Thinking About Setting Up :)

[BOD]

ahh ok....


btw if i fill up my tank with live rock then do i need to run an external filter?

 

[maestro]

not for bioligical filtration buy i have one running with some carbon and some phosphate remover so they do have a use but are not essential by any means

 

[BOD]

ok thanks!

 

[BOD]

Ok so roughly for the size tank im getting i need 15Kg of rock could i do 10KG of live rock and 5KG of base rock?
And what can i expect to do with this? Would i be able to put in some fish/inverts whilst the 5kg of base rock is still seeding?

 

[Aquascaper]

As long as the tanks cycled properly and fully you can add fish and inverts while the base rock is seeding, bear in mind it may take a while though so stock lightly and slowly to allow the live rock time to catch up with the increased bioload.

 

[BOD]

of course im planning to take everything slowly its such a delicate thing and i dont want to mess it up and end up with things dying on me.

thanks to everyone whose helped me so far!

 

[BOD]

I am back!

I have broken down my malawi tank

but i have a question, which lights are better T8 or T5?

 

[SkiFletch]

T5 are better. And Power Compact (twin T5) are better still

 

[BOD]

is this good or not?

This marine T5 luminaire comes complete with 3 x 21 watt lamps


this will be for my 3ft tank.

 

[SkiFletch]

That seems like a low wattage for a 36" T5. Are you sure the bulbs themselves are 36" or is it a 36" long hood with much shorter tubes? Ideally you want tubes that span the entire length of your tank.

 

[BOD]

I think the tubes are just a few inches shorter, but there are 3 of them!

 

[SkiFletch]

True, but even that sounds under powered for T5... I believe 34" T5 bulbs can be found in 39 watt varieties, so the 3x21 is a little underpowered. Remember that if you go with Power Compact's you're lighting capacity more than doubles per bulb (96watts on a single PC bulb) and the overall fixture cost probably isn't that much higher. Where are you searching for light fixtures? locally? online? ebay?

 

[BOD]

anywhere...i was looking at that one on ebay though...

 

[BOD]

does 3X 39Watt sound better or not? i think mayb the wrong Watt was on there



edit - opps just realised you said that most come in 39 watt sorry!

 

[smithrc]

does 3X 39Watt sound better or not? i think mayb the wrong Watt was on there



edit - opps just realised you said that most come in 39 watt sorry!

If I were you I'd go for compacts...

I'm just about to (tomorrow) fit 2x 24W tubes over my new nano project... the tubes are ony 12" long

36W compacts are just 16"... the 55W's are just 20"