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Justin's 550 almost-cube


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No worries Anthony. It will get up on that stand eventually.

 

Jason, yes it will be inwall. The tank is in the garage. Here is the newly installed header above the viewing window (my wife wasn't thrilled about this part, and will be less so when the room-facing drywall is cut out later on)

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Skimmer pic:

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whoes up for cleaning that!?

 

thats gonnabe AWESOME

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  • 2 weeks later...

Justin,

Was awesome meeting you, your lovely daughter and THOSE TANKS!!!

Way too cool!

 

PS, Hope your daughter enjoyed Virginia's company, she did having fun making her braids!! :clap:

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Justin,

Was awesome meeting you, your lovely daughter and THOSE TANKS!!!

Way too cool!

 

PS, Hope your daughter enjoyed Virginia's company, she did having fun making her braids!! :clap:

 

Hey Howard

 

Thanks again for coming by last night, it was nice meeting you and Virginia as well!

 

Ashlyn did enjoy it very much. She insisted on staying up late until Mommy got home so she could show them off.

 

James, yes there is water, only 1/2 full though (I am an optimist). My old RO is hard at work, should have another 300 gal ready by the end of this week.

 

I should have sand in there today if all goes well. Lights are installed but not wired in yet. Stream pumps are in the tank and running, so the bottom half of the rock has been cycling for about a week now.

 

Toastii, It's actually not any more work than a standard skimmer, thanks to Dan's nice twistlock cup. I do need a ladder to reach it though :)

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  • 3 weeks later...

Here you go Anthony. This is 10 minutes after adding your sand:

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Light system is up on the rail (slides completely away from top)

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Today (6? days after adding sand)

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Visible in the back is a loaner skimmer from Dan to help pull out the yuck from the cycling dry rock. Water appears yellow but less so over the past few weeks. The first two days, the skimmer went nuts and I had to suck out the foam with a shop vac nearly continuously for hours. Now it has settled down to producing only an inch or so of skimmate per day. I added some ROX carbon in a mesh bag this afternoon to see if I can get rid of the yellow tint. If the nutrient levels test out okay, I may tie it into the sump & big skimmer this weekend. Oh, I found a live tree coral in the sand, and it seems to be relatively happy with no light and little flow. So I guess the water is capable of supporting life, which is reassuring.

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Are all those VHOs going to be actinic? Only 3 metal halides? Are they going to be 1000 watters?

 

Yes, all actinic VHO. The MH are only 400w. I think this will be plenty of light even at that depth.

 

Thanks Scott!

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Justin,

Awesome setup, gang you got to see his "hobby" area in the garage, UNREAL!!!

PM, on how things are going with the Greenhouse project?

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  • 4 weeks later...

Finally have some progress worth reporting! Yesterday, Tony Gallo came by and helped me run a 100A service out to the fish room (i.e., garage). With him doing 95% of the work, and me trying to be useful yet not get in the way, we got it done by early afternoon. This would have taken me 4 days to do myself (an idea which my wife frowned upon for fear of me burning down the house)

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Thanks again, Tony!

 

I finally finished the inside frame, also to the delight of my wife, who now officially thinks the tank "looks nice"! With electrical done, I was able to fire up one halide:

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The hanging bag is full of carbon, which has made the water sparkling clear. I will probably open the connection to the sump/skimmer early next week, once I am sure the water chemistry is good. I have a lot of live stuff in the sump that I don't want to stress out.

 

I noticed that the glass is completely covered with copepods after a month of live sand and no light. So I should have a pretty good population of bugs and nicely cured rock for when I start adding corals and fish.

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Already beautiful with really nice clear water. All the rods are now hidden with little patching rocks work. Can't wait to see when this tank is in full swing.

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Wow dude! That is awesome! I just joined WAMAS a month ago and haven't checked the site out much. You have an amazing setup!! I love the height of the tank!

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  • 2 weeks later...

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