75 Gallon Reef Build

Water is in and everything is hooked up and functioning. Dosed some dr Tim's One and Only along with some ammonium chloride to start up the cycle. Water volume ended up right around 75.5 gallons total. Now I just need to tinker and get everything dialed in.

I got in my order of shelf rock and after a few days of playing with the aquascape, I think I'm happy with it now. I went ahead and added 40lb of sand. I have 30lb more, but I think it looks about right as it is.

I ended up needing a few extensions for my return pump and gyre to reach the controllers in the cabinet. Just waiting for them to show up so I can start filling it up.

I decided to hold off on building out the front of the stand for now and went ahead and got it all prepped and painted. The tank is hopefully in its final place, for the last time, to be up and running here within the next few weeks.

Sundays project is repainting the cabinet to match the aquarium stand.

I got an open box deal on a xp aqua duetto ato, so that's marked off the list. I also had been looking for some shelf rock and ended up putting an order for 15# of large shelf rock with Addictive Reef Keeping. Hopefully it comes in soon so I can get to working on an aqua scape.

Took some time today and got the tank all plumbed up.

The equipment panel is just about done. Still need to paint the rest of inside of the cabinet white to match.

More progress this weekend. I got the tanks and the light rack painted. Also cut some egg crate for lids fitted to keep the cats out.

@Pfunk66 Do you have three heaters or is one of them plugged into the ink bird?

I started to lay things out and realized my finnex heater wires weren't going to be long enough to reach with their controllers mounted on the left side like I wanted. I drilled another hole on the right to make it a shorter run. I'll be able to use the top left hole still for something like the led strips I wanted to mount inside the cabinet.

Very nice! Your attention to the little details really shows on this build.

I made some more progress today and got my control panel for the cabinet mostly knocked out. I need to grab some filler and cover the screws before I move forward and get some paint on the cabinet so I can start mounting the electronics.

@John Durham build quality seems pretty nice and the neck cleaning feature is really cool.

The Red Sea Skimmers are very nice. Very efficient and very easy to use.

I just about have the sump done now. I just need to paint the back black and finish the egg crate sponge/ media rack.

I also started to layout a template for my control panel, which will be in the top of my cabinet. The desk grommets I'll be using to run the wires through the panel should be arriving soon.

Small update. Got a few more pieces to the puzzle in the mail today. I'm pretty excited about the switch panel.

The cabinet will be refinished to match the tank stand, white inside and black outside. I'll be making a panel for the top shelf to hold the controllers for my heaters, inkbird, wavemakers, and a 8 switch dj power rack. Middle shelf will likely have the dosing pump and resevior along with other food and supply storage with the bottom shelf holding a 10g tank for auto top offs. In the picture now is a 5 gallon, which I assume will be too small.

I love the DYI light mount! Good Job!

Sump is measured out and ready for the baffles to be siliconed in before I can begin dry fitting the plumbing.

The light rack was built following a diy guide I found online and ready to be painted black. I also have some plastic caps to cover the ends of the square tubing.

This is how the stand looked when I purchased it. It's sturdy and looked alright, but I didnt have enough height inside to service the skimmer.

I took it all apart and cut new wood uprights to make the stand taller and added some sheeting to the sides. Got the inside painted white as well.

I still have quite a bit of work do to finish the stand. I need to cut and fit a front panel onto the stand and mount it with magnetic cabinet latches. The outside will be repainted black as well.