375 Gallon Project Under Way

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Congrats on a beautifull project. I do look forward to seeing the final project and the steps along the way.


Jason
 
Very very nice.;) What thickness acrylic? The drawing is super.

A minor suggestion. If it was me, I would build a large acrylic drip pan to cover the whole bottom of the equipment level and make it's rim a couple of inches high to keep splashes, spills when moving or connection, or minor leakage getting into the carpet. Salt water spills make for smelly mildewy carpeting over time. I might even place in a water sensor into the pan and into your computer for an alarm.

I love watching a man work that knows what he is doing....or at least acts like it.:lol:
 
The R/C Man said:
Hey!

Microsoft Paint and a lot of patients.... lol


Just an FYI you can draw some pretty nice stuff using Word as well. Just insert a full size drawing and draw away. I have found it just slightly better than paint. Believe it or not I do crime scene sketches with Word all the time :)
 
So why did you choose the OM 8-way valve instead of just providing steady flow through all outputs in the closed loop?
 
Hey Guys!

Well the 3/4" acrylic was purchased about a year ago and cost me just under $1300 and that was at wholesale prices. So unless you know somebody it will be considerably more. I haven't been working on the tank its self very long. I believe I started about a month ago and I only work on Sundays for a few hours. A couple more weekends and the tank should be done minus the overflows.

I like the idea of a drip pan. What I may do is put a border on the bottom shelf and seal it well. I think that would be adaquate. The alarm has already been addressed. X10 make a pezzo modual that will be incorporated into the system.... I will also ensure that my cell phone gets notification of a falt condition... :D

I never tried drawing in Word before. I will have to try it...

The OM was incorporated just to alternate the current in the tank. I believe it will have benificial results such as aiding in waste removal, food and nutrient transport to the corals as well as encouraging a uniform growth pattern.....

I am also planning to run a battery back up on the main pump and one heater. TrippLite makes a unit that automatically switches from AC to DC in the event of a power outage. When the power returns it automatically recharges the batteries. The plan is to use 2 bklue top gel cells. Hopefully that will run the pump for a few hours. Long enought o hook up a gnerator...
 
The R/C Man said:
Hey Guys!
I like the idea of a drip pan. What I may do is put a border on the bottom shelf and seal it well. I think that would be adaquate. The alarm has already been addressed. X10 make a pezzo modual that will be incorporated into the system.... I will also ensure that my cell phone gets notification of a falt condition... :D

So what is this exactly -- it pages you if there's water detected by a sensor or something?

The R/C Man said:
I am also planning to run a battery back up on the main pump and one heater. TrippLite makes a unit that automatically switches from AC to DC in the event of a power outage. When the power returns it automatically recharges the batteries. The plan is to use 2 bklue top gel cells. Hopefully that will run the pump for a few hours. Long enought o hook up a gnerator...

Or if you're savvy with a soldering iron and screwdriver, there are some cool DIY backups here.
 
The R/C Man said:
I like the idea of a drip pan. What I may do is put a border on the bottom shelf and seal it well. I think that would be adaquate.

Actually it is quicker and easier to simply cover the plywood inside the stand with the cheap white fiberglass sheeting they sell at Home Depot for kitchenwalls. Glue it on like formica and route the edges. It works our well.....and will look good for a long time. attached is my partially completed stand
insidestand.jpg
 
The Neptune Systems Aqua controller pro has some cool features such as sending you falt condition messeges over a pager/text message or e-mail. It has a built in server you can access from any computer in the world. It will allow you to monitor and adjust the perameters remotely. It is really cool...

About the savvy thing.... Thanks for the link but I think that is more work than I really want to do. With the unit mentioned above I can just plug in the two items to a normal socket and then easily wire in the batteries and plug it in to the wall. Simple. Maybe it is me just being lazy. :D

That sheeting sound cool. I will have to check it out next time I head to the hardware store..... I am going to be using rubber mounts that screw into the wood to support the pumps....
 
The R/C Man said:
About the savvy thing.... Thanks for the link but I think that is more work than I really want to do. With the unit mentioned above I can just plug in the two items to a normal socket and then easily wire in the batteries and plug it in to the wall. Simple. Maybe it is me just being lazy. :D

Not at all, I'm so lazy I bought a generator. But actually it came in handy today; lost power for 5 hours and the fish were still warm and snug in their tank thanks to that baby. Not to mention all my frozen pizzas are still frozen.
 
A generator is nice to have. I also have that on the "things to buy" list. The battery back up is only good for short outages and to give me time to return home to start up a generator. Below is a pic and link to the company that makes the converters. I have still have to determine the amperage/wattage draw of the pump and heater to figure out what model to buy. This will give you an idea.......

Here are some leading particulars:
Model #: APS512
12V DC input; 120V AC output; 2 outlets
500 watts continuous output
1000 watts peak surge output for an extended period
Advanced battery charger
Fast load switching with less transfer time
More info here: http://www.tripplite.com/products/product.cfm?productID=177
 
So how exactly does the OM 8-way valve work? Mainly I'm wondering where the intake is. Does it alternate intakes as well as the outputs?
 
Hey!

The intake is on the bottom. It just opens individuals outputs by rotating a drum. The drum can be configured to open one or more ports at a time. I will have 4 open at a time, two opposing each other. It should amount to about 1100 gph through each line from the Hammerhead pump....
 
Made some more progress this weekend.. :D

The top is now on.... Next weekend we will glue the on bottom. The following weekend the tank will be flush trimmed and then given a 1/8" round over. All the edges will them be hand polished.....
 

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