Saltwater & Marine aquarium network

55G progress

It has been a busy 3 months. I have invested in an RO/DI system from thefilterguys.biz OCEAN REEF + 1 FIVE STAGE 75 GPD RO/DI. It has been great not haveing to lug water from the LFS for the nano. However my waterpressure is only at 30psi so The system is slow to make RO/DI. I am going to have to invest in a booster pump at some point but that can wait until after the new tank is up and running.

I bought an AGA black pine stand. nothing fancy but it will work. and I built a sump from a 15g tall AGA glass tank

I added a glass baffle to seperate the intake zone from the skimmer area to let the skimmer work in a calmer water zone. I used glass swizzle sticks to the baffle and the intake side wall so that I can create an egg crate shelf for running carbon under the sock when I want to.

After the Protein skimmer (Tunze DOC 9005) I decided to go with just a 2 baffle bubble trap (over then under). I did a lot of online research and most bubble traps use 3 baffles but I found a couple of articles and DaveK also talked about just needing 2 baffles. The way I looked at it is why would I want water to fall over the 3rd bafffle and thus create new microbubbles.

Then I added a Mag Drive 9.5 for my return pump. I bought a LifeReef slim prefileter box/overflow which has a 700gph flow rate. A mag 7 at 3 feet has a flow rate of 500gph while the Mag 9.5 is at 850. A ball valve will slow flow to within my 700 gph limit. The height from the pump to the top of the tank is about 3 1/2 feet.

I went to the vendor area at IMAC and came home with a Tunze Turbelle NanoStream Pump 6045 for in tank flow.

Here is a test run yesterday in my back yard. The ball valve has yet to be installed. It all held water and my sump worked too even if my silicone job is none too pretty.