90G Lee-Mar with basement sump
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URL: http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633
Printed Date: July 14 2025 at 9:46am
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Topic: 90G Lee-Mar with basement sump
Posted By: sunflashx
Subject: 90G Lee-Mar with basement sump
Date Posted: February 06 2011 at 3:33pm
I've had this tank and stand for like 8 years and never been filled.  The last 3 or 4 years it sat mainly because I knew I'd be building a new house and have no where to keep it during the transition. It's time has finally come, and during the construction of my new house I took the opportunity to embed 3 1.5" PVC pipes along with an additional chase for cables, or tubing or whatever in the wall after framing was complete. They drop down to the room below my office that will primarily be a sump room, along with other random junk.  I've also got a dedicated 20A circuit wired in for it. I really should have done two for redundancy, but didn't think of it at the time. I can always fish a cable up through the chase.  The project is picking up now, last Thursday 100 lbs of Bulk Reef Supply eco rock showed up.   
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Replies:
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: February 06 2011 at 3:38pm
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I think I'm pretty happy right now with the aquascape given the rock that I have to choose from. We'll see what sort of criticism I get here first though. The corner view is what you see from my front door and entry way into the office. The intent there was for it to be more open sand bed. The left hand side is what I see from my desk. Phase 1 will be to finish the plumbing for the overflows. They'll have ball valves on the underside so I can shut them off. Then I'll fill it up as is now and work on turning that dead rock into live while I build out the plumbing and sump. |
Posted By: Nick801
Date Posted: February 06 2011 at 4:48pm
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This looks like its going to be a great build =) I'm jealous of anyone who has the ability to have a basement sump/fish room =) ------------- http://www.reefinsanity.com" rel="nofollow - www.ReefInsanity.com http://www.facebook.com/ReefInsanity" rel="nofollow - www.Facebook.com/ReefInsanity 801-680-4676 |
Posted By: Lewy
Date Posted: February 06 2011 at 5:16pm
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This has great potential, and I think you are right on track. ------------- 40 gal w/ 20 sump |
Posted By: Adam Blundell
Date Posted: February 06 2011 at 9:28pm
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I like it! Adam ------------- Come to a meeting, they�re fun! |
Posted By: cl2ysta1
Date Posted: February 06 2011 at 9:39pm
 ------------- I <3 Boxers Achilles tang lover |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: February 07 2011 at 3:08am
I'd be on a better track if I remembered the correct size of the tank.  I've been sitting here trying to figure out why I have so little room left in the front of the tank with average size rocks. That's because it's only a 90 and I'm missing six inches of depth, compared to the tanks I was comparing myself against.  |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: February 07 2011 at 10:11am
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So when I originally bought this thing I think I originally intended to drive a lot more flow through my sump to avoid having powerheads all over my display. Right now the plan is to have 2x Tunze Turbelle 6105s which are lightyears better than anything that was around when I bought it. Right now I have 2 overflows with 4 total 3/4 holes. The plan was a Herbie style system, 1 siphon per overflow 1 gravity per overflow the like drains together and heading down to the basement. Return comes up the back of the tank. I don't think I really have the need to run that much flow through the sump. I can probably push 700+ gph through it with the combination of two drains. Would I be better served ripping one of them out and blocking off the holes and picking up some tank space? I think it would also eliminate a possible poorly flowing area between the two overflows. |
Posted By: Mark Peterson
Date Posted: February 07 2011 at 8:23pm
Good idea. 
------------- Reefkeeping Tips, & quick, easy setup tricks: www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=9244 Pay it forward - become a paid WMAS member
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Posted By: Corey Price
Date Posted: February 08 2011 at 1:03pm
| Less flow thru sump downstairs=less noise. Herbie method is one way to go for basement sumps, but be prepared for a couple trips up & down the stairs to adjust the water level in the overflow. |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 24 2011 at 8:10pm
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I now have semi live rock. I picked up a coraline coated rock from Mark Petersen, along with another piece of rock with some macro algae on it to start the tank off. All the well lit areas are cropping up with Coraline algae. Unfortunately my current lighting system is a 32 watt power compact left over from my old 7G bowfront, so the lighting coverage isn't edge to edge, but it does seem to be causing growth at all depths. Hard to tell from the pictures, my Canon Rebel died, so I'm stuck with a bad camera now that the tank is sucking up all my money.  
