Sweet. Looks like you have big plans. Have to same I’m very jealous. I’m still getting used to the size of my 120, but have to admit I already have corals growing against the walls in many places. Best of luck to you.
Also calculate into the upfront cost a chiller and into the electrical savings running a chiller for 10 hours a day(basically like leaving the door open on a small unefficient refrigerator for 10 hours). 400W MH will heat up like crazy.
For me if I replaced half of my lighting with LEDs it would pay for itself in 3 years time, but I don’t have the upfront money to do so right now. If your starting from scratch it is much wiser to go with LEDs. 60,000 hours with LEDs or many many years vs maybe 10 months with MH bulbs…
Not only will you be saving on the electric bill ,but also gas money to drive to Dover to properly dispose of your hazardous waste of MH bulbs. Or saving on coal burning and gas burning which both would contribute to CO2 in the air which lowers the pH of the ocean and is currently killing off natural coral reefs at an unprecedented rate.
That’s what I’m looking at also. The upfront cost is high. I do have a 1/2hp chiller here that will keep the tank cool. So when the tank is ready for Sps I will need to decide.
Nice project. i did a little figuring and it looks like it will cost about 700 KWHRs of electicity to run that list of pumps and MH lights, depending on schedule, per month or about $85 dollars a month. a chiller might bump it to $100. about what i spend also on my collection of tanks that total about 300 gallons. not too bad. considering.
[quote=“Cdangel0, post:15, topic:4366”]
Just out of curiosity have you considered potential algae problems from being set up against the window?[/quote]
Yes I have. I watched the amount of light that comes in the window. It only shines in about 3 hrs a day because the trees block the sun once it gets later in the day.
I feel it is free light for the corals. Also if the water quality is good and its not a over amount of light I should have no algae problem. But will be keeping a close eye on it. Worst case I could block the window so no light comes it.
[quote=“armani4o3, post:16, topic:4366”]
I feel it is free light for the corals. Also if the water quality is good [/quote]
no excess nutrients no algae
here we started to work on the braces for the floor and the platform for the sump to sit on
here is the sump a 125gal maineland tank
here is the skimmer area with the glass drilled for the 2 drains
than to the media area where it will flow from the bottom up trough a rock area
fuge area
another media area and than return
will be working on the build again tonight. hope to have all the floor bracing done along with the sump on the platform.
than will be time to start the plumbing…
