New to BRS; Tank Builds

[AquaDon]

Hi Boston! My name is Don and I have been in the fish keeping hobby for years. I originally had a 37 gallon freshwater tank but, I thought I would use it to learn about saltwater set ups. This has been running for months now and has 30 pounds of Aragonite Sand, 50 pounds of Live Rock, has some amazing LED lights that make the colors pop too. For livestock I have 2 Ocellaris Clownfish, 1 Firefish, 1 Pygmy Angel, a Red Legged Hermit, some Nassarius snails, and a turbo snail as well. I will be getting an order from ReefCleaners in a day or so containing 5 Florida Ceriths, and some Cheato for my HOB Refugium. Also will be getting 2 cleaner shrimp as well from Petco. But, this thread was not made just for that tank. I recently purchased a 125 gallon aquarium. It is 6 feet long and is in my living room. It has built in corner overflows arrived along with a Stand, 3 versa tops, Eshoppes R200 refugium, Eshoppes PSK-200 Skimmer and mega-flow kits. I plan on using my Coralife RO Unit to fill the tank and do water changes as well (3 stage), 2 Eheim 400 watt heaters and (1) 36 inch Marineland LED light with built in timer arrived. Need to now, do all plumbing and test tank for leaks.I am considering a total of 120 pounds of live sand and around 130 pounds of live rock. Thoughts would be appreciated. Does anyone know where I can get live rock at a decent price? I am contemplating getting an Apex Lite controller made by Neptune systems with a ph and temp probe to start and would connect all electric to controller.
Pictures will be coming soon...

 

[AquaDon]

Original 37 Gallon Tank

 

[AquaDon]

37 Gallon HOB Refugium

 

[AquaDon]

New 125 Tank and Stand

 

[AquaDon]

Eshoppes Refugium and Skimmer

 

[AquaDon]

LED Light and Heaters

 

[AquaDon]

RO Unit

 

[AquaDon]

Questions for members

I am looking for any suggestions from members regarding where to get live rock at decent prices and also any suggestions or hints regarding plumbing which I will be doing this week. Would appreciate any help as I undertake this adventure. I plan on continuing this Build thread to completion and hope that anyone who wants to comment, will. I am new to this hobby and am looking forward to a rewarding experience.

 

[Pat02026]

Have a look in the for sale forums here, there's usually always someone selling rock, and equipment at reasonable prices. Post up any questions you may have regarding plumbing; there's plenty of us here willing to help walk you through most any situation or issue you may run into.

 

[JohnK]

Last time I checked Aqua addicts and Jays aquatics probably had the best quality / price on LR. Both are in salem NH.

Beware of rock that looks super purple like it was painted or something. If you see this stuff it's probably fine to use, but the purple is too good to be true, it's painted rock. I've seen it around at some LFSs reccently...

As far as plumbing, do you have any specific questions? It's a pretty broad topic so it's hard to offer general advice without specific questions. I can offer this much;
-Personally I prefer to use hard PVC for drain plumbing, to do this you will probably need different bulkheads since the tank most likely came with the ones that have built in hose barbs on the bottom.
-if you do hard plumb, make sure you install unions in strategic locations so you can take the plumbing apart of needed. Sooner or later you WILL want to change something, clean something, or even get a fish or snail out of the plumbing.
-Don't waste money on sch80 PVC. Some people use it to get the cool euro looking grey pipe, but it's a waste of money, and actually has a smaller ID than normal sch40 PVC so it's totally inappropriate for our purposes. (if you really like grey pipe sch40 is made in grey too, it's just much harder to find)
-Read up on the "bean animal drain". A modified version can be used on your tank. Silent, bubble free, and virtually flood proof. You may want to stick with the traditional duroso style drain (the kit that came with the tank is a duroso), but it's better to make an informed decision NOT to do something different, than it is to read of it in 6 months and kick yourself for not considering it in the first place.
-DON'T use check valve(s). They are absolutely unreliable in saltwater, if you rely on a check valve IT WILL FAIL.

That's a start, now how about some questions

 

[dagger]

Have a look in the for sale forums here, there's usually always someone selling rock, and equipment at reasonable prices. Post up any questions you may have regarding plumbing; there's plenty of us here willing to help walk you through most any situation or issue you may run into.

+1 for checking to see if members have any rock to sell. I was at one LFS lately and live rock was $12/pound. You can pick it up for $2-3 from a member. You'd save hundreds when stocking your tank!

 

[JohnK]

Yup, you definately can save a lot on used LR.

