Madmak's 200G Reef Build

[Madmak]

After first trying SW in the early 90s and having some luck (despite the limitations back then) I bought a Nano-Cube 24 a few months ago to see if having a tank again would be wise. I would say that there is no going back now! After some snooping around I will now be bringing and older 200G back to life and adding in some new features.

Within the first 24 hours I have scrubbed it up, removed the corner overflow, started on a 5' wide Bean Animal overflow, and started sourcing some plumbing for an 8 outlet closed loop system. The tank cleaned up very well and the starfire front is sweet.

Here are a few quick pics for now and I will try to document the build, step by step.

Thanks again to Misty for a great tank and a fair deal

[AquaticFinatic]

Tagging along on this one. Good luck with it :0)

[Madmak]

Drilling holes, lots of holes, in a perfectly good tank.

[Madmak]

Still waiting for the overflow to be finished but started working on the stand and the sump. Using 2 30G long tanks for the sump, 1 is purely a refugium. New 3/4 plywood and foam with all the holes necessary for the closed loop returns. Need to find some adjustable feet for my stand...

[phi delt reefer]

if those are old tanks i would take a day to remove the silicone seals and put new seals in them. Always worth the effort on an older tank.

[gregzz4]

For feet you can use appliance ones. Drill and tap the stand if the bottoms of the down tubes are sealed, although you'd probably be better off having someone weld some 1/4" plates under there to drill and tap. The more threads the better. I think the thread rule is basically 1/2 the size of the thread for the metal thickness ie; 1/2" thread, 1/4" metal.
Also, you could just use bolts if you can't find appliance feet.

[Madmak]

The sump tanks are new, cheap at the LFS. I also wanted the option of a good sealed canopy / light for the refugium tank and new makes that easy. Trying to limit noise and evaporation where I can.

Good hints on the feet. I will snoop around a bit. I could tap the steel but also wanted a bit more threads available.

Lighting is the next big ticket item, have to research this a bit.

Return and closed loop pumps are also on the need list. I'm worried about the closed loop pump sizing, can't really turn it up or down if the flow isn't right. I'm going to keep the flow through the sump fairly slow, I'm a believer in giving the LR, slimmer, and media some time to do their jobs. I'm also going to feed the refugium with a separate pump from the raw tank water chamber at about 100 GPH, nice and slow.

[Madmak]

Found a ReeFlo Barracuda pump today for the closed loop

Also found some heavy duty leveling legs for the metal stand. They got installed and the stand is getting a coat of gloss white paint.

Siliconed in the new overflow today as well. It is 5"X5"X48" and will be using a bean animal style drain with 1" pipe.

All my loc-line came in today as well and I installed some of the closed loop lines on the bottom of the tank. Can't wait to have almost 5000 GPH flow without any equipment showing, no powerheads, no cords

[gregzz4]

Cool. Hope that does the trick

[Cade]

Vary cool, good luck!