May want to tell your girlfriend that seahorse and fish in an aquarium are not a good mix. Fish will eat the food before the seahorse has a chance. Sadly, many seahorse that end up in aquariums die of starvation.

My vote...make it a seahorse only tank!!!!!!!

I can already see that alan will be a die hard - hard core reefer. I mean look at it. He has a 27" antennae powered TV sitting in the living room, and instead of getting cable & a big screen, he buys a tank!

Alan - whenever you get thing setup, come on over. I'll hook you up with a few frags. Lets spread the AEFWs & Monti Eating Nudibranchs around!

Actually the atennas and cheap tv stand our out now. We just bought all new living room furniture today. It didnt come out of the reef tank found tho. lol

I'll stop by as soon as I get it set-up, hopefully you get rid of all those pests soon.

The background looks great dude. Looks like it came that way.

Alan:
Sent you a PM, but thought I'd post as well. If you need a stand for your tank, I have a very nice oak stand and light fixture (oak) which would be suitable. Send me your email address and I'll send you a photo: mleety@comcast.net.
Murray

Mines sorta the same, exept i ended up with center driled instead of corner.....oh well. And I got the wrong canopy but that was my fault =P.

My mom wouldnt let me get the tank unless I got Nemo lol. Now I got Nemo AND Dory...Do a big coral tank, and just sea horses. That'd be nice....if not, get a lion fish =)

Update on tank:

I started the stand this weekend and made it 40" tall, I got it all together draged it inside and it was alot taller then I thought. So I toke it back out to the garage and chopped 4" off it and it was perfect. It took me a while to get it complety flat and square but now its perfect. Next step this week will be to skin it and put the tank on it. Thanks to everyone for there comments and advice.

Tank at 40" to high for me.

36" much better

Coming along .. you have any idea how you're skinning it? If you head over to RC, in the tank build sections there are LOTS of great ideas ... and most of them will lead you to spend more than you ever intended ... lol

I LOVE my hard wood flooring on my stand

Alan .. i sure hope you aren't as lazy as I am when it comes to completing the stand/canopy project .. lets see some progress. BTW ... did you do the wrap today?

In the final stages of finishing the stand. Im going to paint the stand black. Ill keep you guys updated on the progress.

What kind of wood is that?
Did you have to sand it all down? I know some fill it with watered down wood filler, then sand it all ... i bought the paint grade birch ... it's pretty smooth. but $$$

Im working on a really tight budget on this, so i just went with basic paneling. I didnt have to sand much or use much wood filler on the paneling. I had to sand the top quite a bit to get it nice and flat.

it looks like the 1/4" slotted paneling that I used on my first stand/canopy? That stuff isn't cheap either!

Its not as expensive as most stuff that i found at home depot. Now I just have to get all my molding for it.

Man if been slacking on the updates of the progress.lol This week i picked up everything I need to finish this build. Started building the sump today and got it all glued together and then realized my protein skimmer wont fit under the stand with the sump. Dang it. So now i think i;m going to build a joining stand to the existing stand, so I can put the protein skimmer underneath and store some other stuff. Ill take pics tomorrow and upload them.

SLACKER!

ok .. now that i've got that off my chest ... I'm no different. With all fo the sh*** that happened, it stopped my train dead in it's tracks. In 2-3 weeks I'm hoping to start picking up the pieces & where I left off a few months ago.

Did you get the EX-1 ? Why won't it fit inside the stand? too large of a foot print with the sump? Can you put it in sump?
Do you have a layout of your sump/fuge design? Check out http://www.melevsreef.com/allmysumps.html

Take care!

That website is really cool. I made the sump/refugm 36x16x18, I wanted the sump to be as big as possible, just forgot about the protein skimmer. The sump fits under the stand no problem just going to have to put the skimmer somewhere else.

just an idea ... can you add a side door to the stand, and access the skimmer that way? Or do you not have enough space for the footprint of the skimmer?

I need enough fotprint for the skimmer. It will be ok tho cause it will be a table by the front door to through my keys and wallet on.lol

Okay so everything is up and running. I had a problem with the skimmer but Marco helped me out on that issue. Ill Post pics soon.

Your timing is excellent. I wish there was a frag auction 2 weeks from when I first set up my tank!
Bill

Alan, will you have rock in by the time the frag event comes around?

Im not sure possibly. I'll go to the frag auction and buy some frags and put them in scott's tank.

End stand isnt complete yet. Slacking.lol

No water, sand, or side stand. Tek T-5 48" 6 Bulb fixture.

Refugium. Ive changed the plumbing on it since this photo. I wont stop till its perfect. lol

Skimmer House and skimmer.

My mad acrylic glueing skills. Whoop Whoop