That said, use some caution as it is possible for LR to have a number of pests, and LR that has been in a nutrient rich system for a long time can have a good amount of phosphate bound on it's surfaces that can then cause a perpetual water quality problem. If I were going to buy used LR I would want to see it in the aquarium, and I would look for excessive nusiance algae growth, flatworms, aptasia, manjo anemones, or anything else that I didn't like. I'm not saying not to buy used LR, just use a little caution.

There is also the option of using mostly dry rock from marcorocks or another supplier. Dry rock will effectively become live rock with time if it's seeded with a smaller amount of good LR. Dry rock will save you a good bit of $, and it gives you more control of what comes into your system.

 

[Pat02026]

Very good point John, I should have passed along some more detail in regards to the possible issues that may come with using rock from another system.

 

[MrX]

Hi and welcome to the forums!

An Apex (or another) controller will be some of the best money you will spend in this hobby. I have the Apex Jr, VDM, EB8 and break-out box controller my 120 system and love it.

Lots of knowledgeable people here. Don't be afraid to take it slow and ask lots of questions.

 

[frank180reef]

welcome to BRS and ask away

Frank

 

[JohnK]

Yup, contollers are great. (OP probably just googled prices and is now considering backing out of this crazy hobby).

They tend to be quite expensive, but much less so when you start to realize how many things they can do and other gadgets you won't need if you have a good system controller.
For example I run an APEX which runs @$500. When I got it it replaced the following;
-5-6 regular timers, $20 each
-PH controller for my Ca reactor $190
-PH monitor for the tank $80
-temp monitor anywhere from $5-100

So that's easily $375 in stuff I would have never bought if I had just bought the controller in the first place. With the controller I also got the added features of being able to control my system through the net, graphing and tracking of everything, and interconnected control (ie if the temp gests too high my lights shut down one by one as the temp rises past a set point, If my PH gets higher than a set point my kalk drip shuts down, if the PH goes too low Ca reactor shuts down, exct. The controller can even text me if something goes out of my set specs)

Don't let us freak you out, this is an expensive hobby

 

[AquaDon]

Thank you everyone who replied, I am glad I joined this forum. I will have a lot to learn and appreciate that you are willing to share your knowledge. I will keep you posted as I move froward and ask more specific questions as I need help or advice.

 

[AquaDon]

New Question about plumbing

Do other members recommend gate valves or some sort of valves for my 4 plumbing lines? 2 Drain, 2 feed? I am thinking it would be great if I could adjust water flows if I needed to, but also, if I need to take something out or repair, wouldn't it be good to have valves, in line? I was thinking about gate valves.

 

[JohnK]

You can always use gate valves on the returns, and contrary to popular misconception throttling back a centrifigual pump will not hurt it (as long as you restrict the output and not the input) AND will actually cause it to use less electricity.

For drain lines there are two distinct approaches you can use.
Most common are vented partial siphion drains, aka duroso, stockman, gurglebuster, or the stock drain set up that came with the tank. With these designs you never have a full siphon, and you NEVER want a valve restricting the flow. These drains are simple and generally reliable, but they tend to be slightly to very noisy and they always dump lots of bubbles into the sump.

The other, newer, and less common approach is to use a full siphon drain. To do this you MUST have a dry back up drain that is capable of handling 100% of the total possible flow. With full siphon drains you need to have a valve (gate valves are far better than ball valves for this) to slow the flow of the siphon. Essentially you carefully dial in restriction on the siphon drain until it exactly matches the return flow rate and the overflow runs silent and bubble free. Without a dry back up drain, this would be playing russian roulette since any little thing that goes down the drain will catch at the restriction point and cause a massive flood. That's where the dry emergency comes in, with a dry emergency you're all set if something slows the primary siphon drain. "herbie" and "Bean animal" are the two common siphon drain systems. Herbie requires 2 holes and is slightly tempermental requiring occasional adjustments to keep things flowing smoothly. Bean uses 3 holes, and is basically set and forget. (bean is a herbie plus a duroso, with the duroso covering the occasional fluxuations in flow that require adjusting with a herbie). Siphon drains are silent and bubble free, but they take up more space and can be a little more complicated on the initial set up.

 

[STiTCH87]

I personally instead of using a ball valve to control return line in general, have a ball valve tee, where as I can adjust the flow up to the tank, any water that doesn't go to the DT (because I am lowering flow back to the DT) goes thru the T line and flows into the refugium. Gives me a good flow in the sump for the skimmer and everything, while having low flow for the refugium, all in the same sump. While at the same time being able to adjust the return to match the overflow. It's a win win win.