Looking for some advice

[DivinusOculus]

Hey everyone,
Hope you've all had a wonderful Holiday season! So I've decided to start doing some research in to different saltwater items. I've been in the freshwater hobby for about 5 years now and want to venture over to salt so I'm looking for some advice as to what brands are the right way to go. Now I've got two considerations, I want to do it right the first time so as I progress from beginner corals to advanced ones I don't want to have to tear my system apart to add a new piece I could have just added from the beginning.. but with that said I am by no means made of money and don't have a few thousand to drop on a dream tank.

What I have: an empty 75 gallon glass
My plan: I'm going to drill the tank and add an overflow.
Custom make a sump out of a 30g and hard plumb it all together.

Now the advice I need:

Lights: please don't tell me in super scientific lingo.. I won't understand,lol. As I said earlier.. to begin with I'm going to do fish and beginners corals.. and eventually grow in to advanced ones. Of course I want to get the Vertex Illumina because it's awesome but not many of us can afford 1+ thousand dollars on a light.. So send me links or info on the lighting systems you recommend.

Skimmer: I know I want one that goes in my sump.. and I'm pretty sure I want an external pump.. I'm thinking somehting in the Super Reef line ,Vertex Omega line or the new Tunze Master DOC Protein Skimmer 9410 ... any advice, suggestions, or general input welcome. Why are these things so darn expensive, lol?

powerheads: Again of course I want the VorTech MP40s but those are fairly expensive.. What do you guys think about the Jebo WP40s? I've seen lots of good reviews on them. I am considering the Tunze 6065 but those are on the expensive end of what I can afford.. tho I understand the power heads aren't a place to skimp on when it comes to quality, especially when it comes to high end corals. Also how many powerheads will I need total? I was thinking four, two for the display tank, one for the sump and one for the barrel I plan to use for mixing the salt and water for water changes. Will I need more?

Pumps: Which ones and how many?? I know I need one for the sump return with a minimum of 750 gph and more depending on how many bends I have in my plumbing, I'm thinking external if I can find an affordable one.. what do you recommend? I know i need one to pump the water from the barrel to the tank during water changes. One for each media reactor.. Any more?

Heaters/ chillers: Here are my thoughts.. two 150w put in the sump, one 25w for the 5g ATO bucket and one 100w one for the water change barrel.. Am I over looking another place a heater would be needed? Do I need a chiller? I'm wanting LED lights, the only internal pumps I'm going to have are the skimmer, the canister filter, and the powerheads If I do need one what size and stuff do I need for it?

Filtration: part of the sump is going to be full of bioballs or ceramic biomedia..( the refugeum part of the sump will also have a sand bed and small rock fragments, I plan of having one of each carbon and gfo reactors and a canister filter with sponges and more ceramic biomedia.. The canister filter came with a UV light.. it's small and pry not really worth much but I will be running it non the less. Of course being in the hobby for 5 years I know the theory of there is no such thing as to much filtration but do you think this is sufficient to eventually build the tank up high end corals and fish?

Controllers/ Monitors: I so baddly want to get the Reefkeeper.. I won't be able to manage the system otherwise.. I'm horrible at remembering stuff on a schedule but the computer alerts will make sure I keep up properly so my tank doesn't die. The reefkeeper system is crazy expensive.. What other recommendations do you guys have??

Now I know there is a lot more needed to construct a tank but these are the specific things I need advice on, everything else I believe I understand well enough, at least for now, lol. Thank you in advance for all your help on each subject.

 

[kdc527]

forget about the canister filter and the bioballs and ceramic media you can accomplish all you filtration needs with a good skimmer and some live rock in your sump. I had a tank set up about 5 years ago and was going to do the same filtration set up as you have outlined. A good friend of my wifes had a saltwater setup and saved me from spending alot of money on unneeded items.

 

[morleyz]

well, i'll give you the short version of what I can help with:

Lighting: Good lights aren't cheap. Buy LEDs. RapidLED, Reef Breeders, and Reef Radiance are all "budget" choices. You can get by on a fish only and softies with cheaper lights, but there is some evidence that the spectrums can cause algae problems. If you super budget on lights, you'll probably want to upgrade later.

Skimmer: All good choices and you'll find people who love and hate each one.

Powerheads: The Jebaos get OK reviews, but their quality and longevity are questionable. The Tunzes are great. You really only need 2 for your display. Not sure what you need one in the sump for. Buy a $20 powerhead for mixing salt.

