55 Gallon Reef Tank

[kaine806]

hello every body I was looking for any suggestions on setting my tank for saltwater i would like to do a small reaf setup but do not know if a 55gal tank would be large enouf?

any way I am new to the forum and to saltwater setup's I have had cichlid's for about 5years now but due to a recent move I had to sell my oscar's.

and now that my tank is back up I would like to use saltwater.

if anybody has any tip's trick's or advice it would very helpful.

First would be to determine what you want to house in your reef. Corals, inverts, fish, etc?

Once you know that, you can make better equipment decisions. For example, if you want soft corals like leathers and mushrooms, it's much easier (and generally cheaper) than if you want acropora and anemones.

Generally, you're going to start by getting some supply of live rock. Curing it in saltwater for a few weeks (it lets the dead stuff get consumed and water quality to stabilize). Get a clean up crew, wait a week or so and slowly add some fish or corals.

A skimmer will also be very helpful to remove wastes from the water. They are nearly required for most hard corals.

 

[kaine806]

is airiation bad for a reef tank?
the skimmer that i got is a piggy back style and put's alot of micro bubbles in to the water.

right know I have 32lb's of liverock and 1 damsel in the tank. I plan on pulling the damsel out in afew weeks when I start adding other corals and fish.

 

[kj23502]

I'm kinda new to sw too! Don't have a tank set up, but I've been reading alot! 55 gallon is pretty good!

Do you have a refractometer or hydrometer? You probably do, but it doesn't hurt to mention it right!! You know about mixing up large amounts of sw right? Its easiest to do it in a 40 gallon garbage can w/a power head and thermometer in there. Are you using r/o water or tap water? What kind of lights do you have?

Um....what's your method of filtration? My plan was getting used to testing the water first and if needed making corrections to it (for calcium and other trace elements) before I get my first corals. Especially since corals are so sensitive, I'd hate to kill my first one. Some inverts need elements in the water too, for their shells.

to the forum!!!

 

[ox5477]

Sounds like your doing good so far. I too have a 55G mini-reef going. Its plenty big for most all corals and if in the future, they start getting too big, you could always frag them and actually sell them off to make money

It does sound like you wanna do corals so there a few things to touch on. KJ23502 has asked about a couple:

• having a dependable salinty measuring device is first and foremost. Swing arm hydrometers are the most common but also usually the least accurate. Floating hydrometers are next and refractometers are pretty inexpensive and can be calibrated to be very accurate.
• having an accurate liquid test kit for pH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, phoshate, calcium, mag, and alkalinity is good to have as well. Now you prob wont find a full set with all these tests (or atleast I've never seen one) but you can mix and match choosing maybe a better and more expensive test for things like alkalinity and calcium while having a cheaper test for tests that don't need as much accuracy such as ammonia and nitrate.
• In a reef, usually the lr is the main filtration of the tank. Bacteria grows in the rock and consumes the animal wastes keeping the reef healthy. Many reefers use a sump/refugium with bioballs and chaeto to help with filtration. And other use canisters filled with lr rubble to help filtration too. Skimmers are supllimentary filtration in that they remove larger solids from the water more than removing dissolved waste chemicals. They can very important in tanks with heavy bioloads as they will remove some of the waste before it gets dissolved into the water.
• with the skimmer too, you mentioned getting microbubbles, and I get these too. I dont use a sump so my skimmer is the HOB style. To get rid of the bubbles many people use a sump and place the skimmer in the sump and use a "bubble trap" or baffold walls to trap the bubbles in the entry chamber of the sump.

A note of caution too: hard corals and anenomes are considered expert only type organisms because each has their own specific requirements, ie. very clean and waste free water, no phosphates and highly intense light for the hard corals, and for both, 100% stability. If one of the water stats such as pH, temp, or salinity change dramatically, then the animal will most likely keel over and nuke your tank, anenomes are notorious for this.

 

[kaine806]

the filter that i am useing right now is a PB filter ( over flow from the filter element ) I plan on getting a canister filter here in the next few week's.
as far as light's go im am using 2X45 watt 48 coral life bulb's with some ballist's that I had. but plan on getting a Orbit 2X96 watt system fo it before adding any kind of coral's.
I also have a full master test kit for the water and a hydrometer.
the water seems's to be pretty staible at this point ( SG @ 1.0024 PH @ 8.27 ) the ammonia levels are high right now but should fall of when the bactiria start's to take over.

all I have in the tank right now is 35lb's of live sand, 28lb's of fiji live rock and one med sized Damsel. ( to keep the ammonia levels up there while I am cycling the tank ) the ammonia was at 1.6ppm today and I can see the algy starting to grow on some of the live rock. I plan on letting it cycle for about 6 week's then I am going to put 10 to 20 snails and crab's in there to clean it up a little.

as far as corals go I want to do some hard corals and anenomes and any advice would be great.

 

[Musho3210]

cmon guys your making it sound hard .

Dont worry about perfect parameters for hard corals or anything, light + saltwater (lets just throw in live rock or a "base" for the coral) = possible coral reef. My corals go through numorous swings in temps (77-86 daily) low calcium, low alk, low ph, (although stable salinity) and for now they are all alive (although i admit, i gotta start getting back into the game, ive been too preoccupied with the building of the 65 gallon i forgot about the 20...)

Anyway, good luck, stay away from anemones though, thats one thing that doesnt fall under what i said. Thats going to need more research and more experiance

Get the damsel out, its being tortured, no more no less.

You can keep pretty much anything photosynthetic from shrooms (maybe not some of the harder to care for leathers) to the harder to care for lps and softies. Id steer clear of SPS if i were you. You may be able to have a clam in there, although not the croceas and maximas, something like a derasa or squamosa, but they get huge for that size tank and in a blink you may be trying to find someone to buy it.

If i were you, dont get the x2 outer orbit 96 watt. Get some halides on there. Dual 150s would work out great and dual 250s would be kick ass.