new to saltwater 55 gallon set up questions

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a buddy from work has offered to take everything i want to give him as far as fish go, so hopefully by the end of this weekend i will have an empty 125 gallon aquarium....

it will be my bare bones, just for now, fowlr tank. this is what i will reuse until i upgrade down the road for a reef with fish

2 36" single bulb t8 light fixtures with glo aqua-glow bulbs
1 fluval fx5 with ehiem substrate pro top to bottom that is well established with freshwater bb
2 300w heaters

immediate plans for the aquarium
4" dsb
live rock
2 power heads for circulation
sweety pie wants clown fish so stocking options have to keep them in mind.

is there a cheaper option for aragonite sand than whats for sale at the lfs? what is the process for setting up the dsb? like is there first do this then wait for that? or is it just 4" of sand throw some ??? in there and away i go?

for some reason im thinking that there is a bit more of a process to this than just doing it.
 
i dont believe theres a specific setup process..other than extensively washing the sand b4 putting in. look into pool filter sand or play sand..
 
im a sand washing fool after changing all my tanks from gravel to sand.

i was under the impression that the sand needed to be aragonite or calcium carbonate to act as a buffering agent. also i thought that the sand had to be a fine sand. ive been reading that southdown used to be THE cheap substitute for the stuff at the lfs but has since gone out of business or changed names and is hard to come by. if pool filter sand is the way to go, then i should be able to just add it on top of what i have now. but whats going to buffer the water to maintain the right ph and hardness?


i really need to catch up on everyone's 125 builds.


fyi my 125 is sitting there empty. my budy came by today and picked up all my sa/ca cichlids. all thats left is 1 chinese algae eater and 2 crayfish... still a very pretty tank to look at.
 
ha and another follow up to myself... i think i will do the pfs.... thanks for the direction!

where does the water buffering come from if not from the substrate?
 
The salt. I belive that you wont get a ph buffer from substrate unless you fall below 7.2 a far cry from the 7.8 you are shooting for, while using sand as a buffering agent with ciclids is a good idea its just not needed in sw as it doesnt really help until too late
 
the sand bed..if you go with a deep sand bed, will provide space for your anerobic process to break your trates into nitrogen;) also it looks pretty sweet if you get some sort of sand moving bottom dweller
 
i was up until 4 last night reading careys 125 build thread and only made it to page 100... i was too deep into it before i realized i should have been taking notes. i know she used crystal sand pool filter sand and had a bag of brown/tan in her batch... i think she said she ended up only used 3 bags to get an almost 4 inch bed. or was it 4 bags? i forget which page that bit was on... she also has been doing a great job with what she has purchased... hence why i should be taking notes.

i know im starting up my 125 off the preferred filtration and lighting but truly my end goal is to get there while having something to look at in the mean time.

i see you have your own 125 build huma-huma but there is no way i can keep everything straight if i read yours along with careys. but your build is on my to do list to read.
 
this is my 125 2 crayfish tank thats going to be made into the salt water. as you can see ive had to some fairly stupid rearranging so i can still live in my house... but the question is how much heat will an appropriate light fixture put out? as you can see i dont want to fry my tv... ha i could always raise the tv and component shelf another foot or two... if its too much heat then i will have to make the salt water out of my 75 gallon cichlid tank and move them to the 125.

img_1486862_0_27194c1569b629b7f0c86f3a09259d2a.jpg
 
haha i get confused myself..and im trying to keep up on Carey,Heeras, and Buffys builds...its extensive. The amount of heat is dependent on the type of bulbs.. but either way, unless youre running a high-powered light setup, your tv will be fine:) the beauty of flat panels is that they are built to handle high heat..so i wouldnt worry

**edit*** and nice comcast dvr box...have the same exact one lol
 
what kind of lights would i need to buy to make this tank reef ready? nothing too fancy but enough to at least cover the basics? i guess to make it a good fish with some reef tank... good to know about the tv and components... the other option is to pull the tank away from the wall a bit if i need more clearance.

still working on that big list of stuff to work up to...


yeah sweety pie hates our dvr... wish uverse was available at our address. i seem to mess around with the computer more than tv and now with the tanks its a rarity that the tv is on for much more than background noise.
 
i would think a 6-8 bulb t5 setup should get ya a good base for some corals.. a 10-12 bulb setup would pretty much give you all the options. with maybe a few minor exceptions

wasnt a big fan of paid tv but the girl wanted it so we all know how that goes lol
 
oh and we went to the lfs tonight just to look around and get some food for another one of her pets... we have spent so much time and money there that they let me barrow 15+ 1.5 inch feeder goldfish to keep the 125 cycled. when we get what we need to do the bare bones saltwater to it they said just bring them back.

payday cant get here fast enough
 
well then who makes a good 72" 6-8 t5 light assy and then same question for the 10-12 bulb...

yeah the things we do for love but oddly enjoy too once we do it.
 
i can def relate to the money and time at the lfs, my girl and i were at the lfs about a month ago and decided to reserve our current Picasso trigger, the guy knew not only my first name, but also our tank size and current fish.... i was like "yep we mineaswell live here"
I know that Current makes a t5 hood called the Nova Extreme.. let me see if i can get a link
 
good thing i was sitting down. lighting is expensive.

daisy chain? are you former military?

and thank you for taking the time to look those links up for me.
 
coffeetwitch said:
good thing i was sitting down. lighting is expensive.

daisy chain? are you former military?

and thank you for taking the time to look those links up for me.
Click to expand...

Check out Aqua traders,you will have some people say how bad the fixtures are and that they heard they catch fire and etc.But you will see posts from years ago.
I had the 36" MH with actinic's on my 46 gallon for 4 years before I upgraded to a 75 gallon.I now have their 48 inch 250W MH fixture on it.I just switched out the bulbs from the 15000k to the 20000k.You can see results of tank in the Members forum tanks photo forum.
I know others who use the fixtures also with no problems.
I had the Coralife 36 fixture on my 48 gallon before I went to the Odyssea one.In comparing them ,internal and external wiring and so on the only difference I could see was the Coralife sticker on the outside.

Only my opinion,but from personal experience.To me T-5 are ok,but still don't match MH with the SPS corals.
 
so im wondering if two 24 inch lights be ok? are there any rules saying that the light has to be the entire span of the tank? huma-huma mentioned smaller ones... and those odyssea fixtures are appear to be a little bit more in my price range.

2x
Odyssea Metal Halide System
or even
Odyssea Metal Halide System

both are less exspencive than the 20" currents.

i know halide lights get hot, think my tv will still be safe?
 
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