Asylumdown's 275 Tank build

[asylumdown]

Originally Posted by lastlight

Really like following along. I'm guessing it's a smaller builder? In my experience the bigger ones don't like to mess with the spec plans as much as you have. Lucky guy!

That high sump will drive you nuts but sounds like it's a necessary evil here. I did water changes in my 225 exactly as you intend to. Easy as pie and only took me maybe 10 min.

Our builder is Citicore, we bought a house in a 60 year old neighborhood and knocked it down, so the house is 100% custom. It gives you tons of freedom, but we're finding that infinite choices can actually start to be a bad thing. It's easy to blow budgets, and of course, I can walk in to a plumbing show room and pick the most expensive things without even looking at a price tag.

I knew the sump was tall, but on paper it didn't seem like it was THAT tall. All that matters is that the skimmer and all the equip will fit and I can put the stuff I need to access the most right up front.

The house was insulated this week, so drywall should start next week (finally!). Once the drywall is up I'll be ordering the actual aquarium, I'm thinking starphire glass on the two exposed panels.

I'm super torn on the best nutrient export system. I can't decide between the Zeovit method or biopellets. I tried biopellets on my 90 gallon and had a crazy cyano outbreak, but I know others have awesome success with them. I love the look of zeo tanks, but man, daily supplementation just doesn't sound like something I will reliably do.

What do you all think?

[fishytime]

Prodibio???.......same principal as Zeo......no rocks to tumble and a more forgiving dosing schedule

[asylumdown]

Met with Kevin, the project manager, and the interior designer yesterday to discuss the finishes around the aquarium. The dining room side is going to be a clean white wall with a tank hovering in the middle. They'll put a wooden panel in front of the stand and build the entire wall around the aquarium out of mdf that's been treated with a marine level of water-proofing. The tank will be rimmed with a thin strip of stainless steel to hide the returns of the wall panels. Should look hot. The access panels will be as low profile as possible with the goal of making it look like they don't exist.

The office side is where most of the business of maintenance will occur, so the access needs to be equally scaled up. They will be building a frame for a large set of vented/louvered cabinet doors for access to the sump area, with solid panels acting as doors above. Originally the doors above were supposed to be louvered/vented to help deal with heat from the MH, but with the fan running at all times, we wanted to create a bottom up vacuum of air that would also evacuate humidity from the sump cabinet. The fan's a 90 CFM, so it will hopefully be able to evacuate enough heat from the canopy to prevent things from getting dangerous.

[asylumdown]

The house is fully insulated and should be getting drywalled at this very moment. Took these pics on Friday:




Just in case any of the drywallers were confused as to whether or not they should stand on the vertical surfaces of of the sump/stand's protective box, we left them a handy sign.

[phi delt reefer]

$100 says you catch one of those idiots standing on it with a smoke dangling out his mouth when you swing by for a surprise look in the near future

[asylumdown]

Not a whole lot has changed, but the house is 80% drywalled now. Can't believe how much of a difference it makes, actually being able to look at closed walls, finally feels like a house. Mudding and taping starts next week, then it's time to order the actual tank!

[asylumdown]

perhaps these photos of an empty space where a tank will eventually be are a little gratuitous, but I'm excited as hell this is happening, so I don't care!

The fan's been incorporated in to the ceiling:


From the office looking toward Kitchen/Dining room:


From the dining room looking in toward the office:


And just cuz it finally looks like a room, the kitchen and dining room (nothing to do with the tank, I'm just excited)