Pasfur's 58 bowfront build
 

The time has arrived. Last night I began the set up of my 58 bowfront, which for the next 6 months or so will be a reef aquarium. After my 180 is mature and the reef is moved, my eventual plans are to use this as a FOWLR tank, perhaps as a species tank for a Pelewensis or Pearscale Butterfly.

Here is a full shot of the 58 bowfront.
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Here is the sump that my brother made. Great design, but there is one big problem. It doesn't fit.
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Given that I am up against the clock and have to get my 38 reef moved into this 58 bowfront within 3 weeks, I decided to use a 10 gallon tank as a sump until my brother can build another. Here is a sump pic:
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I would strongly suggest that anyone planning a reef tank not buy a 58 bowfront. The inside of the sand is ridiculously small. The only option I have for additional sump size is to make a triangle shaped sump, which most people do not have the skills or free glass to design.

Here is my overflow with a Durso:
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Here is the skimmer system I am using currently.
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A point of clarification. The skimmer you see is a CPR double skimmer, with biomedia left inside. This goes against everything I normally recommend. Here is the distinction... in this skimmer design ALL WATER first passes thru the skimmers BEFORE entering the biomedia. In effect, the biomedia serves as an effective bubble trap and very little biological processing of organic waste will occur.

On the plus side, eventually I will remove a large portion of live rock from this 58 to place into my 180. At that time, the biological capability of the biomedia chamber will serve as "insurance", in the event that some organic acids are not skimmed out upon the skimmer pass.

Bottom line, if this was going to be a permanent reef system, then I would not have the biomedia. But because this will eventually be a FOWLR and have a limited supply of live rock at that time, I decided to leave the biomedia in place, under the condition that no water enters the biomedia without first being skimmed.

I plan to add sand and live rock today. More pics to come tonight.

So much for the sand NOT causing the water to be cloudy...

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Hopefully this does not cause much of a delay. Deadline for moving livestock: 18 days.

Sorry guys... more pics will come when this water clears up. Every time I move the live rock around the aquarium gets so cloudy you can't see anything.

I will NEVER use this sand again, I can tell you that. I'm glad I learned this lesson on the 58 and not the 180.

what sand did you use? there always seems to be some sort of cloudiness.

I used CaribSea, which is extremely common in the pet shops. I normally use aragonite, rather than aragonite sand, and trust me when I tell you my 180 will not have CaribSea substrate.

By my count this is the 22nd marine aquarium I have had in my personal fishkeeping career, and I have never had any experience as horrible as this substrate. I will be having a discussion with the LFS owner and with the manufacturer. The directions and claims on the bag are completely misleading.

FINALLY! The water has cleared up enough to post some pics. I am still struggling with the camera... having a hard time getting the depth to show up in the pictures. Here is my best work:

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I think some of the cloudiness may have been a bacterial bloom. I tripled the amount of live rock in the tank last night and the cloudiness was gone this morning.

A close up:

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awesome rock work!

For anyone who is interested in my son's Turtle tank, I moved it today and took some pics:
http://www.fishforum.com/vivarium-po...55/#post179909

The rock work you've done is stellar :-)