MuddyMudSkipper's 34G Solana Build

New photos - tank with the return lines and drain fitted, with the drain pipe. I ultimately want to put some kind of overflow box, but for right now I am going to have this upturned pipe skimming the surface. I also have a strainer for it.

Other pic is all the plumbing elbows. I have painted them with Rustoleum Satin finish - I think it will look nicer than having shiny black plumbing. I also have two ball valves for the return lines that I am painting, minus the valve itself.

Should have some more pics tomorrow of the stand - just about done putting the clearcoat on it.

The plan is to get some water in this sucker this weekend... we shall see I'm prepping with lots of orange buckets - making up saltwater mix a bucket here and there so that the RO/DI unit can keep up.

I'm planning on doing 15-20 gallons of fresh, and 5-10 gallons of water from my old aquarium, pictured above resplendent in duct tape

 

Nice choice for a replacement tank.

I think the concern with your caulk is that it could either A, release chemicals that would directly kill your livestock, or B, be antibacterial, which would kill off the biological filtration of your tank, thus indirectly killing your livestock.

Seems to me like the livestock has been coping with the fix fine for some while now?

 

Yeah, going on 3 weeks now. Taking a second look at it, it appears the caulk is mostly above the waterline anyhow. Oddly enough, the corals seem to be happier than usual for the most part.

 

No new pics yet, but tank is full of water! Used a few gallons from the sump and sump from the old main tank, and lots of fresh salt water mix. Put a big 10-15 pound piece of cured live rock that was in the main tank in there - it had been sitting in a bucket of salt water.

The good news is I got the leveling just right - nice consistent gap all the way around the top. Roughly 1/4" from the top edge of the glass.

Drain pipe seems to be working well, as are the returns. Have an occasional drop of water on the last elbow going into the cabinet on both the return line and the drain line. I'm going to give it a day or two to crust up with salt and then probably just squirt some silicone around it. Looks like the PVC solvent cement didn't quite get all around those two, but that's OK. No major leaks.

I put a bunch of new sand in, so I'm waiting for all the silt to settle. That should go better now that I have the pump stirring it up and draining everything down into the sump - should filter down in there nicely.

I have my spare 100W heater in the sump, so by this time tomorrow hopefully the water will be clear and the right temperature, and I can trial moving some stuff over to it.

 

Looks like my tank is re-cycling, even though I added some cured live rock and water from the old tank. Nitrites at 0.25 ppm, pH at 7.8 / 7dKh (just added some alk to deal with that), zero phosphates, little bit of nitrates and ammonia (not enough to register a number, but changed the color enough to where I can tell it's not zero)

Just did a little RTV silicone around the connections on a couple of drip leaks. We'll see how that goes.

 

Hi Mud,

No updates?

Merry Xmas