First Marine Experience

[JJ56]

Hey, some of you may remember my topic on what I should do to start a small reef tank.

So, after lots of reading up, asking questions and pestering, I'm setting out on my first marine tank, and I hope to keep updating this journal.

Heres what I have bought.

New 32 x 12 x 15 unbranded tank from my local fish store
8kg of Aragonite crushed coral gravel
1 of the powerheads, donated to me, maxijet 1000, but needs mounting hardware

So, next on my list: (please make suggestions on this)

Polystyrene / Styrofoam to insulate / level underneath the tank.
Black / blue background for the tank.
Heater (s?), need to look up what size I'll need.
Another powerhead, maybe two
(Lighting? I have little knowledge on marine lighting as I use plain old flourescent tubes on my FW tanks)
RO water and marine salt
Hydrometer and full test kit

Then of course Live rock, clean up crew etc, but I'm still looking at hardware at the moment.

I hope some of you can point me in the right direction with this, I'm bowing dwon to superior knowledge and learning all of the time.

Thanks

JJ

 

[chrissaysyes]

A lot of these variables (i.e. lighting, flow) have everything to do with your stocking choices. What do you plan on keeping? Corals?

 

[JJ56]

Yes, I know lighting is something at should relate directly to my livestock, heres what I'm thinking:

Tank will have the appropiate amount of live rock to begin with, and Ill leave it for a while whilst I get the water right. I will then start adding soft corals, nothing which requires very high light. Any reccomendations? The tank is only 15" high so it doesn't need to penetrate far.

From my little experience, I think T5's should be enough to support soft corals? Correct me here if I am wrong. They will only need to support soft corals and polyps.

I am I right in thinking I should aim for a x20 turnover? that would be 2000 lph? seems alot to me but I'm coming from freshwater. The maxijet I already have pumps 960 lph.

Today I got my polystyrene under the tank, and it has all been leveled off. I am going to get a black trim made which will hide this and tidy up the bottom of the tank.

Thanks

JJ

 

[shibby]

20 x turnover will be fine.

twin 55 watt t5s would look good you can buy daylight blues which have 1 white one blue there quite cool.

i also vote a black background!

 

[JJ56]

Right, little update:

I have a heater in, 200w, should easily be more than enough.

Need to work out how to mount the powerhead, as I have no bracket.

I'm considering changing the coral cravel to a sand, for asthetics mainy, is live sand really worth £24 for 20lbs? Any alternate soloutions?

Thinking about the water situation, only one shop locally sells RO, but another local shop warned me of buying water which isnt RO, problems caused by broken membranes etc. A unit may be a better option.


So I have:

36 x 12 x 15 tank
1 maxijet 1000 powerhead
1 200w heater
8kg of coral aragonite gravel, should it stay or should it go?

Could anyone tell me what I should look for next?

Also, once my tank is started, my uncle has kindly offered to donate some LR, with mushroom corals and coraline attatched.

Cheers

JJ

 

[ben1987]

id get everything hardware related first. So another powerhead lighting etc. Test kits, salt and refractometor. everything you need to get going. Then buy RO water and get it to right salt levels and temp. lastly look at getting rock. Get timers for the lights too

 

[JJ56]

Thanks for the call on the hardware, I'm still getting bits and pieces.

Managed to mount the powerhead, zip tied to two suckers onto it, and its rock solid!

I found a light transformer I had spare, on it's side, it says up to 40w, however it easily managed to light a 58w, 5 foot long T8 flourescent tube from my garage. One question, will this be able to run a marine T8 that would support soft corals? If theres such ones around 50w. otherwise, I'd be looking at a pair of 55w T5's. any reccomendations?

Busy designing a hood at the moment, to house the lights and a few pc fans for cooling. Again, any ideas? I've read the pinned DIY topic on this.

I'm going to be using my Uncle's test kits and equiptment initially, but its my birthday in a few weeks so I may have some surprises!

Thanks, I'll update with more pictures when I put the background on.

JJ

 

[chrissaysyes]

Sounds like you're moving in the right direction. You have enough hardware now to start cycling the tank. Just add saltwater, a power head, food, and a few chunks of LR.

 

[JJ56]

Great! Looking forward to this now!

I am still looking for advice with lighting, im not sure if a 50w (or close) T8 would be enough? Please can someone clarify? I would of course fit a reflector.

Sooo, I'll go take some new pictures. Im thinking of going out and buying timber for a hood tonight, or I could save up some more money for my water / salt etc.

Also, do you guys reccomend adding my substrate before or after filling with water? I ask this because I'm thinking of changing to sand, and dont think taking it out is an option once filled.

Cheers

JJ

 

[JJ56]

Update:

Heres whats been added. Black background, made for me at my dads work. Powerhead mounted, 200w heater fitted, polystyrene base added to stop cracks, some of you may spot the light transformer, should I use it, oh I added a thermometer too.