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Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 25 2011 at 2:00am
 As you can see that 32 watt PC isn't going to cut it. I've got a new LED light fixture in the works. Currently I'm thinking it will be 1 of 2 I use over this tank.   I'm using 2 meanwell 60-48D drivers. The blues are wired in parallel as there are 16 lamps which puts me over the voltage limit of the drivers. Ultimately I'd like to drive the plain blues separately from the rest so I can use them as moonlight and keep the place free of the clutter of an additional lighting system. That will make my strings too short on lamps though, so I'll have to rewire them again into 1 string. There's also the fact that driving that few LED's doesn't work with these drivers, I'll have to hunt up a different model Meanwell driver. |
Posted By: Josh95
Date Posted: March 25 2011 at 9:18pm
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The best idea would to run the blue and royal blue on 1 circuit and the CW on the other circuit. It is awesome, controllable from 6k-20k |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 25 2011 at 10:13pm
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The blues are currently all wired in together. They're all wired in on the same driver/dimmer. During normal daylight hours I'd like to run the blues at probably the same output as the Royals, I'd just like to have the capacity to run them low output during the night for moonlights. That's more of a someday when I buy a controller that can dim the lamps variably throughout the day sort of plan though. Also, there's no CW. Strange as it is, all my whites are Neutral White by design. Mixing in some CW could be good, but it's a struggle to include more colors and still be able to get decent color mixing without using a cost prohibitive number of lamps. I really like the color this arrangement should provide. I probably won't know for some time though if it works for me as well as the pictures I'm basing my decisions off. I don't anticipate having anything that will really show off the colors for a while yet. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 04 2011 at 12:57am
 Drilled my first tank today. That was somewhat un-nerving. I'm not sure which is worse, replacing the whole tank, or the idea of tearing the thing apart to try and successfuly replace one pane.  I placed the pump on the edge of my "sumpbench", as it seems like it left more usable work space on the bench. It also aligns the return more closely to the pipe it joins up with going back up. The return pump is a ReeFlo UNO Tarpon, the construction of the thing is pretty impressive.  This is one of the Bulk Reef Supply SCH 80 bulk heads. The thing is a beast compared to my tiny drain bulkheads. $13 vs $6? In the upgrade display tank I'm already planning I'll only use these babies. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 3:41am
 Sumpbench just before being painted. 12 cut outs on the back panel for electrical boxes and individual outlets, perfect for clock timers or DC adapters. The top row and the bottom row will be on separate circuits each chained off of a gfci outlet. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: dc
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 3:56am
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sunflashx wrote:Posted By: dc
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 4:03am
| it would free up some space but you say no powerheads for flow and 700 gph is a bit low for a reef, unless you looking at LPS and softies. also 2x3/4 drains i think 800 gph max. i have 1x1" & 1x3/4" and run a mag 12, if i close the 3/4 drain the tank will over flow in about 4-5 hours. just my thoughts. |
Posted By: dc
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 4:07am
| sorry i mean 700 gph is a bit low for a 90 gal. 900 + is more ideal. but just my thoughts. |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 4:27pm
The low flow is just for the sump. Primary circulation is a Tunze 6105 on a 7096 Controller, and I'm planning on adding a second 6105 to do a back and forth interval or wave generation. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 4:38pm
 Painted, and wired up for outlets. The top deck has a piece of travertine pattern Formica drying on it.  The boxes are sealed pretty well other than the two side penetrations, and I tried to give them all a pretty good drip loop. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: dc
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 6:41pm
| oh closed loop? good idea! sorry i must have missed that. |
Posted By: Kirklan
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 8:36pm
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The build looks like it is off to a great start! ------------- SE Idaho 67G Rimless Reef |
Posted By: saltlaketank
Date Posted: April 10 2011 at 9:42pm
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Bad ass that you took the time to hardwire all the boxes into your tank like that. By the time I'm ready for my big tank I will know just what to do. ------------- JayDee 8016042780 90 Gallon 30 Gallon sump G3 Skimmer |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 15 2011 at 6:17pm
