This past weekend I have took down my 90 gallon which has been up for 3 years and set up an 80 gallon deep blue rimless that I have been working on for the past month or two. I grew tired of your typical run of the mill tank and stand setup so I embarked on a mission to put together a setup that will be contemporary/modern and wife approved that would not cost an arm and a leg like those ELOS tanks. At first I had no plans of doing a tank build write up. But then I figure I’d show my gratitude and appreciation to this invaluable club that I am a part. I do listen and learn from each and every one of you that I have met. I love to read about other members builds and figure that someone might find something that they can incorporate into their system from this build like I have from other member’s build threads. From the 90 I have always (eventually will) want to upgrade to a much bigger tank. I currently have a 180 that I was not feeling atm so I decided to push that aside and go with something that would be more than just a tank. I was then set on creating a reef tank with substance and quality rather than having a big tank filled with corals (we will see how close I get to this as the tank matures).
The stand is your basic 2 x 4 stand with some wood panels on the side opening to mount equipment. I am not very good at woodworking (all that I own is a miter saw and a drill) so I decided to go with IKEA cabinet doors (http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/90267189/#/10267188) fitted with magnets to skin the stand. The magnets I got were these: http://www.magnet4sale.com/n45-neodymium-magnet-dia-3-4x1-8-ndfeb-disc-magnet-epoxy-coated/. These were rated for 10 lbs, with 4 planned for each panel I figured that they would be plenty strong which they are but next time I will go for something in the 15 lb range in order to make it harder for kids to pull it off. I got some regular epoxy from HD and used a forstner bit (in order to set the magnets into the panel. The duct tape was just so that I didn’t get epoxy all over the rest of the panels.
The panels were 24” x 40” so it worked out perfectly for the 2’ X 4’ tank. Did I forget to mention that the actual tank itself with bottom trim is a little bit bigger than 2’ x 4’. I had initially planned on attaching metal tabs to the stand frame in order to hold the panels up. But with tank be a bit larger than my stand I had to make the metal tabs floating (used a nut behind the metal tabs in order to raise it away from the stand). This worked out great with the leds I added to accent the stand.
Once everything was fitted I painted the stand with Kilz then off to the plumbing. One thing that I truly hate with this hobby is cutting and gluing of pvc pipes and fittings. I think it is more so the excess dried primer and glue that is visible. I was determined to figure out a way so that I did not have to do so, just a lot of elbow grease and teflon tape. With never ending measurements I was able to run the plumbing with all threaded pvc parts. I also added a two port manifold on the return line so that I will be ditching my feed pumps for my calcium reactor and GFO reactor.
The tank transfer took pretty much the whole day. Through it all I lost a flame angel and an one anthias. I decided to go barebottom with this setup just cause I’ve have never tried it before and was sick of dealing with it in my last setup. All of my previous tanks have either had black or dark blue background so I decided to go a different route this time. I went with a light blue spray paint to complement the white stand. The tank has not gone through its final aquascape yet. I pretty much tossed it in and have left it ever since. I really did not want to spend 6 hours with aquascaping so I will just slowly move a rock here and there from time to time.
Here is the current equipment list:
-80 gallon deep blue rimless tank
-ATI 36” Dimmable T5 Fixture with built in Controller
- 2 x MP40
- Eheim 1262 Return Pump
- SWC 180 Cone skimmer
- Apex Lite
- Life Reef Calcium Reactor
The stand is your basic 2 x 4 stand with some wood panels on the side opening to mount equipment. I am not very good at woodworking (all that I own is a miter saw and a drill) so I decided to go with IKEA cabinet doors (http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/90267189/#/10267188) fitted with magnets to skin the stand. The magnets I got were these: http://www.magnet4sale.com/n45-neodymium-magnet-dia-3-4x1-8-ndfeb-disc-magnet-epoxy-coated/. These were rated for 10 lbs, with 4 planned for each panel I figured that they would be plenty strong which they are but next time I will go for something in the 15 lb range in order to make it harder for kids to pull it off. I got some regular epoxy from HD and used a forstner bit (in order to set the magnets into the panel. The duct tape was just so that I didn’t get epoxy all over the rest of the panels.
The panels were 24” x 40” so it worked out perfectly for the 2’ X 4’ tank. Did I forget to mention that the actual tank itself with bottom trim is a little bit bigger than 2’ x 4’. I had initially planned on attaching metal tabs to the stand frame in order to hold the panels up. But with tank be a bit larger than my stand I had to make the metal tabs floating (used a nut behind the metal tabs in order to raise it away from the stand). This worked out great with the leds I added to accent the stand.
Once everything was fitted I painted the stand with Kilz then off to the plumbing. One thing that I truly hate with this hobby is cutting and gluing of pvc pipes and fittings. I think it is more so the excess dried primer and glue that is visible. I was determined to figure out a way so that I did not have to do so, just a lot of elbow grease and teflon tape. With never ending measurements I was able to run the plumbing with all threaded pvc parts. I also added a two port manifold on the return line so that I will be ditching my feed pumps for my calcium reactor and GFO reactor.
The tank transfer took pretty much the whole day. Through it all I lost a flame angel and an one anthias. I decided to go barebottom with this setup just cause I’ve have never tried it before and was sick of dealing with it in my last setup. All of my previous tanks have either had black or dark blue background so I decided to go a different route this time. I went with a light blue spray paint to complement the white stand. The tank has not gone through its final aquascape yet. I pretty much tossed it in and have left it ever since. I really did not want to spend 6 hours with aquascaping so I will just slowly move a rock here and there from time to time.
Here is the current equipment list:
-80 gallon deep blue rimless tank
-ATI 36” Dimmable T5 Fixture with built in Controller
- 2 x MP40
- Eheim 1262 Return Pump
- SWC 180 Cone skimmer
- Apex Lite
- Life Reef Calcium Reactor
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