chippwalters

Just uploaded a new reactor design to Printables. Here are some pictures. Learn more about it at:

https://www.printables.com/model/292376-aquarium-reactor

Gave one to Tim to try out. Made in PLA (which I've tested and seems to work fine in my smaller saltwater tank over 1 years time).

Cost of materials isn't too bad: 

• Acrylic Tube: 4" x 3" OD 2 3/4" ID : $6
• Pump at Amazon: $11
• 3D plastic: ~$4
• Laser cut Acrylic pieces: ~$4
• So, it's under $30 all-in if you have a 3D printer and a Laser cutter.

On 2/24/2022 at 8:15 AM, mFrame said:

That's a beautiful design Chipp!  I have transitioned to printing tank parts with PETG for durability.  Have you done any investigation about PLA and it's lifetime in saltwater?  How long are your parts lasting?  I know that several strainer feeders and other parts I have printed tend to become algae traps so I was replacing them often.  I've wondered about coating them in epoxy, the print lines seem to provide the surface area that algae loves.

Hi Mike,

My parts seem to be doing well. I've got a reactor in the sump for close to 10 months now, with no issues. I wash it out every few months, but my sump is cryptic, so there's not much light getting to it for algae to grow.

Hey guys, been a while since I posted. Tim and I get together every couple weeks to talk about saltwater stuff and politics (jk!). I already have an interesting 22 gallon with 15 gallon sump going on over a year now and it's doing great. But the purpose of this topic thread is to show you a small reef tank I've been designing with Tim's help. It starts with a 6 gallon inexpensive tank from Amazon, somewhere around 80 bucks. And has a pretty nice $60 lamp which I'll share with you later. The goal is to create a sump area in the back and do it in a way that minimizes maintenance effort while maximizing water changes. So I have a tiny little pump that has a valve in it which can pump water out of the back into a 1 gallon polyethylene milk container so that there's no siphoning necessary. And, there's a little can be pure tray set up for the overflow box as well as a cryptic rubble sump area.

Here's a video that explains it a bit more. I'm using a glowforge laser cutting machine to help out and if I need to have got a 3D printer but I'm trying to minimize the customization necessary. In other words, the idea it would be that I could just cut out the parts on the glowforge and ship them in a flat pack and somebody could assemble them if they wanted to.

Anyway, here's the video explaining part of it.

Yeah, that was ABS. We'll have to wait and see how it works out.

1 hour ago, Timfish said:

If I'm remembering correctly yhe overflow Chipp printed when he first strarted printing stuff and has another couple years use on it in addition to how long your system's been running.

 

This small tank reactor is great for nano tanks under 40 gallons. It moves around 100 gallons an hour through the media bag.

I use it with pre-packaged bags of Chemipure Elite:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BS96U60/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_Q20Z0XT4EXQ1MGPEWZ53?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

but you can use it with any media in a filter bag, including charcoal, gfo and other.

It requires the use of this inexpensive pump, which snaps directly into the side. You can get 2 of them for $18:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07SKGYNYZ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The unit can sit on the bottom of your sump or you can attach it to the wall using these 1.26 inch D x 1/8 inch neodymium disc magnets (always be careful when handling magnets!):

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B089CPXQQG/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o06_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The magnets are enclosed in screw cap containers.

This reactor is super simple to operate and clean. You can easily snap the pump on and off the unit, and there are no holes on the bottom so it won't drip water when your remove it from your sump. Just unscrew the lid to swap out the media bag.

I printed it in PLA using a .4mm nozzle with .2mm layer height. Printed on my MK3S+

Files can be found at: https://www.prusaprinters.org/prints/139031-small-aquarium-tank-reactor

Gorgeous! You've done a great job with this tank

Kim, sorry to hear about the over feeding incident. Hope things turn out. I too just lost some 2+ year old acans which fell (or should I say we're *pushed* by Mr. Tuxedo) from their post into one of Pat's recovering frogspawn. The euphyllia won the ensuing battle.

Great to see how well you've done with this new setup. It looks great!,

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I received my order from brs with the clear netting, so I got the screen tops done.

I always liked that solution. I've sadly lost at least 3 fish to jumping and recently purchased the same kit. Nice to see it works for you!

