For some background, the tank will feature some coral and plenty of seagrass. I'm hoping for some hardier, fast growing corals for the rock structure. I'm thinking something like a couple of staghorn species, a branching and plating Montipora species, or maybe a Heliopora/blue ridge in place of the branching Montipora. Had a huge one of those in my old 75 and I loved it. May have a sand dwelling anemone on the far side and possibly a smattering of larger polyped corals here and there. It will be comparatively sparse, but I'm hoping to grow larger, mature corals instead of the assortment, so to speak. This also will not be a designer-style tank with every color and named coral known to man. I won't be paying for those, unfortunately.

Okay, some specs on the tank:

40g Breeder @ 36"x18"x17"
2-250w XM 10K lamps (one is DE, sorry for the lack of symmetry, lol)
1-Vortech MP40w ES--will add more as things fill in and sand settles/gets biofilm
~10lbs base rock and ~10lbs live rock, infested
~120lbs of sand for seagrass

Scrubber is the only filtration--may later include skimmer, as I've found it helps with the heavy amount of organics seagrasses create. It consists of a 9"x10" screen lit by 2-40w CFLs, all fed from my overflow.

Now for the pics, in rough order:

Leak test:


Rough 'scape with about the same amount of overall rock that will be in the tank, maybe a very small amount more. More of a mock-up than anything:


Filling it up:


Couldn't resist turning the lamp on to see how it would look:


Minus the trash bag:


Got some nice live rock with an amazing surprise to complete my collection:




No big deal, right. Hey, it will only set me back a few months as far as letting my fish go.

So, here it is as of a couple of days ago. My poor fish are staying in the breeder nets, but doing well. I'm hoping they can be released in several weeks to a month, as I haven't seen anymore isopods after removing 70+ individuals from only 10 lbs of rock (!!!):






Loving these 10K lamps--it gives it an incredibly natural look. No pics of the scrubber just yet, as it is unproductive. There is very little input into the tank, which is slowing it down. I would pick up the feeding pace, but I don't want to feed the cirolanids, either. Any and all food stays in those little breeding nets and is eaten promptly. Anyway, let me know what you guys think. I'm hoping this will be a successful long term setup, which is one reason I've ditched the smaller, faster growing seagrasses, which crashed my last system. The turtle grass and shoal grass grows substantially slower, so I'm hoping that will do the trick.