New to MR and Saltwater tanks

[Cbutkos]

Hello Everyone my name is Chris. After years of keeping freshwater fish ive decided to tackle a saltwater setup. After lurking on many saltwater sites for months gathering information and watching Craigslist and amassing parts i started my build. I found a good deal on a nice 90 Gallon and proceeded to build a stand, drill the back, make a coast-to-coast overflow and plumb it to a 40 gallon breeder used as a sump. I filled the tank with dry rock and sand and seeded it with a few pieces of LR from a LFS. After cycling i added a CUC, then a pair of clowns, then an Orchid Dottyback, and a Hippo Tang. Well the hippo tang brought ich into the system because i wasn't properly quarantining anything. So now ive got all the fish in a hospital tank in Hypo for another few weeks and the tank is laying fallow until mid may. Ive got a frag of green zoas, a zenia, and some GSP starting, and a RBTA for the clowns when they come back. This tank will most likely house soft corals and mushrooms primarily, though who knows it may turn into something completely different. Here's a few pictures, let me know what you think of the scape, what corals should i get.

 

[theMeat]

Looks great. You did your homework. Corals? What kinda lights? Lets see some pics of the stand you crafted.
Welcome to the site

 

[theMeat]

might wanna move rocks away from glass a bit more so you can clean.

 

[Cbutkos]

might wanna move rocks away from glass a bit more so you can clean.

That picture is a little skewed, there's a good inch or two all around for cleaning, I'll post some pictures of the sump and stand tomorrow along with the lights and a bracket I welded up to hold the lights in place, the lighting is from two 165watt Chinese led fixtures, similar to the Mars aqua but a different seller so I know I can't keep super high light demand corals but maybe some rhodactis or something like that

 

[theMeat]

would start with zoas, mushrooms, pulsing zenia and toadstools. What'r you doing for calcium and alkaline? Skimmer? Fuge? If the lights use 3watt bulbs and are adjustable, you could do sps as well

 

[Cbutkos]

would start with zoas, mushrooms, pulsing zenia and toadstools. What'r you doing for calcium and alkaline? Skimmer? Fuge? If the lights use 3watt bulbs and are adjustable, you could do sps as well

Nothing yet with calc or all as I don't really have any load on that yet, but I suppose I would use weekly water changes as a way to "dose" until I get enough corals to warrant actual dosing. I've got a 40 gallon sump, three compartments, filter sock and reef octopus 150 skimmer in the first, large center section for macro, caulerpa and chaeto, and a few pieces of LR, and the last has the return. They are three watt diodes, I havent researched it fully but I think I saw something about replacing the Chinese diodes with Crees (or other American diode) as an upgrade without having to replace the whole fixture. So maybe that's something for the future as well.

 

[theMeat]

i'm a big fan of auto top off, with kalkwasser. Kalk will balance alk, cal, and ph. It's just so easy to tweak, cheap, and works great. If/when the tank's demands are greater than what kalk can provide, you can do aditional dosing. But it will still keep the water level, and cut down on how much you have to dose and is much cheaper.
Love the way you have the sump set up. The skimmer having a chance at the dirtiest water in first section makes so much sense . If you have or ever set up a reactor or uv you can have it pick up in the firs section, and dump into the last section, which will bypass and slow down the flow in the the middle/fuge area giving the plants more time to absorb, and pods a better environment to breed.
Good time to get a small clean up crew going.

 

[Cbutkos]

i'm a big fan of auto top off, with kalkwasser. Kalk will balance alk, cal, and ph. It's just so easy to tweak, cheap, and works great. If/when the tank's demands are greater than what kalk can provide, you can do aditional dosing. But it will still keep the water level, and cut down on how much you have to dose and is much cheaper.
Love the way you have the sump set up. The skimmer having a chance at the dirtiest water in first section makes so much sense . If you have or ever set up a reactor or uv you can have it pick up in the firs section, and dump into the last section, which will bypass and slow down the flow in the the middle/fuge area giving the plants more time to absorb, and pods a better environment to breed.
Good time to get a small clean up crew going.

I'll have to look into the kalk, and I do have a CUC, I got it from reefcleaners and bought a few additional hermits locally, they seem to be doing a great job keeping the hair algae nice and short

 

[theMeat]

Hair algae in display? What's growing in fuge? What light on fuge, and what hours is it on?

 

[Cbutkos]

Hair algae in display? What's growing in fuge? What light on fuge, and what hours is it on?

A little, they're very short, like less than a mm long, and there's chaeto and caulerpa in the fuge lights are on for like 18 hrs, I think since I'm feeding sparingly because I've got no fish in it right now the macro algae is being outcompeted for the limited nutrients, once I have the fish back in there it should be OK,

 

[theMeat]

What kelvin/wavelength is fuge light? Helps when the light in fuge is color that is designed to grow plants, so green prefers to grow there, instead of in display.
Have been doing some experimenting....
Have found 6500k grows calerpa like crazy on one side of fuge. On the other side red and blue leds grow algea, but not much calerpa. And tried full spectrum, grows about as much as the display, which is nil. Of course this testing isn't 100% because led wattage, and lens angles varied so?

 

[Cbutkos]

What kelvin/wavelength is fuge light? Helps when the light in fuge is color that is designed to grow plants, so green prefers to grow there, instead of in display.
Have been doing some experimenting....
Have found 6500k grows calerpa like crazy on one side of fuge. On the other side red and blue leds grow algea, but not much calerpa. And tried full spectrum, grows about as much as the display, which is nil. Of course this testing isn't 100% because led wattage, and lens angles varied so?

Ive got a 6500k CFL for the fuge. its a little old so maybe the spectrum is a little off, i doubt enough to stunt growth. i think my water is just really nutrient poor which really lets the micro algae compete better than the macro. that mini experiment is interesting though, you would think a full spectrum would grow better.

 

[Reef Reaper]

Nice start! Good luck

 

[Maldonado]

Welcome to the other side! Patience is the key, goes a long way. Good luck with everything

 

[Cbutkos]

As requested here are some pictures of the stand and sump. The stands i made are from 1/4" square stock from home depot, cut to the size of the light and legs cut to size of the tank. The facade of the stand is made from pallet wood. The frame of the stand i found online, its overbuilt but was cheap to make. i painted it heavily inside and out to keep it from rotting in the event of a spill.

 

[theMeat]

Good stuff Man. Gotta love how quiet bean animal overflow is. Nice handy work

 

[ErickEricka]

nice set up, where did you get the mounts for your lights?

 

[Cbutkos]

nice set up, where did you get the mounts for your lights?

Stands are home made, I described it in the above post but I just looked back and I guess it wasn't that clear...it's 1/4" square steel rod, I made a square about the size of the light and then made diagonal legs to rest in the inner lip of the tank

 

[ErickEricka]

im using the same lights, thats a great idea.

 

[theMeat]

Good idea to put a ground probe on the tank, paired with a gfci breaker for tank electric.