Tank Journal Archive

[gtrxu1]

Was very excited to unload the new tank, the box wouldn't fit through the door so we had to unpack outside.

The first surprise was the new sump design, I am very happy with this as I was going to put in a custom sump but I think this new design will fit my needs.
They have removed the filter/media area from the front left side which makes the first chamber quite large. As I plan on using filter socks this will be great.
There is a fuge area on the right side, I'm a big fan or Marine Pure so I will put a block in there.

Here's a bad shot of the sump.

Issues:
I thought the plumbing was absolute rubbish, the ball valve was the worst quality I have seen. I went and replaced that straight away and am looking further into a custom plumbing design as the factory plumbing is truly awful imo.

The other issue I have is the comb on the weir is not straight:

This has really pissed me off, the left side hasn't been pushed down enough when they have glued it.
I was weighing up going custom instead of a Cade and its shit like this that makes me wish I had done.
Maybe not a huge issue but I expect better quality when spending this much money.

Am I over-reacting?

 

[Wrangy]

Awesome new tank! :) and as for the weir that's a pain but mine is the same, it's just slightly off. Once you have water and lights you won't even notice it and the rest of the build quality is grouse in my opinion. What are you planning for stock? :)

 

[gtrxu1]

Awesome new tank! :) and as for the weir that's a pain but mine is the same, it's just slightly off. Once you have water and lights you won't even notice it and the rest of the build quality is grouse in my opinion. What are you planning for stock? :)

Cool that makes me feel a lot better, did you do anything different with your plumbing? Or did you keep it standard?
As for stock I'm keeping my current fish - 2 Assessor's, Lawnmower, Flame Hawk, Whitetail Angel, Dottyback & 2 Mandarins.
I want to add a pair of clowns and would love some Anthias.

 

[Wrangy]

I made some minor adjustments in heights and distances but it's still the stock plumbing, although that may change if/when I get a new sump at the start of next year as the 600 sump is very inefficient and I'd love a fuge :) once you've got it setup and running they are an incredibly beautiful tank and I can't really fault anything else about them :) you'll love it!
Awesome fish list! I do love anthias but the constant need from food rules them out for me at least :( lol

 

[aussieant32]

Alot of people have had success with normal feeding :)

Tank looks great mate, cant wait to see it filled

 

[gtrxu1]

I ended up replacing the entire plumbing I just couldn't work with the Cade stuff.
I used the three holes in the weir for a beananimal and ran the return up the back of the tank.
It works amazing and totally silent, was tricky to do with the small weir and short spacing between the holes but I'm pretty happy with it.
Now I'm thinking about redoing it with threaded poly rather than the pvc now that I know all of the sizing.
I'll post some photos of it tomorrow.

 

[Wrangy]

Awesome can't wait to see the photos! :)

 

[gtrxu1]

Here is a photo of the back plumbing.

Here is my 'Crude' temporary return, getting some locline this week to finish this off properly. There is a small leak due to it being temporary and not glued.

Underneath

The flexi I'm using between the return pump and piping is a little to rigid, it puts pressure on the pump so I'll also be replacing that with some nicer flexi.
Apart from that I'm pretty happy with all this.

 

[Wrangy]

Nice work mate, it looks really good! How did you go about silencing the overflow as I'm having real issues with noise and wan't to be able to quieten it even a little lol

 

[Sam Parker]

new plumbing looks great, nice work!

 

[gtrxu1]

Nice work mate, it looks really good! How did you go about silencing the overflow as I'm having real issues with noise and wan't to be able to quieten it even a little lol

Have a read about beananimal overflows, its designed to be completely silent. Not sure if it would be possible to have a silent overflow with the standard Cade plumbing. The problem is the drain and the standpipe share the same lower pipe, which is a massive oversight from Cade IMO. The trick is to have just a trickle going down the standpipe and the drain taking most of the flow. Not sure how that would work on the Cade as the lower pipe is shared between the drain and the standpipe.

Also the ball valve on my old tank is crap so when I need to adjust it I do the adjustment on the eheim pump to slow it down a little, rather than the ball valve.
Moving the ball valve like 1mm is enough to make it gurgle. The old tank is generally silent though but needs constant tuning.

 

[gtrxu1]

Didn't do much with the tank on the weekend, have been neglecting the current/old tank a bit lately so I spent a lot of time on that.

The crooked weir comb was really getting on my nerves so I pulled it off, i'll be putting in a better one asap.

Will also be getting some black vinyl for the background this week, anyone know where I can get it from?

 

[Wrangy]

Weir finally got the best of you? :p
Ernie at Reeflections has some really good black backing for the tank which is what I'm using, you just have to take your time and use a ruler or knife to make sure you don't trap air when you do it but it looks great :)

 

[gtrxu1]

Cool thanks @Wrangy i'll give them a call.

 

[Wrangy]

No problems mate! Just happy to help out :)

 

[gtrxu1]

Well after a lot of negotiation the wife has decided that the new tank can go in another spot in the room which means I don't have to pull the old one down to move it out of the way.

This is exciting as I was a little put off by having to pull the old tank down.

Full steam ahead now hopefully will be cycling in another week or two! Just need to get some live rock and sand and I am pretty much ready to roll.

 

[gtrxu1]

Finally got the loc-line in the mail and rigged up my return plumbing, only to discover the loc-line is pissing water everywhere.
Took a day off work as well so I could finish the tank.

I have so much bad luck buying things online :( Dam you fish-street.

 

[holly]

:( This always happens to me too. Should take 1 hr = all day disaster.

 

[gtrxu1]

Made some modifications, shortened the locline and ran some longer poly tubing with an elbow.
Not to happy with the look of it now, the elbow is a little chunky although the focus wont be on that once the tank is filled.

Would love some feedback...

 

[gtrxu1]

Was thinking about doing something really ambitious, thinking I could drill a hole for the return :eek
Kind of risky, should have gone custom by the time I'm done it will be custom tank anyway :D