Any dirty marks will be off me measuring up for the hood, sorry!

Any views on lighting? should I use a T8 bulb or just go for a new T5 set up?

I've had a chat with my uncle, I'm going to be collecting a load of parts of him, including powerheads, coral sand (new), loads of books and some lovely liverock once I have water in it.

Cheers

JJ

 

[JJ56]

Update,

Tank has gone a few changes over the last week, here goes:

crushed coral had been changed for marine sand.
tank was filled up with ready mixed saltwater from my marine specific lfs, which is where im buying all livestock from.
everything was turned on, and left to settle.
today, I bought 2kg of fully cured indonesian LR, just as a start, its in the tank now, randomly placed, these bits will probably be used for attatching corals and be placed high on the stack.

My uncle also kindly donated me a load of kit, including:

A big tub of rowa phos (where should I put this?)
Box of instant ocean salt
Hydrometer
Bottled addatives calcium / green / etc, etc
Test kit
And various other bits of hardware

So, heres the plan.

Buy a few more little bits of LR leading up to my birthday (less than 3 weeks) where I will then be getting a large amount of Liverock!
Go out and buy a light unit with birthday money (My lfs has just gotten them LED units in, any views? they cost nothing to run too apparently...... tank is currently limping under a t8 bulb, just so I can view the LR)
Soon after, depending on my water stats, CUC will be added.

Thanks for reading,

JJ

 

[BigC]

I would look toward getting another water movement pump in there, perhaps on from the Hydor Koralia range.
The lighting I would go all out for a MH Luminaire, for future expansion into LPS/SPS corals (pretty expensive but worth it)
The new Led light bars whilst reduce running costs and carbon footprints I dont think would cut the mustard with hard corals.
Id say your lighting and water movement would be your main concerns at this present moment.
Get you SG correct and heating up. Insert your LR
Test for Ammonia it will spike and fall away to zero (may take days or weeks depending on the amount of die-off on the LR) Then start testing for Nitrite, this too will spike at some point and like Ammonia fall away to zero. Now you can test for Nitrates if and when they fall below zero do a large waterchange 50% or more then you can add your CUC
Regards
BigC

 

[JJ56]

Thanks, I currently have two pumps in, the Maxijet and another powerhead, can't remember the name, they provide a good amount of flow, but I think they may be too directional, being the older impeller style.

SG and temperature are perfect, matched too my lfs too, for ease of acclimatisation.

Lighting is my current main issue, still undecided betwean units. T5's , most likely, as I think MH is too expensive, and overkill for what I want to keep, (softies mainly)

Thanks for the advice on cycling BigC, I'm hoping it should be relativly painless due to me using fully cured LR from my LFS, so minimal die off.

One question, does Indonesian LR differ greatly from Fiji LR, is the extra £4 per kilo justified? I hope to eventually achieve a deep purple coraline build up on my LR, which type of LR is suited to this? or is it irrelivant?

Thanks again guys, I may add some pics later on.

JJ

 

[JJ56]

Hey,

I just came home and had a look in my tank at the few cunks of live rock in it, and I am delighted to see some signs of life!

There are lots of tiny white "fans" on the top of the rock, they are only a few mm big, they open up and fan around, then they withdraw and close up into tiny red tubes on the rock. It's very interesting to watch, can anyone identify? (I wouldnt be able to photograph them, they are so fine) will these grow any bigger?

Also, I noticed a simlar creature, but it had "fingers" which reached out from a central point in a circle, its legs curving inwards slightly. It too was white.

Just went to test for ammonia, and spotted the test kit was out of date, damn. However, My other kits were fine, and I recorded 0 Nitrate and 0 Nitirite. I'll go out and get a new ammonia kit asap.

So, things are moving forward!

Better Lighting + more LR to come. I have a book in which I will record all dated test results for future referance.

JJ

 

[ox5477]

I guess I can add in my two cents here:

Im guessing the dimensions you gave were all in inches, so you have a 29 or 30G US tank. Good size for a beginner.... thats what I started with.

For powerheads, I would look at you maxi again, there is no such 1000. Its either a 900 or a 1200. either way they are good, but I would get another one of the same brand and size. Positioned at either end of the tank, these will give great turbulance and great flow in the tank.

For lighting, BigC is right that Metal Halides with a Luminarc reflector is a great light for sps, but honestly, with the depth of your tank and the cost aspect of MH's, a 36" 4 or 6 bulb T5 fixture would be perfect. Though even something like this may work for your purposes until you can do more research and figure out what you realy like: 78W, 2 x T5 Odyssea Fixture

The small things on top are prob feather dusters. Cool little worms, filter feeders, and pose no threat to anything in your tank.

As for the other thing you describe, not sure from your description

Ox