Pumps: Don't know much about external pumps, so hopefully someone else can help.

Heaters/Chillers: Heaters are fine, except I don't think you need one for ATO. The small amounts of ATO that get dumped into your sump won't have any affect on temperature. Chiller will depend on a lot of other factors, like ambient temperature, do you have a hood, etc.?

Filtration: Skip the bioballs, ceramic media, and the canister. These will all contribute nitrates to your system, which is not something you want in a reef. Your filtration is handled by the live rock. If you want mechanical filtration, use filter socks on your drain line(s), just change them often. There are logs of ways to export nitrate (water changes, macroalgae, etc.) Use one of those methods to keep nitrates down.

Controller: If you want one, the ReefKeeper is actually the cheaper option.

 

[Scuba_Steve]

Truthfully, all controllers will do the basic tasks you need to do. I use an old Aquacontroller JR. and have alerts setup on my cell phone for other things. You can pick one up used for $100.

I agree with lights, LED is the way to go. Even get some cheap ebay fixtures. Whats important is that they are using at least 3 watt leds. A basic fixture is going to just give you blues and whites, which is all you really need.

Jebos and koralias are good budget powerheads. I use a koralia in my mixing tanks as well.

Most people do not need a chiller unless you are really pumping down some serious halide power. I ran a 250w on a 40 cube and never came close to needing a chiller. If I ran a 400w then maybe. No heater in the ATO.

Bioballs, Biomedia, and filters are for freshwater. Liverock, flow and a good protein skimmer is all the filtration you will need. If you use a media reactor, I use a maxijet 1200 (what are they called now?) as a feed pump.

 

[dutchbro14]

i have a jebao rw-8 running on my 50 gallon freshwater, packs a serious flow and is really too much for the tank even on the lowest setting...the controllers are nice. ive seen a vortex in person and have used koarillas in the past. jeabos have flow to match a vortech imo

i got an eheim 1260 for my 90, and deff the way to go..super quiet, i would know its in my bedroom lol

dont have much experince with lighting but i tank of the month has an sps reef lit by ai vegas. probably going to be what i end up getting for lighting my new reef too, of course theres a ton of options though

also check out reef octopus skimmers. have a friend who runs one and it pulls serious gunk, and from what i can tell theyre a bit less than vertex skimmers and such

good luck with your setup!

 

[Mrramsey]

Here we go....

Lights: I recommend LED for the lowest ongoing costs. The best you can afford. I use Reefbreeders LED, the photon 48 but the 32 might work for a 75. You can call them as they are helpful.

Skimmer: Something sized for your total tank volume. Lets face it they all can skim pretty effectively. You will pay for better quality materials and pumps. I have a used SWC extreme 150 that I traded a stand for. Works great. You can find good used equipment out there.

Powerheads: Jebaos so far for me have been great. I started with 2 wp-25's in the 120 but decided i needed a bit more so I upgraded to the new rw-8's. very strong flow and I run them at 40%. Longevity of these is somewhat unknown since they are new to the US. I look at it like this... if they last me 1-2 years I got my monies worth and by then I will be in a better position to go another route if I need to.

You do not need to heat your ATO water. the ammount that you add will have little effect on your total system volume.

Pumps: You will need one return. Danner Mag pumps are the reliable standard it seems. Not super silent, and not the most efficient out there but reliable. I use a Sicce pump, I like it a lot. A sicce syncra 4.0 might be a good choice for yours.

Heaters: 2 150w will be fine for your sump. I would recommend the finnex titanium heaters. You will need a separate heater controller to run them because they do not have a thermostat built in. They have a safety cutoff. I build my heater controller from a STC-1000 temp control pretty simple to do if you are handy. You do not need one in the ATO.

Filters: Your live rovk is the only filtration you need. Bioballs and ceramic media are a freshwater thing and have no place in a marine system. Ditch the canister filter and uv light as well. In a marine environment it is possible to over filtrate to the point where your system is too clean.

Controllers: I like them for some things but I Highly recommend that you learn for a good 6-12 months how to do it all yourself so that when that controller fails you know what to do and how to handle the issue. I do not own one currently but when I do I am leaning toward just using it to monitor my system and not really "control" anything more or less to just be my eyes on the tank while I am away from it.