If You Are New to Reef Central, Introduce Yourself Here!

[sarah12345]

Hi I'm Sarah and I'm new to saltwater fishkeeping in general. Having kept and bred various freshwater fish for about 6 years now, including discus, EBJDs, halfmoon bettas and others, I am taking the leap into salt. Knowing very little about saltwater, I am planning to keep a reef style tank, with my only absolute must have fish being a pair of picasso clowns. I am planning to do this setup in my 3x3x2 ex-dicsus display, which I think should be more than ample for my first tank.

 

[DerrickH]

...

 

[DerrickH]

New to this hobby but really enjoying the DIY stuff. I have a 40g acrylic Truvu with custom stand, all glass 20g sump, quite one 6000 return pump, and homemade plumbing. Lighting is plain fluorescent for now till tank is cycled and such. Also have a 55g long with custom stand thats not set up yet, and a 20g deep that houses some African cichlids for my daughter. Pics of my soon to be reef tank below.

 

[falonchristie]

Newcomer!

Newcomer!

Hello,
My name is Falon and I am very new to the hobby. I set up a 55 gal about a month ago and have put live sand and 1/2 live rock and 1/2 lace rock. A few turbo snails and a few crabs. Also I added a few gupies out of my freshwater tank. I am trying to study as much as I can before making any more purchases. My next step is the t5 lighting. I went and got actinic bulbs for the tank and found out that this is not going to be enough. And thats about as far as ive gotten. I keep trying to go to the next step but I get confused with all of this other stuff I know nothing about. After lighting I dont know what my next focus should be. I really dont know what a sump is or what is the full purpose but I think this is something I need to read up on today that I might need to do for a reef tank. But Hi to all and hopefully I will learn something at a COMAS meeting in oklahoma I have herd about recently.
Thanks,
Falon

 

[pns]

Hi all,

I'm not really new to the hobby, per se, as I've had a 65 gallon tank up for about a year and a half. I've been lurking around the RC forums for a while now, but never really had anything useful to add.

I'm currently finishing up the set up phase of a 225 DT (crappy phone pic attached) and have had a couple issues come up which could've been addressed quickly with the insight of some of you guys. Thanks for all the info you all provide!

 

[pns]

Forgot to include my tank info:


65 gallon tall (36x24x18) | CPR BakPak 2 | 2 Hydor Koralia 2 | Rio 10HF | 36" Coralife PC (1 96W 10K, 1 96W Actinic, 2 LED Night Lights)

- 3" Salarias fasciatus | 3-4" Paracanthurus hepatus | 2-3" Neocirrhites armatus
- 3" Lysmata debelius | 3" Strombus alatus
- Euphyllia divisa | Actinodiscus*sp. | Zoanthids | Pachyclavularia sp. | Xenia umbellata


225 gallon (72x24x30) | Reef Dynamics INS250 | 4 Ecotech Vortech MP40W ES | 4 AquaIllumination Sol Blue (70 degree optics)

 

[jbullfroggy]

Hi everybody. My name is Jeremiah and I'm from Rockford Il.
I've had my tank up and running for about 9 months now so I'm still pretty new to the hobby but learning more everyday. I'm looking forward to speaking with all of you in the future.


55 gallon mixed reef
roughly 70lbs live rock
2 inch sand bed
4 t5 ho 54 watt bulbs
2 koralia 2s & 1 koralia 1 for current
30 gallon sump
sea clone skimmer

2 percula clownfish, six lined wrasse, fridmani dottyback, coral beauty angel, sailfin tang, fire shrimp, green bta. large cuc. frogspawn, kenya tree, assorted mushrooms, zoanthid polyps, candy cane, orange fungia plate coral, gsp frag, montipora(not sure of name)

 

[a1eyejack]

Help finding Coralife Aqua-Chill Chiller connections

Help finding Coralife Aqua-Chill Chiller connections

I have a Coralife Aqua-Chill 1/4 HP Chiller, that I bought used. good thing is that it works, the bad thing is that the inlet and outlet connections are missing.

I have contacted Oceanic about this, since they own Coralife I guess, and they said that those connections were discontinued about 5 years ago. I'm thinking that there must be some other source of these connections out there.

The best way I can discribe the connection is this: A compression fitting to the chiller, that converts to a hose barb.

My ruler says the outside threads are approx. 1&1/4 inches. The inside dimension is about 9/16 inch.

Anyone that can help, please send me ANY leads if you can. Otherwise, I may have to dismantle this chiller and see if I can rig up something else!

Attached are 2 images of the chiller and the chiller fitting I'm talking about.

Thank you for you help
a1eyejack

 

[Zymurgy]

Hi

Hi

Hello

I just joined up a bit ago. From Grand Rapids MI. Going to design my first reef tank- about 100g rimless cube. (Once had a fish only tank.) Will be coming here for a lot of advice so thought I'd introduce myself. Current thoughts are ACAN LED lights, sapphire rimless (any suggestions), an oversized protein skimmer, refugium. I would like to be able to shop for used items but it seems I am not allowed to view the sale postings? How can I become eligible for that? Anyway, thanks in advance for tolerating all the questions I will be asking as things move along.