Trimming the edge off of the Formica counter top surface the the top of the bench. It was glued on with 3M "77" spray adhesive. Getting closer to getting this thing in the loop. Pipes need to get swing over to the left side of the tank, and a friend is supposed to be dropping off some pieces of glass that are my baffles.  ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 23 2011 at 4:57pm
Avast CS1 Skimmer. I got it with an auto squeegee neck cleaner thing, they call a Swabbie. It was back ordered, and shipped a few days after the rest of the kit. It should be here in a couple days. Lots of parts, slightly confusing as I've never held a skimmer in my hands before, and they had updated the design slightly but not the documentation.  All done. A few of the glue seams turned out really well, some of them not so well. This was my first experience with Acrylic and solvent cement, so I'm pretty sure I could do a better job next time.  At $254 with the pump it seemed like a pretty good deal. Seems to be about $100 under anything comparable that comes assembled. I guess we'll find out what sort of deal it was it if all blows apart on me the first time I fire it up. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: Deluxe247
Date Posted: April 29 2011 at 10:34pm
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I think the fridge within arm's length of the "sump bench" adds a nice touch to your man space. Perfect for grabbing a soda or cold pizza. ------------- 90G Mixed Reef |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: May 23 2011 at 1:55am
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Finally finished plumbing in the sump. I had a hell of a time finding 3/4" PVC flex that I wanted to use on my pump outlet and my overflow drains. It's set up to be about 6" below the rim to keep any splashing contained. So far it seems to be working well. The Herbie style drain took some tuning to get dialed in, which is about a hundred trips up and down the stains, and probably more to come. I still need to tune my drain plumbing a little.  So far no leaks in my plumbing and only a near almost flood when setting the drains initially. One ball valve shut off that should have been on...  Blue tape marks on the side, I filled it from 5 gallon jugs so I could get an idea of how much volume the return side was at.  The skimmer didn't blow up, it's been running for about a week now with just plain salt water. It pulled some junk out of that, but settled down to not sending anything up to the cup. Hopefully it picks up now that the tank is looped in. 1/4" feed line off the main there for a CA reactor. It's flow volume should be low enough it won't mes with my return rate or cause me any grief. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: jmtreml
Date Posted: May 23 2011 at 4:38am
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Looks like an awsome setup! ------------- 34 Gallon Red Sea Max 29 gallon Bio cube |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: June 02 2011 at 11:28am
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Finally finished the first half of my LED lighting array. I'll have one of these on each side my my stand for the left and right arrays. It's sort of Ghetto fabulous, but the common alternative just seems to be to wad it all up in a box of some sort in a tangled mess. The number of drivers required when using the common Meanwell drivers is messy. There's probably like a 30% chance I'll do something different with it, so I left all the wires long and just coiled them up and stapled them to the backing board with my cable staple gun.  I haven't put optics of any sort on it yet and it's half of the LED numbers I am planning on. Whites are being driven at 1000 ma as the efficiency of the lamps supposedly decreases as you approach max output, and lifespan decreases. The blue strings are set at 750ma max and are probably being driven closer to 500 as it's set now.  I've still been running off of the 34w PC light until now, so I haven't tried to add any sort of coral, as I want a primarily SPS tank and that wasn't going to work out. Time to start frag shopping. I had anticipated putting some sort of shroud for airflow on the heatsink, and I think that would have been true if I ran it in an exhaust type mode sucking in air and blowing it upwards. I found that pointing the airflow down at the heatsink it vents naturally down the full length of the sink, and being able to feel air venting out the ends of it. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 21 2012 at 12:41pm
I'm rebuilding my LED fixtures with the new heatsinks Rapidled.com sells. You can see the guides for the splash shield in the picture, I really like that, along with the way the fins are formed on the top so you can mount things to it is great. Also, it has taller fins than the normal heatsinkusa.com stuff lots of people use, which should shed heat better, not that it's really an issue. I struggle with finding a layout that maintains a 2 to 1 ratio of blue to white and maintains an even distribution. I settled on this:  I'm also redoing my driver installation, and moving it down to the basement. I picked up 10 euro style wiring blocks from eBay for $0.99 + shipping, they should make my mounting cleaner. Reefledlights wants $5 a shot for them, and they are $10 ea at the home depot.  More pictures to come when I wrap it all up. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: Melissa
Date Posted: March 21 2012 at 12:50pm
