Marine tank update

[yekim_4321]

Hi all, thought i better post an update. Okay i said i had all the equipment i needed i was nearly right!!!!!!! when i bought my tank i told the supplier i needed enough salt for 100gal of water to make a salinity around 1.024......he sold me 3kilos of salt and said that will do fine , got home set everything up spent 4 days filling tank and sump using D/I water added salt and mixed until dissolved, brought temp upto 26c and tested SG 1.014 how dissapointed, anyway sent the guy an e-mail asking as it was his advice i was following etc would he give me the salt i needed and asked for. The reply "Sorry sold out of instant ocean on Sunday" . Since then i have managed to allow 2" of water to cover the dining room floor through not paying attention to my skimmer cup(lesson learned), so now i am awaiting a new skimmer and getting live rock on Wednesday, along with some ocean rock. Here is a pic of what i have so far, cabinet still to be put in place when im satisfied everything is running as i want.

Mick

 

[William]

CAn't wait to see it with the liverock / stock added

 

[jams.alaskan]

This is going to be so great - start to finish type of thing? Gan't wait.

ALASKA

 

[yekim_4321]

If people are interested i can do a complete start to finish with costs? think i still have the pics of empty tanks and Destroy It Yourself things.


Mick

 

[ste2k3]

I think that would be great

ste

 

[Doggfather]

can't wait to see the livestock!!!

 

[yekim_4321]

Okay will start sorting pics and cost breakdown, will post something from the very start with a liitle bit of history as to how it came about....watch this space

 

[jams.alaskan]

Will do

ALASKA

 

[yekim_4321]

Okay here we go right back to the start. I have been keeping tropical freshwater fish for some 17 years now, about 5 yrs with community and then moved on to cichlids which i have kept for 12 years in one way or another. Over the 3 years or so i decided that they no longer presented the kind of challenge i was looking for(not that i dont like them) its i found once you get everything right then its just water tests and changes, which means to get a challenge you start a new tank problem was i ended up with 42 tanks of different kinds of cichlid, which was starting to take over. I had never up until about 3 months ago given serious thought(and i mean SERIOUS thought) to marines, but alas everything i read seemed to put them out of my capability and price range. Then my wife started rescuing chinchillas and i gave my fish house over to cages and sold my gear?. With the spare cash i thought right "Go for it", so i contacted a guy i know who builds tanks etc and asked for a 48"*18"*15" with a 50mm bottom hole, he informed me it would cost £40 deal done.this is the tank as i received it.

 

[yekim_4321]

From there it sort of snowballed. I needed a skimmer so went to e-bay and got an air driven skimmer for £22, which turned out to be the wrong kind it was in tank and i needed an in sump skimmer. Back to the drawing board oooooh i thought i need a sump, ah i just happen to have a 40" tank divided into three for fry that cost me £25, okay i'll just modify it. This meant cutting one compartment glass down by three inches to allow water to flow over the top, the i cut 4-5" and raised to allow water to flow under, the centre will house live rock @ 10kilos to act as part of the filter system. The DIY sump is pictured below.

 

[yekim_4321]

Next i decided that i needed to work out what size return pump i needed, for this i contacted a marine engineer friend of mine, he went away with all the details and came back to me saying that it must be at least 2500l/h. Right i started searching for good deals on the net cheapest was just short of output required but was only £45....NO keep looking its there somewhere. I went to a LFS, and bingo there it was a sign on the counter all aquaclear powerheads half price! so i looked around and found the 5000 it can pump upto 3900 l/h at 0 head, quick phone call to engineer "yeah that would be ideal as it can be used when u upgrade tank, if its too much now just put a closed loop in" how much did it cost £35 instead of £70. Picture below.

 

[yekim_4321]

Armed with this small amount of equipment and a De-Ioniser which cost £20 brand new from a local fish auction i proceeded to set up my tank it took 4 days to fill using the D/I unit water in through 5mm airline and out via the same!!!!! the pipework was £3 from B&Q, once full the salt was mixed in and pump switched on, rather a nervous moment would it work, would the sump leak from my first ever attempt at DIY....NO it worked pic below. From here it turned out that i needed a load more equipment and all at the same time!!!!!! .will start on that part next.

 

[yekim_4321]

New pics

 

[ste2k3]

New pics

where

ste