Zymurgy

 

[Wichers]

Hello ALL!!
From Sioux Falls, SD. I just been getting into this very addicting hobby for a full year now my tanks now consist of 29g biocube, 75g oceanic thats freshwater now with tetras(plans to get it drilled and make it into saltwater it was my 1st tank) and also a 180 rr tank that just sits downstairs empty with the unfinished basement. so over a years time i really dug in. And also attending MACNA hope to learn alot there.
Thanks, MATT

 

[Brwestern]

Hey all.

Brand new to the hobby. So new that I haven't purchased a single item yet. I've been researching and reading...getting my hands on any book I can buy right now. Trying to make sure I know what to expect, what to/not to buy. Hoping to start a 120g reef tank.

 

[phillyfishguy]

Hey all,

Name is craig from philadelphia and doing research on a 120 gallon set-up and all plumbed to my basement. Been doing research for like 5 months and just bought stand and tank and custom sump for basement. Taking it nice and slow and doing all research and buying the right stuff once... I hope lol

 

[HollandsReef]

Well, we just picked up our first of two shipments of LS and LR. We put it in the tank last night. Need to re-adjust the rock a little because we couldn't see them very well. The tank has settled for the most part and ammonia test this morning shows .25 ppm
We will keep you all posted on progress.
Mark & Karen in Ga.

 

[dub_23]

Hi everyone! my name is George and i live in Salinas CA. i have 50 gallon tank that i want to set up...but i dont know where to begin so far i have is a fluval filter and lights.....can anyone help me out and direct me the right way? is there anyone near by monterey county?

 

[1AaronTravels]

New to Hobby.

New to Hobby.

Hello All, new to the Hobby. Building a Reef with a 120 Gallon tank. So far, my empty tank looks like this: 29 Gallon sump/fuge, a rio 3100 return via a diy Weir/overflow with 1 inch drain. The return runs to a SCWD. I have 2 Rio 1700 PH's in the tank and a AquaC Remora Pro PS in the sump. I bought 75 lbs of marco rock ( due on wednesday) and have 110lbs of argonite shells (boiled, and rinsed and dried in the NM Air from a past life of a Cichlid tank base medium.)

A couple of questions,
1. Should I add a bag of regular argonite sand ( 30 lbs and remove like quantity from what I have??)
2. I've read a lot about cycling a tank, am believing that the best way for me to proceed is to:
a. add my sand and argonite to the tank.
b. build my Marco reef rock structures,
c. add my water ( RO from walgreens) and add my salt. ( 8.0 ph, 80degrees and 1.025 sg)
d. toss in a couple of shrimp and let the cycling begin.
e. in 6 to 8 weeks, once everything spikes and returns to normal,
f. Purchase and add 25 lbs of Live rock and add to tank at this time
g. do a 20% water change, take readings and if good, add a sturdy/hardy fish or coral????
h. And thats my plan of action...
i. Lights... Havent purchased them yet, am leaning towards Marineland Reef LED's 48-60 inch size.

Anyone see how to improve with this? Any glaring oversites???

Thanks all.

Aaron in New Mexico.

 

[jag940]

im new lol

im new lol

Hi everyone I'm jason I just bought a 120 drilled reef tank with a new fuge/ sump setup pretty green on reefing but sure looks fun

 

[Ghxst]

Hello

Hello

Wanted to post my introduction before I started to dig into reading, I may forget my intro if I wait to long.

The beginning of my saltwater interest started years ago when I worked at a petco years ago. I was hired on for freight but I couldn't stay away from the aquatics section. Soon there after I had my own saltwater fish tank! I kept it going for just over a year with great success. That was until my roomates at the time had a huge party and someone put a beer can in the tank :eek2::worried::furious::uzi:

Now 10 years later, married and in a house with NO roommates, my wife surprises me with a 45g tank for Christmas she got at the LFS. She thought it would help me out with my anxiety (LOL). I went crazy doing research for about 20 days, planing on how I can make this tank work for me, and figuring out what equipment I would need and how I will manage to afford it all, as I wanted to do it all right this time without the petco budget and cheaper equipment.

I contacted our friends that live down the road for some advice that have several Saltwater and Reef tanks. We were invited over and to my utter surprise they had a lot of the equipment to give me from a tank they recently took appart, including live rock for the entire tank (Thank you so much Lin & Woap!!!)

After staring at the box of equipment lost as heck, not sure where to start, I talked to Lin and she pointed me here. She recommended Reef Central and most importantly the Newb section, lol. I am just going to jump right in, if you have any suggestions where to start, please let me know. Once I get set and ready to start I will make sure to post equipment and pics so everyone can follow along and hopefully give advice along the way.
Sincerely,

Ghxst

 

[AutoEXE]

Hello everyone,
I am new to this forum site I am switching my 75 gal from freshwater to saltwater it will be a FOWLR Tank. I will be posting a thread soon to show everyone and get everyone's advise (because I don't know everything yet).

 

[phoneman]

Anyone from Sacramento area ?

 

[Angler7]

Newbie. Just purchased New Marine Aquarium to help get me up to speed as well as reading Sk8r blogs. What i have is in my signature. thanks to all for any help.