Hey all, I'm looking to start a 30g reef tank, with many inverts and maybe one or two fish. My LFS told me that with LS, LR, protein skimmer, and sufficient lighting (depending on what I want in there) that I would be good to go. Is this good enough, and what components or set up do you all recommend
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Salty Brother
New member
Your going to want to start off right in the beginning, you are going to spend at least a grand on your tank, so go to the best right away.
Start a sump, get a nice big skimmer, I like my coralife super skimmer, and get a nice Metal Halide, you are going to want all this stuff soner or later so you might as well get it right away.
Good Luck, ask if you have more questions
Start a sump, get a nice big skimmer, I like my coralife super skimmer, and get a nice Metal Halide, you are going to want all this stuff soner or later so you might as well get it right away.
Good Luck, ask if you have more questions
shouldabenacowboy
New member
<img src="/images/welcome.gif" width="500" height="62"><br><b><i><big><big>To Reef Central</b></i></big></big>
SBC
SBC
theop
Active member
Welcome!
A couple of questions which will influence my advice:
1. Is this your first SW tank? Are you experienced in FW?
2. How tight is the budget? Salty Brother is right, that it will get pricey.
3. Do you know what types of corals, etc. you want to keep? This will be the driving factor for your setup (lights, water turnover, need for reactors, etc).
Here is my general advice, however.
1. If you are setting up a 30g, get an Oceanic 30g "cube" rather than a standard "30 long" or "29 high" tank. When a tank is only 12" front to back, it is very limiting for aquascaping and tank placement. The Oceanic is 18" front to back.
2. Sumps have several advantages, but also make things more complicated. For a sump, you need more equipment (reef ready tank or overflow box, return pump), and there is a higher chance of flooding if things go wrong. However, a sump gives you more water volume, a place to put equipment (skimmer, heater, auto top-off, reactors), and can be designed to give you some refugium space as well. There is nothing wrong with using hang-on filters, especially for a tank that size. There are even combo protein skimmer - refugium hang-on setups.
3. Buy GOOD equipment, especially a protein skimmer. There is a reason that they cost more - they work! Most inexpensive skimmers don't work very well without significant modifications. For a tank your size, something like an AquaC Remora would be a good choice. Also buy a good heater -- cheap heaters are notoriously unreliable and if your heater malfunctions it can only take minutes to kill your entire tank. Go ahead and buy a good test kit, and a refractometer too (swing arm hydrometers are unreliable). Trust me, you eventually buy them anyway.
This is just a start. Once I know the goals for your tank, I can be more specific about stuff.
HTH!
Dave
A couple of questions which will influence my advice:
1. Is this your first SW tank? Are you experienced in FW?
2. How tight is the budget? Salty Brother is right, that it will get pricey.
3. Do you know what types of corals, etc. you want to keep? This will be the driving factor for your setup (lights, water turnover, need for reactors, etc).
Here is my general advice, however.
1. If you are setting up a 30g, get an Oceanic 30g "cube" rather than a standard "30 long" or "29 high" tank. When a tank is only 12" front to back, it is very limiting for aquascaping and tank placement. The Oceanic is 18" front to back.
2. Sumps have several advantages, but also make things more complicated. For a sump, you need more equipment (reef ready tank or overflow box, return pump), and there is a higher chance of flooding if things go wrong. However, a sump gives you more water volume, a place to put equipment (skimmer, heater, auto top-off, reactors), and can be designed to give you some refugium space as well. There is nothing wrong with using hang-on filters, especially for a tank that size. There are even combo protein skimmer - refugium hang-on setups.
3. Buy GOOD equipment, especially a protein skimmer. There is a reason that they cost more - they work! Most inexpensive skimmers don't work very well without significant modifications. For a tank your size, something like an AquaC Remora would be a good choice. Also buy a good heater -- cheap heaters are notoriously unreliable and if your heater malfunctions it can only take minutes to kill your entire tank. Go ahead and buy a good test kit, and a refractometer too (swing arm hydrometers are unreliable). Trust me, you eventually buy them anyway.
This is just a start. Once I know the goals for your tank, I can be more specific about stuff.
HTH!
Dave
Right now i'm still in the researching stages, trying to figure out equipment and such. I'm just starting to look into different corals etc. Unfortunately though I do not have any experience with SW aquariums (thus I've been reading books like no other). My budget is fairly tight being that I'm a college student, but its still a lil flexible. Thanks for your help, and I hope that those "sort of goals" give you some kind of indication of where i'm heading.
Thanks again for all of the help.
Thanks again for all of the help.
Salty Brother
New member
Do you live in a dorm? Becuase if you do most colleges dont allow over 20gal tanks. But anyways, you will have to kinda make a decion on corals, there are 3 major groups, SPS (small polyp stonies) LPS (Large polyp stonies) and softies.
It is possible to keep all three, but very carfully, you would get metal halides, keep SPS at top with very high flow directed at them, then space out LPS and softies occording to how much light they need.
Sorry, but we need more specfics to help.
And again, I recommend the ccs 125 or even ccs 250. Very nice for the price.
It is possible to keep all three, but very carfully, you would get metal halides, keep SPS at top with very high flow directed at them, then space out LPS and softies occording to how much light they need.
Sorry, but we need more specfics to help.
And again, I recommend the ccs 125 or even ccs 250. Very nice for the price.
