After three months (school's been busy and I've been lazy), I finally set up my new tank!
It's a customized Fluval Edge 12 gallon, with quite a lot of work done on it (this took months of intermittent work). With the help of my friend's machine shop and his general skills, we were able to create a fully customized setup that Fluval would be envious of!
Here are some pictures as promised!
http://imgur.com/a/jMGsd/all
Note: The tank is currently really foggy because I've been rearranging the rocks. I used live sand and live rock from a friend two days ago to start it off. It should be cycled instantly, if not very soon. The top of the tank is also missing the signature Fluval Edge cover, which I have. It's just not in the picture, so just imagine it looking cleaner!
List of customizations:
-Retrofit RapidLED soldierless 5x3w attachment to the original Fluval light (which I will still use as a supplement). I also had to sand down the opening of the tank to fit the heatsinks!
~5gallon sump made from Tap Plastics acrylic scraps welded together.
-Overflow into the original Fluval edge back pedestal, made by sanding down the original opening of the tank, and using acrylic scraps and silicone to water seal an overflow ramp.
-Water sealed the original Fluval Edge back pedestal and turned it into a wet/dry filter by adding custom baffles and drilling holes in acrylic scraps.
-Plumbed connections from the wet/dry to the sump, and then the return pipe which empties into the display tank.
-Earthquake resistant stand that is screwed into the original Fluval Edge bottom pedestal. The stand was a fake ADA style stand, which was pretty beaten up. It was free from one of my friends on sfbaaps. I sanded it down, used high gloss paint, and also used styrene for the front.
Basically, I wanted a tank setup that wouldn't have any chance of failure in case of a power outage. This was my solution. The water from the display tank overflows into the pedestal, passing a filter media bag with purigen, and a whole bunch of sponge scrubbers (which I got from the dollar store as a cheaper alternative to bio balls) and then is stopped by an acrylic baffle with two bulkheads in it. The water then is forced into the two bulkheads, where it drains into the sump. The sump, which I'm going to use as a refugium/breeding ground for volcano shrimp, then pumps the water back up into the display tank. So even in the event of a power failure, the water will just trickle down into the sump.
Potential problems:
-The water trickle is loud. Really loud. I'm thinking that the noise is mainly from when the water hits the sump. I don't think I can sleep with this setup, since it is in my bedroom. Is there a way I can silence this without potentially clogging the pipes and trapping debris?
-The pump is loud. Also pretty loud. That combined with the water trickle is driving me nuts, even as I'm typing this, let alone when I'm trying to sleep. It was the cheapest pump I found on Amazon, probably because this whole project was already way over my nonexistent budget. It's an "Ecoplus, probably rated for 200+ gallons per hour?
-The LEDs get pretty hot. I opted not to go with a fan, because 1. I don't have any room in this setup to really put one in, and 2. I wanted to cut down on noise. The heatsinks are doing a decent job, where they're cool enough to touch, but still pretty warm. Any suggestions for this?
-The live rock I got from my friend has been stored without light for quite a while, so there is no coraline algae. Is there an effective way to introduce this into my tank?
-How the hell do I do easy water changes with this system?
Many thanks for everyone who offered to start me out with some frags or perhaps some equipment.
This project went waaay over my budget, since I didn't know how much the small things add up, from the PVC piping, to the acrylic scraps, to the styrene cement, etc etc.
Things I'm still looking for:
-Starter frags! As mentioned above, I used to have a gorgeous colony of frogspawn that I sincerely missed.
-Some sort of auto top off system. I last used the JBJ one, and I have to say, that one was terrible. I'd come home and my floor would be flooded... (don't tell the landlord) I'm not sure if you can see in the pictures, but I split a Home Depot bucket below the sump as a reservoir. It's only about 2-3 gallons, but it's better than nothing.
-A quiet pump? I'm not sure if these even exist. Even for my freshwater tank, the pump is loud as hell even though it was supposed to be pretty quiet.
-Livestock. Good livestock. There's no way in hell I'm running a quarantine tank in my room, so I'm looking for a LFS or perhaps a personal breeder that has disease free fish. I'm mostly scared of ich... that devastated my last tank for a while.
-Stocking recommendations! I'm thinking clowns of course, and maybe a tailspot blenny? I know for sure I won't be able to sit through training another mandarin goby to be pellet trained. I'm hoping to have pretty low maintenance fish... nothing I'll have to feed live/frozen food. I'm going to for sure throw a colony of opae ula in my sump just for fun.
-Suggestions on how to fix the problems I listed above!
Thanks for reading guys! I hope to be an active part of this forum, now that my hard work is done and this tank is setup!
