Well, with a lot of help from members we were able to put together the 100 gallon sump for my 65 sps tank and 65 clam tanks in the basement. Beanhead came by yesterday and started the project but had to leave when his wife called and was ill. Thankfully, Marti, Jim and James were able to come buy today and help with the assembly. I couldn't have done it without them - thanks a bunch. Putting a glass aquarium together is definitely and art, it is a good thing that this was a learning project for functionality. Despite having planned as much as I possibly could the work time for silicone is so short that it is a hectic rush once you get started. I had originally tapped off near all of the joints to be able to peal the tape away with the wet silicone and leave a nice edge. This was mostly pointless and only caused problems when the silicone was dry and the tape had to be removed. I will not tape off again, this was lesson one. Again, despite our planning both James and I put our end pains in upside down. Mine was not a problem because it was a single pain with no up or down. James's end had bulkheads in it and had to be removed and resiliconed. I think that we got it removed and set back in plenty of time. We put the stand together in the close confines of the basement because I was worried about the structural integrity of the tank if we put it together outside and then had to turn it on its side to put it on the stand in the basement room. In hind sight it would have been better to put it together outside. The structural integrity of the tank was not an issue but the fumes from the silicone and heat in the small room were an issue. We worked through it but it would have been a lot less trouble outside. There is only about 20 minutes of work time with the silicone at best so assembly has to go very quickly. We used tape to temp. hold the pains of glass and then put clamps on various places to snug things up. I went down this evening and cleaned up the excess silicone and was very pleased with the work that we did. Thanks a bunch everyone.
I got the lighting put over the sump today, 2 400 watt metal halides that I traded for the work on Normans 400 gallon stand and canopy. (Guess I better get to work on it) The tank holds water well - thanks to James, Marti and Jim. The water on the floor is from it running out the bulkheads at one end, I didn't get the water turned off in time. I have a large floor fan that will bow across the tank to keep the heat from the hides (as Marti calls them) down. I can't wait to see what the PAR values are - the lights are currently 17 inches above the water level.
Chris are you going to set the photoperiod on the sump to reverse daylight, thats my plan for my sump system once I have some frags to start growing out.
I probably will not do a reverse light cycle because I will not be growing macro algae in the sump. If I don't plan on having macro does it mater when the cycle is? Perhaps I need to consider allotting some space for macro and doing the reverse light cycle. Let me know what you think - I suppose it would make for a much more stable system.
If your going to use it as a prop/sump for your sps tank, then reverse day light would definitly help keep the ph more stable. Just have opposite photo periods for each tank and you would not need any macros. But if you use a Calcium reactor macro would be usefull in reducing the residual co2 from the reactor. Are you going to stock the tank with some fish?
The main tank will definitely have some fish but I will also probably have a few fish running around in the sump. I envision the sps portion of the sump to have a couple of damsels, which I like very much but don't have anymore because they are so belligerent making it all but impossible to add new tank mates. I will definitely be doing a reverse light cycle like you suggest for the stability. While I do run Ca+ reactors I have always felt that the major benefits to macro in the sump were for taking up nutrients and hadn't really considered the use of residual CO2 as a benefit. I had originally not wanted to dedicate any space to macro algae and initially I am not going to alot for it, but that may change as the set up comes on line and I watch it mature.
