Matt's 29g Custom LED

Condensed version of my tank build. If you see one of my DIY projects and want some more info on it let me know and I'll put up a link to the build.

So... I started off with a typical 29g tank and took off the top. Ended up looking like this:

Next I modded the tank to include a filtering area, fuge and overflow from the main section of the tank similar to a JBJ. Donnie helped me with the design here:



And here's what it looked like after all of the cutting, drilling siliconing ect.

I used a Rio +1100 380gph pump for the return and a Rio 90 85gph pump for the reactor. Also placed a hydor rotating deflector on the return into the tank.

I'm using filter floss on the top shelf, chaeto in the middle (soon to be lit by a JBJ Nano-Glo), and 100ml of purigen on the bottom shelf. Using 6.5oz of Chemi-Pure Elite in the reactor.

For lighting I went with an Evolution LED 14k unit. Here's a spec sheet on the 20k unit. My unit has 60 blue LEDs and 59 white LEDs. The unit is 119w and each LED is a 1w LED. The unit is not dimmable but blues and whites each have their own power cord and their is a power button on the top of the light that turns off the whites for those times when you want to show the tank off with just the blues on. Here's the specs:



And here's an example of these lights hanging over a 240g. Not mine!

Here's a quick picture of my reactor. Just built it from a gravel vac. Lol.

I ended up cutting the blue end completely off and capping it with another piece of acrylic. Then cutting a hole in that acrylic and attaching the entire thing on top of the pump.

So I grabbed two clowns hosting in green hairy mushrooms from Jason and approx 22lbs of live rock. I also have 5lbs of live rock in my live rock rubble section in my fuge... if you were curious of my total. I will add more live rock later though.

Here are some pics of my tank fully set up now. :-)

And here's my first video:

Tank looks great Matt, I like the look of the LEDs!!

Nice Tank!!

BigBlue wrote:Nice Tank!!

+1!!! I love those leds!

Awesome tank!!!

Nice tank !!!

Thanks ya'll! I've got to be honest... I never really imagined it would turn out this well. You always hope... but when it comes down to it you never know. Couldn't have come out looking so nice so quick without Jason's generosity. You won't be on this forum for long before you realize that he's very respected, and after dealing with him a few times you'll know why.

Here are the new frags I picked up from ritter in the co-op and a new full tank shot. As soon as I saw these pics I changed my tank background from blue to black. You'll notice the change in my next batch of pictures, but in this one... ignore the ugly blue background. lol.

Green Senularia


Velvet Finger Montipora Digitata - Ritter called it brown... Velvet Finger sounds so much better. lol


Frogspawn! So pumped...

Nice adds matt.

Who is this jason guy?

On the often referred to "other forum" he's pool_man. Over here he's j.davis. And... if he checks his email today he'll find that a friend of his offered to help him clean out his new tank tomorrow.

+1 on Jason. Awesome guy. That tank gonna take lots of "help" matt.

matt_longview wrote:
Velvet Finger Montipora Digitata - Ritter called it brown... Velvet Finger sounds so much better. lol


Frogspawn! So pumped...

Velvet finger it is! Take care of that frogspawn it was my first born baby! The mother colony is making baby heads like this,

You did good Matt! Taking that trim off the tank kinda worried me but looks like it worked out great.

Hahaha! Ritter that vid is classic.

That mother colony is a beast. Does it have any purple tint on the arms when they're stretched out? I couldn't tell if my little one would or not.

Thanks Donnie! I thought it would be okay, but I was sure it would be fine after I ran it filled all the way to the very top for several weeks without any extra braces inside. Adding that fuge to the inside of it only made it stronger. :-)

gabe that frogspawn looks just awesome! if u happen to have any more pieces fall off it and just cant make up your mind where to put it... leme know lol been wanting some of that or a torch or hammer coral or somethin like that... it looks really nice and my lil tank is doing better than ever, id like to try a LPS in there soon and maybe even a lil clam down the road! but here i go getting ambitious again... i better settle down!