First Time Saltwater Aquarium, Advice Needed!!

[david713]

First off I would like to thank this board for being here, I wouldn’t have made it this far this fast. Right now my excitement level is about 10 on the excitement scale I hate to think what I’m going to be like when it come time to put fish in the tank., I just might have to stay home from work a few days. lol

I am working toward having a Reef Tank/wFish. I started my tank setup about 21/2 weeks ago, I first tried to build a sump to go under my aquarium but that was a disaster so I decided on a Canister Filter, I will add a sump later when I get little better at this. I haven’t used anything to help cycle the water other than the live rock. I heard the forum talking about using a store bought cocktail shrimp; I will try and get one of those today. As of right now I have no algae except for on the live rock and it came with the algae on it. I didn't start testing the water until the 14th. And that’s about It. So when and if the forum has time I would appreciate your advice.

[center:4b403555bd]Equipment[/center:4b403555bd]
[center:4b403555bd]55-Gallon Tank
Crush Coral 60lbs
Live Rock 12lbs
Seaclone 100 Protein Skimmer
Oceanic Natural Sea Salt Mix
Cascade 1500 Canister Filter,
Saltwater Master Liquid Test Kit
Tetra 100 watt Heater
Ocean Sun 10,000K /15 watts[/center:4b403555bd]

[center:4b403555bd]Water Testing History[/center:4b403555bd]
[center:4b403555bd]01/14/2006
Ammonia 1.0
Nitrite .15
PH 8.2
Nitrate 0

01/16/2006
Ammonia .50
Nitrite 0
PH 7.8
Nitrate 0

01/21/2006
Ammonia .25
Nitrite 0
PH 8.0
Nitrate 0[/center:4b403555bd]


[center:4b403555bd]Pic’s as of 01/21/2006[/center:4b403555bd]
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[center:4b403555bd]Thanks, david713[/center:4b403555bd]

 

[lando]

Welcome to AquariumAdvice.com!!!
Well David, it seems you are off to a great start. Go ahead with the cocktail shrimp to start your cycle. The biggest advice I can offer at this point is to invest in some more LR. It is the single best thing you can do for your tank. Put in as much as you can afford to right now. If you do eventually want a reef, use the next few months to research a lighting upgrade. Good luck!

 

[tcarola154]

more live rock would always be a plus... also what temperature are you currently running? 100 watt seems kinda small for a 55, im running a 150 in a 45 with an extra 50 in my fuge... someone else might want to chime in on that though because im not sure what exactly is recommended for watt/gallon

 

[david713]

Brian, looks like the bear ate me on the sump, lol Thanks for the light advice, I'll go to work on that.

 

[david713]

tcarola154, right now my temperature is 76, but it stays most of the time between 74 & 76

 

[vsnsofadrgn]

definately more lr (1.5 - 2 lbs per gal) good luck and welcome

 

[Raker333]

From what others said in previous postings elsewhere in this forum, If I had it to do over again I would go with sand and not CC.

Just a thought...

 

[david713]

ok, added more lr 40lbs that gives me a total of 52 lbs, I'll get more next week. Also looking into a different Lighting System & Heater

 

[vsnsofadrgn]

good choice with more lr, adding more is a good choice too. the lighting is up to what you want o put in the tank.

 

[david713]

Update picture since adding more LR

 

[tecwzrd]

Welcome to AA Tanks looking pretty good so far.

Personally I’d return the SeaClone and get a Bak Pak Skimmer which costs about the same or an AquaC Remora Pro which is twice as much but 10 X better IMO.

You can hide the heater horizontally behind the lr also until you get your sump. As already mentioned you will probably hate that cc down the road due to having to vacuum it all the time and limiting your fish/inverts selections. Since you are just starting you might want to get it out and replace with 70+ lbs of sand before cycling.

Lastly adding a sump later in a 55 gal is going to be difficult. If your stand is bottomless then getting a 20 gal long tank or other longer sumps in there and then putting the tank on top is much easier. If you do replace the cc I’d also consider adding the sump when you drain the tank. You can worry about the overflow/pump at a later date but at least you would have your sump in place without trying to fight something in between the middle spacer bar.

