Couple of Questions

[SuperFish]

HI, i was wondering, i have a 29 gallon tank that is almost cycled and i was going to buy a protein skimmer and some powerheads. Here are my questions.

1 - is a seaclone 100 protein skimmer a good skimmer for this size tank?

2 - is a seaclone protein skimmer a good skimmer at all?

3 - how many poerheads do i need, where should i place them, and what kind of powerheads should i get?

Thanks for your help.

 

[BillyZ]

not too well versed on skimmer myself so I'll jump to question 3... (hmmm... a lot like I used to take tests in school! lol)

how much water flow you "need" depends a little on what type of life you plan on putting in your tank. A good average is to have a total of 10 time your water volume in water flow.

When deciding on size and placement, what you want to accomplish is turbulant water movement. To do this best you want to go with multiple power heads. For a smaller tank such as yours two should be sufficeint. I would say two PHs rated for 150 - 200 GPH should be all you need. If your going to have a sump or other equipment (such as the skimmer) that will move water you can take a portion of it's rating in account when determining how much water movement you have.

The exact placement is different for every tank as the rocks, sand bed and even the other equipment all affect the flow. Basicaly follow these tips for water movement:
- Avoid the "cyclone" effect. IOW, dont point all your PHs in the same direction so the water just swirls in the tank.
- At least one PH should be directed to flow across the top surface of the water to stimulate gas exchange
- Try to create a turbulant water flow by directing the PH's flow so it crosses or meets other water flow in the tank.

HTH

 

[SuperFish]

Thanks BillyZ.

I have another question. I have a Tetratec 300 gpm biological filter and no live rock. I was thinking of adding about 10 pounds of cured live rock per month until i am at my 1.5 pounds per gallon mark. Then i was going to remove the filter and just run the protein skimmer. Will i need any additional filtration? Is this a good idea?

Thanks Again.

 

[BillyZ]

having LR as your filtration is a good idea. You will also want a DSB with LS. do you have that already? If you do, what did you use for a substrate? Sand, Crushed Coral or something else?

The only thing I would suggest, however, is that instead of adding alittle at a time you save up your cash and buy them all at once. Adding new LR to an established tank can cause an ammonia spike and re-start your cycle so it would be best to only do this once. And in the mean time... and this is the hard part... no fish. Wait until you have the LR in place and the tank's parameters are settled where they should be. I know it's tough, you've already gone through a cycle with the tank and water... but adding LR will surely start another cycle (unless you cure it in a seperate tank)

After adding the LR you shouldn't need the filter, but you might as well keep it for water flow (just remove any mechanical filtration). The LR, LS and Skimmer should be all the filtration you need. But i will make one comment. A 29 gallon tank doesn't leave a lot of room for error. You will need to be diligent with your water tests, top-offs and water changes. What many people do with small volume tanks is add a sump (explained here) to give your tank more water volume and make it easier to maintain.

Overall... just remember that patience is key to a successful marine tank.

 

[SuperFish]

I Used 15 pounds Crushed Coral on the bottom of the tank then covered it with 40 pounds of live sand. Is this good? Also is there a place with good info on building a sump?

 

[BillyZ]

let me ask you this very important question... is there anything alive in your tank yet? Such as fish, clean up crew or anything?

hopefully you don't have anything in there yet. I'll make a suggestion that hopefully others will back me up on. Take this chance to right now remove the crushed coral from the tank and replace it with all sand. CC doesn't make nearly as good of a DSB as all sand. Trust me... I have a CC bed right now and WISH i had realized the mistake it was earlier. Changing it out once you have the tank established is risky at best IMO.

For removing it, I would just scoup it all out into a bucket and replace it with Southdown/Yard Right/Oldcastle play sand that you can get at most home improvement store.

 

[Salt4Us]

I don't know about Seaclone's but we use a CPR BakPak 2R hang on skimmer on our 29 gallon and I believe Reefrunner has one on his 20 gallon, I can't speak for him, but we are happy with ours, not noisy and does a real good job collecting.

 

[SuperFish]

Thanks everyone, you've been a huge help.