Joe's Wet Dream, A 550 Gallon Work In Progress

[Jobiwan]

Not a hobby for impatient type A's, that's for sure....

Haven't heard back from the sheetmetal guy, hope to firm that up this week. I got to see my Luminarc minis today, they were custom built with an exhaust hole in each one, each pair will be connected with tubing (drier type?) to a 4" Icecap fan, hopefully that will extend bulb life, but lacking a light meter who knows... The other 4 fans will be spread around the hood. The Bubble King finally hit the US shores, it is now on it's way to Jason's from the distributor, can't wait to see it..

The best news though is the progress Jason is making in the construction phase. The sump is now completed, if you looked at the earlier CAD's I posted you will see that Jason built it exactly to my design specs, I couldn't be happier. It has a large refugium with a double compartment, 1 for DSB/Seagrass, the smaller one will be filled with coral rubble for a copepod factory. The largest chamber that holds the prefilter, reactor, and skimmer will be at a constant level of 9" H2O, the smaller section that the fuge empties into will be the evap chamber with the auto topoff, this is the tank return area and the chamber which the auto feeders will dump food into. You will also see the custom made prefilter box Jason made, it is the item with two valves on top, It eliminates any splashing and has three drawers that can hold the filter medias of your choice.. Here are a few photos, the protective paper is still in place, but you can get the idea, check out the little overflow chute coming out of the end of the fuge into the evap chamber, another thing that will eliminate splashing, salt creep should be very minimal with this monster. Due to it's size there will be a top, when the Bubble King arives Jason will engineer the portholes. Now without further ado, here are the photos...

 

[james734]

Man that is one big sump.

 

[Jobiwan]

88 sq feet of 1/2 " plexi so far, and that doesn't include the top....I really need an intervention...

 

[james734]

I really need an intervention...

Don't we all..

Jason built my sump also. Now it's not a large as yours. It was funny cause he made a statement that he hasn't built a small sump like mine in a long time.

He does some nice work. If I'm ever in the market to buy a completely new display setup I'm going to be giving him a call.

 

[NC2WA]

James,

You cannot go wrong with anything Jason builds. Absolutely fabulous !! The tank he built for me is rock solid and I am very very pleased with it.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7329275@N05

Joe,

That is one big honky sump; how many gallons is it?

My skimmer is pulling out some great dark skimmage. I am very happy with the H&S purchase.

Kirk

 

[Jobiwan]

Hi Guys, the sump has a volume of 250 gallons, exactly 1/3 of that volume is taken up by the dual refugiums, it measures 48" x 60" x 20". The amount of water in the skimmer compartment with the 9" level will be only 55 gallons. I'm anxious to see how the constant level works for fine tuning my skimmer, I've always used a single compartment sump before and relied on auto top offs to maintain the level, so there was always a bit of variation. I looked at H & N's seriously also, they are a quality skimmer. Sure like your aquascaping Kirk, I'm gonna try to duplicate that for my cave construction...

 

[blind1993]

lol ur skimmer probably makes more foam than the volume of my 55g. where are u going to dump all of that foam?

 

[Jobiwan]

If I have enough self discipline and self control there shouldn't be that much foam, none of my tanks have ever run below 1 ppm nitrates though, I hope I can run this at 0 ppm, but I have to fine tune my feeding habits, my biggest challenge with this system will be developing good husbandry on the overall tank and all its inhabitants...

 

[blind1993]

i think u should try ur techniques on a tank u have set up and see what works for u. and then use it on ur new investement.

 

[Jobiwan]

You're kidding right? I refuse to rise to the bait....

 

[Scooterman]

That sure is one heck of a sump Joe, progress sounds like it is going great.

 

[Bricky]

It was a pleasure to meet you the other day Joe. And yes, the sump is huge and built quite nicely. Definitely a challenge of a build, but with Jason behind the router your bound to end up with a nice product.

Matt

 

[Jobiwan]

Hi Scooty, it is coming along, of course I want it yesterday...Pleasure meeting you Matt, I love the buit in fuges in the sump, they did add a lot to the total sump size, I just hope it all works as well as I'm hoping, I'll only be able to blame myself if there are any problems...

 

[Bricky]

The fuge idea is a great theory. Just do your best to keep the detritus out of both to eliminate the nutrient sink that they could become. With both being of manageable size you should be okay.

What was the type of macro you were going to use and where were you going to get it?

 

[Jobiwan]

I'll be using a couple of seagrass varieties rather than macros, I'm particularly intrigued by paddle weed, it will be a difficult to find it, the normal seagrass outlets such as floridapets.com et al don't seem to have it, but I love a challenge. The seagrass side will have a DSB of course, I'll give it at least 6 months to mature before attempting the seagrass thing, I'll keep it full of chaeto until I move into the seagrass phase.

 

[Jobiwan]

Talked to Jason last night, the tank itself is almost finished, I'll post pictures soon. We are meeting in Tacoma tomorrow to finalize the construction of the stainless steel cabinet and hood, that may take several weeks, so that is the new choke point for the installation of my system. Jason will be taking some time off to attend his brothers wedding this week, I'm very concerned about his misplaced priorities.....

 

[james734]

I'm very concerned about his misplaced priorities.....

LOL.. I would to. Come on what's more important here. Family of a reefers new tank..

 

[class clown]

Joe - you're a funny guy. I'm very excited for you and can't wait to see it. Stainless steel stand & hood - holy macral - can't wait to see that too.

 

[Jobiwan]

Yeah, I'm a slob when it comes to maintaining wood fixtures around a salt tank, I pretty much trash them within a couple of years, one of my many talents. I hope the stainless works out, I've never seen that done before, it will either be incredibly striking or a total disaster, I don't see any chance for anything in between. Some "stainless" will readily corrode in a marine environment, there are a multitude of alloys available with differing properties, the stuff they will be using for me is the same stuff they use to make cabinetry on commercial fishing boats, they have some of their products that have been out there in that harsh environment for over 30 years. Rather than a mirror like polished surface (it wouldn't be mirror like long around me) I will have a wire buffed surface, it gives it a lot of patterns and texture, you may have noticed this type of finish in some of the bars/restaurants around here that have stainless as part of their decor. I should have some tank photos to post tonight or tomorrow, stay tuned....

 

[Bricky]

Well Joe, I saw the skimmer today. I think you'll be like a kid that just got his first 'Red Rider'. Definitely a well built and sexy skimmer. It'll fit well into what you've got planned.