Dumpster hexagon

[Fearnofish541]

So last weekend I made a late night trip to plaid pantry in Oregon City at around 2am. I live close enough that I always walk there. As I'm walking I notice there a hexagon aquarium with stand and canopy next to their dumpster. I asked the clerk about it and someone dumped it there and he said I could have it. I told I'd look at it and I might take take it. I went there and looked better it's a truvu hexagon with a nice oak? stand and canopy. Tank was pretty scratched up and the stand and canopy had a few scratches. I got so excited to take it I didn't even bother to go home and get my truck I just opened the cabinet door shoved the canopy inside plopped it up on my shoulder and grabbed the tank and walked home super happy. My wife was very surprised when I came back with all this at 2am when I just went to get cigarettes. She been making behind jokes about it all week but she's excited we get to setup a new tank. After looking at it at home we found the inside was scratched pretty bad and some air bubbles at top of a seam. I will wet sand and polish the inside and outside. I'm a bit worried about air bubbles.

So this is going to be a extreme budget tank partly for the challenge, mostly because we just had our second son and like lots of folks money has gotten tight the last few years. I've been reefing for 6 years now so like anyone who's been doing it for awhile I got lots of extra equipment. In fact I really only need to buy two things for this and that's a nano HOB protein skimmer and sand. I have some old sand I guess I could wash but sands cheaps enough I'll just start fresh. 

I have a ton of old live rock that's been dried out for few years when I downsized my main tank probably around 90 lbs. The tank a have now is 15 gal aio and the rock in there is nasty and I was going to acid clean it in near future. Since that was my plan before I got this tank I had already bleached around 30 lbs of the dry rock I had and I was just at the point that I need to cycle it. Which is perfect timing for this second tank. 

Lights will be a Mars Aqua black box led. I've had pretty good results with this light but I might upgrade my main tank light and use the kessil from that on this tank.

Filtration for now will be a small hob marine land from a planted tank. I have a couple packs of new filters too still. This is just till I can afford a small hob skimmer probably be able to get it before it cycled. I'll still use the little hob when/if needed after the skimmer is on.

[Fearnofish541]

Cleaned it out really good and got to wet sanding. After sanding I used novus steps 3-1. I spent roughly 4 hours sanding and polishing there's still a few scratches that were deep but they're mostly gone and hardly noticeable. The scratches in the picture are the bottom. 

I'm still figuring out how I want actually mount the light but for now it's slightly raised off the top.

Got the tank in place and filled it with enough water to start cycling the rock but I still need to figure that seam and how I'm going to fix it. Figured I can start cycling the rocks until I fix that seam since if I need to it's easy to drain it and take rock out. I also wanted the carpet and padding to settle a bit before filling completely.

Also once I got what rock I had already bleached in the tank I realized I need a lot more to look nice and get the look I want. So I need to get out to my storage unit and start bleaching more rock. I might just acid wash then bleach all the rock including what's in the tank now before it's cycled all the way. 

[Fearnofish541]

Was planning on getting some acrylic rod and weld on 16 from Tap plastics but I work graveyard and with the two kids I was just too tired to go. I did get some weld on 16 from dad and just ran a thick bead on the inside with propped up on its side. It held water before I did this and should be fine I just wanted a little extra piece of mind. 

Got it in place and started mixing salt water. I got a 5 gal jug with some live rock I started curing last week. I have maybe 10 lbs sand in the bucket also. Need to go get more sand next weekend. Pulled the rest of the old rock out of the garage and there was still a bit of saltwater in the tub and the rocks were wet. I'm thinking about doing a acid bath then soak in bleach. It's all been through multiple tanks and some I got second hand and who knows what they put it through. Thinking the acid bath and bleach soak with give it the best fresh start. Before this went out to the garage I had it in water with heater and pump for 2-3 months before I dumped most of the water out it out there. I might just try using it as is and testing the water before adding anything live to the tank.

Hot glued this mess of a light riser out of plastic cardboard. I don't want drill into the canopy yet because I probably won't keep the black box led but I also didn't want to just set it on top of the tank. So in the spirit of being cheap build I brought home some plastic cardboard that was going to be tossed. I cut up some strips and hot glued those together then I spot glued that to the light should be easy to remove but keep it in place. With the canopy no one will see it and it works.  

[Hincapiej4]

I'm selling a reefi uno that would probably do well for that tank. Just fyi.

[pdxmonkeyboy]

nice work man!  I wouldn't worry about those bubbles.  As long as they don't go all the way through the seam you are fine, plus they are at the top of the tank.  I loathe truview acrylic tanks because they are SOOO thin they bow like crazy.  On the plus side though, this tank won't due that because the panels are so narrow.