crawlerman
Member
I moved out of state two years ago and sold my 75g mixed reef. It was never planned out properly. Went to the LFS with plans to buy freshwater fish and left with a wet/dry, pump and overflow. Kept it up and running for 10 years before selling and moving. I'm closing on a new house next week and plan on buying an oceanic 210g (7x2x2). I plan on having a pretty heavy fish load and mostly SPS. Need some advice on equipment choices.
1. Lighting: I am intrigued with the LED lighting, but notice that there are tons of LED lights for sale and I almost never see MH lighting for sale. I am leaning towards Metal Halides. I am assuming I would need 3 lights. Should I go 250W or 400W. Am I correct in assuming I would have better success with MH lighting over LED? Also, would fans cool the tank enough with the MH lighting above or would I need a chiller?
2. Skimmer: There are so many options I'm not sure what to get. Reef Octopus seem to be popular and reasonably priced. What size would I need 210G that is heavily stocked? Any other skimmers I should be looking at? Any reason not to get a used skimmer from the for sale section?
3. Flow: It appears as if the Ecotech Vortech MP's are popular. I plan on having a somewhat minimalist approach to the aquascaping. What would be a good plan for flow? I'm thinking (2) mp40's at the ends, what about the middle, some kind of wave maker maybe?
4. Dosing: I will be starting off with frags. Would it be best to just manually add supplements and then add some kind of dosing pumps down the line? I can probably keep parameters in check with water changes until things start growing bigger correct? What is the best way to keep everything stable, dosing pumps, kalk water in ATO, Calcium reactor?
5. Filtration: In my last tank I relied on the skimmer and live rock for filtration. Never really had a problem with Nitrates, but phosphates would get high occasionally and I would just use the poly pads to lower. Should I be running a reactor with GFO or something else? What about Carbon, yes, no or only if there is a problem?
Sorry for the long post and so many questions. I want to do it right from the start.
1. Lighting: I am intrigued with the LED lighting, but notice that there are tons of LED lights for sale and I almost never see MH lighting for sale. I am leaning towards Metal Halides. I am assuming I would need 3 lights. Should I go 250W or 400W. Am I correct in assuming I would have better success with MH lighting over LED? Also, would fans cool the tank enough with the MH lighting above or would I need a chiller?
2. Skimmer: There are so many options I'm not sure what to get. Reef Octopus seem to be popular and reasonably priced. What size would I need 210G that is heavily stocked? Any other skimmers I should be looking at? Any reason not to get a used skimmer from the for sale section?
3. Flow: It appears as if the Ecotech Vortech MP's are popular. I plan on having a somewhat minimalist approach to the aquascaping. What would be a good plan for flow? I'm thinking (2) mp40's at the ends, what about the middle, some kind of wave maker maybe?
4. Dosing: I will be starting off with frags. Would it be best to just manually add supplements and then add some kind of dosing pumps down the line? I can probably keep parameters in check with water changes until things start growing bigger correct? What is the best way to keep everything stable, dosing pumps, kalk water in ATO, Calcium reactor?
5. Filtration: In my last tank I relied on the skimmer and live rock for filtration. Never really had a problem with Nitrates, but phosphates would get high occasionally and I would just use the poly pads to lower. Should I be running a reactor with GFO or something else? What about Carbon, yes, no or only if there is a problem?
Sorry for the long post and so many questions. I want to do it right from the start.
