My 90 (The Rebuild again)

EQUIPMENT & LIVESTOCK LISTS on POST #102

I've kind of been keeping this to myself, mainly because I have other build threads that have just petered out and I didn't know how quickly I would build it. Selling frags locally has been good to me the last two months so this project has really moved along well and should be wet in the next two weeks.
Some of you may remember my thread about trading my dad's ice fishing gear for this tank. Well that never happened but what did was he also had an AquaController II, probes and 8 X-10 modules that I picked up for $100 when I turned down the trade offer. I had intentions of reselling. About a week later he found out he was getting deployed and called me. Said the tank, stand and canopy was mine or the dumps because he didn't have time to sell it and didn't want to store it. We moved it to our storage that day. It was in rough shape and I seriously had my doubts it'd hold water. We filled it with a hose and let it sit for 2 days. The only leak was from a cracked bulk head so the wheels began turning.
My wife wanted a tank in our clothing store but I didn't want to mess with a nano down there. Now I had a 90....hmm let's see...
We decided it would go there and be an educational and introduction tool for those who wouldn't otherwise think about the hobby or more importantly our natural reefs and oceans. Believe it or not, not many people here in good ol' South Dakota give a rats smelly end about the sea. LOL
So then the Holidays came upon us followed by a blizzard and then it was January. Finally got a break and a good day to move the tank to the shop so I could begin work. Here's what I had the day we moved it in. The pics date stamp is formatted dd/mm/yyyy, don't ask me why I did it that way.:-/




After I got the pics, we set the tank down on the floor and I began the clean up the next day. That literally took 4 or 5 days, several hours each day. I cut out the pvc junk, got all the sand out and used a vinegar/ro mix to clean glass and plastic over and over until a white rag came away streak free.
Next I used the glass/acrylic refurbishing kit I got in my Box O' Crap from championlighting when a few of us went through that craze last year. I dry polished the inside and out of the front glass until it suited me. No updated pics of the clean tank though, mainly because it's still on the floor.

 

DD/MM/YYYY is the format all the world use beside the USA. just an fyi. good luck on your build

 

Cool. you brought pictures back from the future! lol

 

Beat me to it.

Good luck....I'd reseal the hood's interior too.

 

The bulk head and the canopy

Now that it was cleaned up I went to work on the cracked bulk head. Now I don't know what goes through the minds of some people but a lot of them should just let their thoughts go. I discovered that an attempt had been made to seal the crack with what I'm assuming to be PVC cement. This not only failed, it welded the threads shut on the nut. My only option was to cut it out with my Dremmel. If you don't own one, I highly recommend putting it on your list of must haves.
The only problem was, I was by myself so I had to tip the tank onto it's face and lay on my gut to make the cuts. Big guy + odd, uncomfortable work angle = p.o'd big guy. The whole time I was working on the bulk head that ungodly looking canopy was staring me in the face. By the time the cuts had been made I had decided I really hated the canopy and was going to build my own. The following is a series of pics from that project up to the staining.
Measuring rails and stiles

Sanding the butt joints

Best $20 tool investment I ever made

Face and rear plates done


End rails

Sanding ply panels and butt joints


Frame complete

Light rail added

Skinned

Fitting/marking doors

Doors hung

Moulding on

About this time I decided to add a box that hides the two WorkHorse 7 ballasts for the VHO supplemental lights. I attached it to the back of the canopy.

Stained

And for comparison...

 

Looking god Mike! I was admiring your canopy from facebook

 

Thanks

So glad you took the time to read the thread....

Thanks Sky. I took the time to build another canopy . Sealed the inside of it with Thompsons.

Thanks Eric. I wasn't going to do a build thread here but it's moving along to nicely not to.

 

Wow. Top notch wood work there. Looks fantastic. This will be a great tank.

 

WoW!That is seriously amazing! Good luck!

 

Looking good, cannot wait to see it wet.