 

[jaiden]

If your temp is fluctuating, you may need a bigger (or another) heater

 

[david713]

AquaC Remora Pro, Take out cc and put in Sand, better lighting & better heater.Done!!

*Now for the Hard Part: The Sump? I need every bit of informationon on how to build this thing, Pictures & detailed descriptions, I hope the forum can help me here. I really would like to set one up, but with out trial & error. So give me what you got and I'll build it.

Thanks again, david713

 

[david713]

Also I think I done wrong by not cleaning my lr before placing it in my tank. Should I change all my water and clean everything including lr?

 

[david713]

Ok, Saltwater Aquarium Advisors, lets kick some butt here! Give me your best shot give me your best info!!!!!!!! Remember I have a 55gal tank

 

[jaiden]

LR doesn't need to be "cleaned" unless it's DRY rock (which is not LR yet). Sometimes it needs to be cured, which just means maintained for a few weeks in a stable healthy environment such that the cycle created by dieoff goes away. Sometimes selective dead bits are scrubbed off to help with this, but overall LR should be left alone. Shipped rock especially needs to be cured.

you need a lot more LR. Spend your money on that instead of worrying about a sump yet. You should be aiming for 1.5 to 2 lb per gallon. @hile sumps are nice, you don't HAVE to have one, but you do have to have more LR if that's what you're using for filtration.

http://www.melevsreef.com/ is a good place to learn about sumps.

Don't make any rash decisions about anything. You're doing fine. While others may have made other choices, that doesn't mean that you won't find a way to make things work. No one knows everything (especially me) and while for example I agree that the bak pak or remora are better choices, any skimmer is better than none. If your budget is limited (and whose isn't?) go for LR and at least 10x circulation and let it ride. IF you're really not budget conscious, then you probably want an in-sump skimmer rather than the (very good) remora pro.

 

[tecwzrd]

This thread goes into some pretty good detail on building a sump.

If you don’t want to build it a 20 gal long tank will probably fit in your stand (what I use) and you can add your baffles pretty easily. Mine wouldn’t fit through the middle of the stand and I had to drain the tank half way, remove the lr and have a couple of strong guys move the tank off to get it in through the bottom.

There are wet/dry units you can buy that will fit in the 55 stand as well and they include:
Tidepool 1
ProClear Aquatics 75 (Remove bio-balls and replace with lr rubble)

You might want to consider a HOB Refugium also if you don’t want a sump or the hassle of dealing with an overflow. A lot of them come with a decent skimmer as well.

As jaiden said take your time and read\ask questions as much as possible before jumping in All of us have been doing it “our way” for years and all have our preferences on how a SW tank should be done but of course the ultimate decision should be yours after careful review of all the options available to you.

 

[david713]

Man, This is some go stuff, you got me reading and thinking
Thanks

 

[Fish Dude]

Looks great. Good idea relocating the sea clone to the back as well. If you are going reef the next investment would be ligthing. I keep my temp up around 79-81.

 

[david713]

Thanks everyone for you help and advise.
Let me catch you uptodate with my addons, I went to http://www.melevsreef.com/ and got the instructions on how to build a sump/refugium, anyways I built a HOB 15gal Refugium and so far it's working great I wish I would have taken pictures before I installed it, but I'll see what I can do about getting some pictures to post. The refugium is: 44" L X 14" D X 6" W It has 5 compartments the first section is my Inlet (which is fead from my Canister Filter & also my Skimmer discharge) Second department is the Bubble section, Third department is the Sump/Refugium (28x14x6) Fourth department is another Bubble section and Fifth department is the Sump Return back into the tank. I need to get some LS and LR to go into the sump. It wasn't to hard to build It was rather fun.
I also added a Damsel Fish which is very Beautiful and is very exciting to watch I beleave he has sniffed out everything in the tank, He has went in every nuck & cramy. Neat Fish!

Thanks, david713