Well, sad to say, but this one's gone now. I've replaced it with an ADA 60-P which has a new tank thread and can be found at:

http://www.austinreefclub.com/topic/28548-chipps-ada-60-p/

Beautiful pictures. The macro lens is very nice. Patrick

Whoops. Sorry. Those pics taken with my iPhone!

Woke up this morning thinking something was wrong. What downstairs and the sun was shining through the window at just the right time, at just the right part of the year, and my tank was gorgeous.

Turns out what was actually happening, was the tank was having a memorial service for my one and only fish, who had decided last night to take a stroll outside the tank.

Funny. I'm thinking of taking a job as Miss Cleo's assistant!

Just received my new ADA 60-P. It's exactly the same footprint, only twice as tall.

I found some really nice legacy dried coral which I'm going to aquascape and add some dry rock. I plan on running to two tanks off the same pump until the 60-P is ready, then I'll transfer all corals and fish from the 60-F to the 60-P.

Here's the legacy corals:

Nice shot of new green leather:

Also, new (LAST?) FTS: (newly 3D printed snail guard on return).

More from Pat's place..

Went to Subsea's place last week and took these pics. Not sure what everything is, but there's some nice colors!

And more..

More..

Added some bright green zoas, and some blue zoas, and a few polys. Some pics of everything...

Nice photos. I really like the third one here you have two areas/corals in crisp focus. I like the second to the last coral. What kind is that?

The second to last pic is Patricks frogspawn frag I picked up from him a few months ago. He had a tank crash last year and thought he had lost all his mixed frogspawn. Then, slowly, it started coming back. I got a small frag. Some great krypto tips! I hope to get it all the way back and then reseed him with new frags.

Wow those are some great shots!

Thanks, Kim. Do you have a new build thread?

Awesome indeed. The details on the snails working side was phenominal.

Hi Patrick. Do you recognize your frogspawn?

Got rid of the GBTA. Wasn't looking good and started walking around the tank a bit and just didn't want to chance it. Replaced it with a very nice Krypto Hammer. Finally got around to purchasing a decent camera. Ended up with a Lumix G5-K micro 4/3 which has just been reduced to $400, and also bought a nice Olympus ED 60mm f2.8 macro lens. Just playing around and took these shots:

Update: Of course the gbta doesn't want to behave, and has now crawled around back. So far, it hasn't harmed anything, but I'm still moving corals around 'just to be sure' until he settles down.

I have to say, I did have some doubts for awhile there about this whole cryptic sump business, but it really is working great now. I clean the glass maybe every other week-- I've let it go longer with than 2 weeks with still no notable algae or scum. So very low maintenance as all I do is add some live bacteria solution, change out the filter each week, and top off the water. I've been doing water changes every 2 weeks lately and pumped up the lighting as well to 100% from the Radion and things are looking really good. No skimmer, just a bag of charcoal and one of Purigen every couple months and I've been good.

Tim's and Patricks frogspawn are very healthy. Brian's magnificent Duncans are gorgeous and Aqua Ranch's acans and Japanese Dendro are rocking. I did buy a beautiful cleaner shrimp, but the powerhead got him the next day. Ouch.

A couple pics from my iPhone:

Oh, and I did splurge for one of these:

It's called an Ogle Macro Viewer (for aquariums) and it's supposed to work great with smartphones. We'll see.

I love LPS, and your tank looks great! I've been wondering how it was going.

Thanks. Here's another FTS...with the GBTA

Look forward to catching up next month.

Been a while since my last post. A lot has happened. Pretty much going forward with an all LPS tank.

The tank was just too shallow to support SPS and not bleach out all the LPS on the bottom.

Here are some latest images.

Tim,

Thought I'd update you on the birdsnest. Here are a few pics. The 'lighter' stuff is getting redder, and the red piece is almost the same color as the goniopora! Looking good ;-)

Pat is a great guy always helping people out with knowledge, frags or both

Yep, couldn't agree more. He babysat a few of my corals which just barely survived-- in fact he still has some of my Acans which are still struggling. Recently, I returned the favor and helped him build his new website: www.aquacultureranch.com (not quite yet ready for business).

I have that replacement duncan if you want to schedule time to swing by.