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Very nice. We still need to come out and visit and see it all. |
Posted By: Aquarium Creations
Date Posted: March 21 2012 at 1:34pm
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I didnt know Leemar built aquariums with plastic trim. nice build thread ------------- Aquarium Maintenance,Consulting,Custom Built Glass Aquariums Rimless/Euro,24Hr Emergency Service 8015485201 Www.UtahAquariumDoctors.com [email protected] |
Posted By: Adam Blundell
Date Posted: March 21 2012 at 2:44pm
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I hadn't seen this until just now... WAY cool!!!! Adam ------------- Come to a meeting, they�re fun! |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 22 2012 at 12:39am
They may not anymore, I bought it quite a while ago. It came to me new from Mountain Shadows... ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 30 2012 at 7:15pm
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Finished V2 fixture. Fan is crooked because the slotted fins are lined up for a 90mm fan, and this is a 120mm. Power connectors are Anderson Powerpoles, with a hydrostatic anti corrosion product on the terminals, ordered from www.powerwerx.com.  Integrated splash shield is pulled back to the 2nd row of LEDs so you can see it's there.  ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 30 2012 at 7:19pm
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My blue strings have room for a couple more LEDs each, I may end up sticking a couple cool blue (plain blue, not royal blue) on it for color. I have a bag of optics to put on once it's all tested out and ready to go. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 31 2012 at 9:54am
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Picked up a 65 gallon tank from http://www.synergyplastics.net/" rel="nofollow - Rotational Molding of Utah up in Brigham City. It came with 2 3/4 fittings plastic welded on to the tank, so no need for bulkheads. Different sizes were available. Like all the plastic tanks I've had, it came reeking of new plastic, so I filled it up with tap water and a pound or so of baking soda and ran that for a couple weeks. Now it's nice and fresh. I picked up the pump from the Classifieds here.  I picked up a set of two http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/store/brs-top-off-doser-50-ml-per-minute.html" rel="nofollow - BRS Top off Dosers and plan on doing a continuous water change. I'll run the pumps for 30-60 minutes a day and swap out 10% ish per month.  Pictures out of my basement are pretty terrible, the light isn't very good and I'm still using my phone for a camera. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: Dion Richins
Date Posted: March 31 2012 at 10:41am
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Sweet!! Cant wait to start my new build!!! ------------- http://www.customaquariumfurniture.com" rel="nofollow - Bad "censored" Cabinets Best quality in the valley! He is one sexy bald guy, even with out a finger!(MAC) |
Posted By: Josh95
Date Posted: March 31 2012 at 11:35am
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Looks good man, i got to really reding into your LEDs and on your pic it says your running the whites at 1000mA, so in this case i have to wonder what LEDs are these again? because if your running them at max amperage i've read that it reduces the lifespan of the LEDs. ------------- Josh M. Phone: 406.471.1334 |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: March 31 2012 at 6:21pm
Neutral white XP-G. Max amperage is actually 1500mA http://www.cree.com/products/pdf/xlampxp-g.pdf" rel="nofollow - http://www.cree.com/products/pdf/xlampxp-g.pdf Page 3. The new CREE XML's max out at 3000mA. Most people run them at less than maximum because the power to light ratio is exponential. You get diminishing returns on efficiency the closer you get to maximum power. As long as you can shed the heat I don't believe lifespan is effected. ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 04 2012 at 10:34pm
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Finished driver assembly (2 blue drivers on left, 1 white, 1 extra on right side of board):  Under tank termination:  Light fixture mounting tray:  ------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |
Posted By: sunflashx
Date Posted: April 10 2012 at 9:48pm
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Current Tunze settings. Powers heads alternate back and forth every 4 hours, and ramp up from 30% to the upper setting over 3 seconds when it's the active unit, otherwise it idles along at 30%. Minimum flow is 30% at all times from each. #1 is on the left, #2 is on the right. #1 used to have a higher power rating but was blowing sand around. The left hand side of the tank developed a little algae on the sand bed so I upped the flow going that direction and it's been clearing up without moving sand. I'm sure I could probably still turn them up some, but I haven't worked at finding perfect positioning and settings for them since I added the 2nd one. The 6105 pumps would really rock a 6' long tank. They're kind of big for my tank unless it was maybe full up of mature sps colonies creating drag. 
------------- http://www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=46633" rel="nofollow - 90G Display, 75G Basement Sump, "DIY" Avast Skimmer, DIY LED Array |