Brian Howell:
Hey, guys. This is Brian Howell from Saltwater Ambitions. Today, I wanted to give you a quick update on the Saltwater Ambitions build itself. For those of you who might not be following the Saltwater Ambitions site or any of the social media pages, I thought I’d catch you up, and then if you like things or if you want more information, you can certainly choose to follow us moving forward. What you’re looking at right now is the main display tank that’s built into the wall behind the bar, as you can see. The entire thing is framed out in cedar, and the display tank itself is a Lifetime Aquarium that I had custom-built by the folks at customaquariums.com.
Really super high quality build. They use an anodized aluminum frame system, and really high quality materials and process for building their displays. I highly recommend you check out customaquariums.com if you are interested in ordering something that will truly last you for a lifetime.
The tank itself is lit by three AquaIllumination Hydra 52 HD light fixtures. I really like those units. They’re completely controllable by an app on my iPhone or iPad. It allows you to set up different light scenarios with sunrise, and sunset, moonlight features. You could even create thunderstorm settings if you wanted to; the entire thing is programmable and, certainly, set up to be adjustable for whatever your needs are.
The lights are mounted about 10 inches above the top of the glass lids on the tank, and that really gives me all the lighting that I need. Inside the tank itself, you can see there are four multidirectional outputs that actually have siphon stoppers on them. Those will allow me to get the water flow moving in basically any direction I want within the tank, and they prevent an overflow in the sump in the event of a power outage so the water will not completely siphon out of the tank into the sump and cause a disaster, basically.
You also see there are three H2Overflow units from Custom Aquariums as well. These things are really nice. They’re giving me 3,600 gallons an hour of water flow into my sump. What I like about them, if you noticed, they’re up at the top there and you really have to look to see them, but when you back away and you’re looking at the display, they sort of disappearing behind the frame. They keep the water level really high in the tank, and you don’t have a big overflow box or a corner overflow.
You don’t have to worry about you know aquascaping or rescaping around an overflow box, so it gives you a really clean look and feel for anybody that’s looking for that as part of their build.
Let me show you what’s running behind the scenes here.
Now, as you can see, I’ve got a seamless sump solution that’s also from Custom Aquariums. These are four individual pieces that are all tied together via either bulkhead and flexible tube solution as you see on the bottom, or on the top here there are a couple of overflow drains that flow into the different tubs. These things are super high quality as well. They’re made out of a great material that’s very flexible; you can drill them through, whatever your needs are. They’re really, really durable, so you don’t have to worry about anything cracking, breaking, or fading.
The first tub that you see here is the protein skimmer tub. The protein skimmer itself is a Reef Octopus Regal 300-INT protein skimmer that’s run by a VarioS-6S pump. The entire thing is controlled by a controller unit. It’s a five-speed adjustable controller unit that has two different power settings for feeding and doing maintenance. Also, I’ve got a float switch attached to the protein skimmer so that if the skimmate tank were to ever get to dangerous level, we wouldn’t want that nasty stuff to overflow, so that will shut off the pump on the protein skimmer.
Then we have the Stealth Box Overflow that’s running from those H2Overflow, down through this PVC into a giant sock tub here. The sock tub is super large, helps with water volume. The sock tubs will catch any particles that are coming out of the water.
Then running out of both sides, one way into the protein skimmer and the other way into this baffle tub. On the left side of the baffle tub, there are about five trays of different media for the filtration, and then I also have a 300 Watt titanium Finnex heater in the baffle tub as well. Doing that allows you to heat the tank without having a heater in your main display. I really like the way that that keeps things clean.
There are four Sicce Syncra 4.0 return pumps in this battle tub as well that all flow out. As you can see, I’ve got the Finnex controller for the heater. It’s set to, or right now it’s running at 80 degrees, gives me a visual on what the temperature is in the tank, but it also has audible alarms. I’ve got it set to within a couple degrees if the water gets too cold, I’ll certainly know about it. If it gets too warm, the thing will actually shut off and I don’t have to worry about overheating the tank, and the audible alarms will alert me and I can take care of that right away.
I also have this Coralife 18 Watt UV sterilizer that’s being driven by return pump 3 here. Then I also have this little tee, and a lot of people have asked me about this. It’s set up between the hose on the return pump 4. The purpose of this is actually to keep the water moving in this last tank. This last reservoir used to fill with RO/DI water, and it’s basically a top opposite situation. I don’t want the water stagnant in this tank, so the water is flowing through this hose right here and just basically circulating the water in this evaporation tank.
The other hose, I thought is a great solution as well, I like the drip acclimate any livestock that I put in the tank. Rather than creating a siphon every time, I actually have this guy with some drip emitters on the end, and all I have to do is pinpoint dial this in and I have basically a drip solution ready to go without setting up any sort of siphon out of the actual display tank. It’s worked out well so far, and I’ve used that solution for all the livestock that’s in the tank.
The main display is sitting on this steel stand that I also had purchased from Custom Aquariums. They did a great job with the stand. I had it powder-coated black. All the welds on this thing are basically perfect. It’s a very clean look.
As you can see, the top of the stand, I’ve got a piece of plywood across the top of it, with also a piece of foam on top of that, so the entire display tank is sitting on that foam, helps with leveling and really prevents any damage via cracking or if something were to be underneath there. I would recommend that you do put your tank on some type of foam just for that purpose.
This is basically the build as it sits right now. It’s been running for several months. I’ve got a schedule for all of my testing and whatnot that I do. At minimum, weekly, do a cleaning and a testing. I just use the API test kits for about half a dozen or more different things. This is really where it’s at, guys.
If you have any questions for me, let me know. I’d be happy to talk about it. Or feel free to Google Saltwater Ambitions, and join the community that I’m trying to put together. You have the ability to create your own profile on the site and post pictures of your own tanks, or your livestock, or really whatever you want, and certainly communicate with other people that are in the community that way. If you have any questions, let me know. Otherwise, I’ll talk to you soon, guys. Thanks for watching.
