jtalley;3444617; said:
I have a habit of putting my foot in my mouth...
Sorry bud. I still think your tank is absolutly awesome! Hopefully I conveyed that well in my message above.
Starting a 500 gallon build
- Thread starter jtalley
- Start date
I have a habit of putting my foot in my mouth...
Sorry bud. I still think your tank is absolutly awesome! Hopefully I conveyed that well in my message above.
Some progress so far this weekend:
- Cleaned out the overflow the best I could, lot of built up saltwater residue however. Plan to try and clean it out simply with regular water and then keep doing water changes to maintain low salt concentration.
- Power heads arrived and have been installed in the top right and left corners. They are the Koralia 4's (1200 gph). The acrylic is too thick for the magnet/suction cup, so they can only work on the overflow or on the top acrylic plate as they are now. I will have to test if they are too close to the surface to cause any splatter.
- Cleaned a 50 lb bag of pool filter sand I had left over from my 120 gallon cichlid tank, barely makes any differences in this tank. Planning to move the 100 lbs currently in the 120 gallon before moving the fish. 150 lbs should give approximately 1" of sand in the bottom.
- Picked up piece of driftwood over 2' tall from ThatPetPlace (driving through Lancaster to pick the new puppy from an Amish family). My trade for this tank... But I know that piece will still look pretty dwarfed in this tank. Planning to start soaking it in a bath tub for about a week.
Plumbing will arrive this Wednesday, so I will be planning to have all the prep work finished so I can make the transfer next weekend!
- Cleaned out the overflow the best I could, lot of built up saltwater residue however. Plan to try and clean it out simply with regular water and then keep doing water changes to maintain low salt concentration.
- Power heads arrived and have been installed in the top right and left corners. They are the Koralia 4's (1200 gph). The acrylic is too thick for the magnet/suction cup, so they can only work on the overflow or on the top acrylic plate as they are now. I will have to test if they are too close to the surface to cause any splatter.
- Cleaned a 50 lb bag of pool filter sand I had left over from my 120 gallon cichlid tank, barely makes any differences in this tank. Planning to move the 100 lbs currently in the 120 gallon before moving the fish. 150 lbs should give approximately 1" of sand in the bottom.
- Picked up piece of driftwood over 2' tall from ThatPetPlace (driving through Lancaster to pick the new puppy from an Amish family). My trade for this tank... But I know that piece will still look pretty dwarfed in this tank. Planning to start soaking it in a bath tub for about a week.
Plumbing will arrive this Wednesday, so I will be planning to have all the prep work finished so I can make the transfer next weekend!
Planning to post some pictures soon. Last night I put in another 30 lb of sand or so from the tank to be transferred as well as about 100 lbs of rock. I am trying to stack the rock I have into one large pile with some height and using driftwood elsewhere and some intermediate stones, but the rock doesn't take up much height at all. Probably going to try and rearrange it when I put the last rock in.
I have received all the orders but the plumbing parts that should arrive today. Plan is to move more sand, cover the overflow with gutter guard again for my juvi's, add a second FX5 to my existing 120 to start some bacteria, and make the final list of other plumbing I will need from Lowe's. I'm also still soaking the driftwood, one bath tub full or water at a time. Water still looks like tea after a day, and the wood isn't fully sunk so that may take a while longer.
I have received all the orders but the plumbing parts that should arrive today. Plan is to move more sand, cover the overflow with gutter guard again for my juvi's, add a second FX5 to my existing 120 to start some bacteria, and make the final list of other plumbing I will need from Lowe's. I'm also still soaking the driftwood, one bath tub full or water at a time. Water still looks like tea after a day, and the wood isn't fully sunk so that may take a while longer.
It's finally Saturday and I have all day to work on the tank. Time to move some more sand and rock and then start the plumbing!
Today was a productive day. Finished moving sand and all but only a few rocks for fish to hide in in the 120 gallon. But there is about 150 lbs of PFS and rock in the 500 gallon now. I also moved the driftwood piece I had been soaking in the tub for a week (since leeching but not too bad now). That piece is ~27" tall, and I went to pick up another piece from a landscaping place today but they closed early due to the Penn State game.
On the plumbing side, I installed all the bulkheads (2-2" and 2-1"), I am plugging the 1" lines for now and running an FX5 on each of the 2" lines with one of the return having a 36W Turbotwist UV. I went to put together the UV filter today and there are no o-rings in the unit, or the box, so now I have to call Coralife on Monday.
The way I am setting up the filters is to use the 2" lines from the overflow for the suction side, and then the discharge side I am using the tubing they come with, and the bracket on the top panel. But instead of using their split return, I have changed with out for Loclines. Still a little nervous about the height of the water above the FX5 for pumping back up (just around the 4.9 ft they say is the max), after placing the filters on some concrete blocks.
In the tank I got all the rock arranged (will post pictures tomorrow when I start to fill). Its hard to get a good pictures now right because of some sand sticking to the acrylic. Since most of the cichlid's I currently have are juvi's, I also covered the overflow slits with gutter guard to keep them out.
Plan for tomorrow is to:
- wash out the overflow
- install the power heads, heaters
- fill the tank & condition with prime
- heat to 78 deg
- switch cycled FX5 from current tank with new uncycled filter
- start up all equipment and run for several hours
- drain out approximately 100 gallons and replace with old tank water
- transfer fish, lights, timers, etc.
- Post pictures to MFK and enjoy.
Then the items remaining being: install UV filter after receiving o-rings (I may end up going into my lab tomorrow and making o-rings that work...), add more driftwood, skin tank stand.
On the plumbing side, I installed all the bulkheads (2-2" and 2-1"), I am plugging the 1" lines for now and running an FX5 on each of the 2" lines with one of the return having a 36W Turbotwist UV. I went to put together the UV filter today and there are no o-rings in the unit, or the box, so now I have to call Coralife on Monday.
The way I am setting up the filters is to use the 2" lines from the overflow for the suction side, and then the discharge side I am using the tubing they come with, and the bracket on the top panel. But instead of using their split return, I have changed with out for Loclines. Still a little nervous about the height of the water above the FX5 for pumping back up (just around the 4.9 ft they say is the max), after placing the filters on some concrete blocks.
In the tank I got all the rock arranged (will post pictures tomorrow when I start to fill). Its hard to get a good pictures now right because of some sand sticking to the acrylic. Since most of the cichlid's I currently have are juvi's, I also covered the overflow slits with gutter guard to keep them out.
Plan for tomorrow is to:
- wash out the overflow
- install the power heads, heaters
- fill the tank & condition with prime
- heat to 78 deg
- switch cycled FX5 from current tank with new uncycled filter
- start up all equipment and run for several hours
- drain out approximately 100 gallons and replace with old tank water
- transfer fish, lights, timers, etc.
- Post pictures to MFK and enjoy.
Then the items remaining being: install UV filter after receiving o-rings (I may end up going into my lab tomorrow and making o-rings that work...), add more driftwood, skin tank stand.
