I have kept freshwater fish for may years and, in fact, have a fish house with over 100 tanks, mostly small breeding tanks for killies. I have decided I need a new challenge and will be setting up a reef tank, probably eventually more than one.

I live in Oregon and have been looking for good sources of large tanks. In particular I'm looking for a 72x24x24 tank. I like what I see on the Glass Cages web site but the shipping costs to my place are prohibitive. Can anyone suggest a good manufacturer of tanks in the west? A related question is whether Starphire glass is worth the extra cost and effort to get it. Does it really make much difference in viewing a populated tank?

A second question is which online sellers of livestock are best. I realize this is a delicate question but I would appreciate a few recommendations as to who is good to deal with, if that is possible.

Barry

Hey Barry, Welcome to RAF!!

100 TANKS Must take forever to maintain all of that.

Well, I'm not too familiar with aquarium manufacturers in Oregon, however I know there are quite a few reef enthusiasts out there so there has to be someone who makes tanks. One of the best ways I've found to find local manufacturers is too look in your local phone book (The actual paper book, not online). There are usually more companies listed there than online, not really sure why.

I really like starphire because in larger tanks especially where the glass is so thick, that green hue of normal glass really shows up. Not such a big deal in planted tanks where everything in the tank is green, so it doesn't really matter, but in reef tanks, it's noticeable. To save money, you can just have the front pane made of starphire, unless you'll be viewing it on multiple sides.

My favorite online dealers due to reliability, customer service and quality of livestock are : Petsolutions and Blue Zoo Aquatics If you're looking for giant clams though down the road, I'd go with Clams Direct

spinycheek wrote:Hey Barry, Welcome to RAF!!

100 TANKS Must take forever to maintain all of that.

It's not so bad. All my FW tanks are on an automatic water change system, controlled by a Rainbird irrigation controller with solenoid valves to each station. I have well water here that is very soft (virtually unmeasurable hardness) but it has two problems. One is that is is very alkaline (pH >10 out of the tap), apparently due to containing some NaOH, and the second is that it contains significant silicates. I finally got tired of trying to adjust the pH so I invested in a large RO/DI unit (rated at 400 gal/day but I get about 300). I fill a 300 gal reservoir from that and for the FW tanks add Seachem's Equilibrium, some salt, and a little sodium bicarb to provide some buffering capacity. That unit will come in handy for making salt water for the reef tanks.

This is early days. I'm still looking for a good source of tanks. I have a friend who owns a very good aquarium store. His tanks come from Aqueon (formerly All Glass) but I'm not sure whether they can provide one with a Starphire front pane.

Barry

That sounds like an awesome system! I'd love to see pictures if you have any.

Here are a few:

Overview of part of the fishroom. You can see several racks of tanks with the water distribution system, the lower pvc pipe above the tanks with the vertical segment forming part of a loop that feeds two rows of tanks. The upper pipe at top is connected to an air manifold. Both the water and air feeds are connected to loops that run around the room just below the ceiling. Air comes from a large linear piston pump. The water feeds are connected to solenoid valves controlled by the Rainbird controller. At the back you can see a rack with 55 gal tanks on it. That is the rack I'm planning on replacing with (eventually) two 180 gal 72x24x24" reef tanks. The bottom of those 55s is about 45" above the floor, with a row of 15s and 20 longs below the 55s. I'm trying to decide whether to forgo those lower tanks as I don't think I want the 180 gal tanks to be that high. On the other hand I think the 15s and 20s would be useful as quarantine tanks and perhaps as refugiums.



The Rainbird controller is on the right. The box to the left is a relay that the controller uses to turn on the electrical power to the pump that pressurizes the water feed line (see next pic). The wires coming out of the controller run to the solenoid valves. This unit can control 8 stations.



The reservoir seen in part on the left is a 300 gal cylindrical tank. The smaller blue object in the middle is a shallow well pump used to pressurize the system. On the right is the pressure tank fed by the pump. Its use prevents too frequent cycling of the pump. This was taken before I installed the RO/DI system (see next).

I seem to have reached a limit for adding image files to this message. I'll post a pic of the RO/DI unit in the next message.

Barry

Finally, this is the RO/DI unit I referred to earlier.



This unit is manufactured by Spectrapure and is UHE (ultra high efficiency). I have soft water, although alkaline and containing silicates, so I can run it at better than 1:1 product to waste. I currently actually get 300 gal per day product from it, with the product having zero conductivity. You will see a tall cylinder of 6" PVC pipe to the left of the unit. The product feeds into that. When it reaches the level of the overflow seen at the top left of that cylinder, it flows into my reservoir. The reason it is done that way is that to get the high efficiency the unit backflushes with pure water periodically. I add salts to my reservoir so have to have an intermediate holding tank. You should be able to see two electronic float switches on the right of the large reservoir, with wires leading to the controller on the unit. The bottom one turns on the RO/DI unit when the level of water in the reservoir drops to that level. The top one turns it off when the water reaches it. The filling is thus automatic. I just have to add the salts when it is filling.

Once I have the reef tank set up I can run off pure RO/DI water by diverting the feed from the intermediate holding tank. I can use a pigtail plugged into the controller to override the float switches or I could use a second set of float switches installed in a receptacle to be used for making marine water.

Well, I hope this is not too much, as most of this setup is for freshwater fish (killies). I hope it is of some interest.

Barry

Awesome set-up indeed!! You obviously put a lot of planning into that system, do you breed fish or just really, really, really love the hobby?

spinycheek wrote:Awesome set-up indeed!! You obviously put a lot of planning into that system, do you breed fish or just really, really, really love the hobby?

I do breed killies but I think you mean "for profit". I breed for fun and give away or trade most of the surplus. I certainly don't make a profit - just the opposite. So, I guess the answer is "love the hobby". I tell people it's a hobby out of control.

Barry