schedule. Down where I live, relatively near the water, they now have local codes to build homes to sustain 160mph winds. They do wicked specific inspections, and the build process is a little slower. Good for me in the long run, so I'm not complaining. I did sneak in and run a bunch of wires in the house behind the scenes, including a CAT5 for the controller. All the electrical is in the house, and I have 2 dedicated circuits to the tank and a third that's shared with a part of the garage.

It's been a nice to have a bit of time off (been 10 years since I've not had a tank), but I'm itching to get geared up again.

[Hop]

Good to hear the update!

[Hop]

Oh yeah... And I can't click the red house anymore

[crvz]

Originally Posted by Hop

Oh yeah... And I can't click the red house anymore

CRIPES!! I've had that signature for too long. I'll have to think up a better one...

[crvz]

Another two weeks has passed... and at least we have sheetrock. They finished all the electrical and insulation, and this week they started drywall and exterior brick. We're also under contract on our current place, so I'll be homeless in a few weeks. Good news financially, but bad news logistically. I was hoping not to have to move twice, but we couldnt negotiate a lease-back and it's ultimately better not to have two mortgages. Ugh, I'm getting intimidated by the work-load staring at us, but the end result will definitely be worth it.

[crvz]

I've too much time to contemplate before making any decisions, and as a result I've been intrigued by the marineland 300 gallon deep dimension tank. I've been getting input around the interwebs, anyone have thoughts? Looks like a great solution, especially when considering the costs compared to custom tanks.

[Taqpol]

I know someone who has a Marineland 200 gallon, and the only thing that could make the tank cooler is if it were a 6' 300 gallon. I guess one downside is it has the standard (and very large) corner overflows as opposed to something like a Calfo or other external overflow, but that might not be a big deal to you.

[crvz]

Originally Posted by Taqpol

I know someone who has a Marineland 200 gallon, and the only thing that could make the tank cooler is if it were a 6' 300 gallon. I guess one downside is it has the standard (and very large) corner overflows as opposed to something like a Calfo or other external overflow, but that might not be a big deal to you.

great quote. I was trying to make it even cooler by asking for a price on a 7 foot version (marineland does custom work), but it was 5 times what the regular 300 gallon was. The overflows are a bit of a sacrifice, but with the front to back depth and the fact that it's an inwall, I'm not overly concerned about. I'm still trying to get details about all those dimensions, though, just to be sure.

[crvz]

Metal halide options. I've got lumatek ballasts, but I need to get my hands on some bulbs and reflectors yet. I'm pretty well decided on the lumen bright mini wide reflectors. I'm also highly convinced the Radium 20kK 250W bulbs are to be used. Someone please give me confidence that these selections are going to do well. We're about 5 weeks away from closing, and I'll need to have something to fire up for the few inhabitants I currently have once we get moved.

[mixer911]

You got my vote on the Lumen Bright and Radium combination. That's what I run and love it! Just be careful when acclimating the corals to the lumen bright. It is really powerful in the center. Once acclimated the corals will love it.