csauer52
New member
Group,
It's been a long while since I posted here, in fact it's been since I started my first tank a couple years back. In short, this past Sunday my wife and I came home from church to find the tank looking extremely desolate with steam rising off the top.
It appears I had a thermostat failure that resulted in the water temp rising to ~ 120F. Needless to say, this past weekend was not the best one I've had in a while. I've essesntially lost my entire tank and I'm now faced with starting over.
While I'm very sad at my loss, I'm also excited with the prospect of having the opportunity to start over and improve on my system given the experience gained in maintaining my initial system.
My first tank was a 46 gallon bow front with no sump. As a result, I had to rely heavily on hanging equipment for system stability. Not only was this unsightly, but it led to what I feel was an inordinate amount of maintenance work as I was performing water changes at least once a week and constantly topping off evaporated water. My plan this time around is to minimize these tasks as much as possible in order to spend more time viewing and less time working. I'm also upsizing a tad and going with a 135 gallon tank this time around that will have 2 overflows and a 38 gallon sump. I felt the 46 was a little over crowded and I was never able to get coral to grow the way I really wanted it to. I'm also upgrading the lighting and I think I'm going to go with metal halides instead of power compacts as my coral proliferated throughout the tank but never turned the pretty colors I expected. I've read this could be a sign of insufficient lighting and I do plan on finding out.
I'm looking for advice though on how to maximize my new system in order to fully realize it's potential.
A few questions:
1) I really like the look of white sand similar to that found in Siesta Key Fla. Would it be ok to use this as a substrate for my new tank and where is a good place to get it from.
2) My first tank had ~ 90 lbs of live rock and I think I'll need to add a little more. Even with my predicament, I think the rock should still be ok. Can I just add more to the new tank and give it time to cycle prior to adding new livestock?
3) I have no experience with using a sump but I'd like to keep algae from growing within the display tank. I'm looking for ideas on using the sump to meet this requirement. Any ideas?
4) I really want to automate water top offs as I grew extremely weary of doing this chore manually throughout the week. Are there any recommendations for automating RO/DI topoffs?
Thanks for your help.
Chris
It's been a long while since I posted here, in fact it's been since I started my first tank a couple years back. In short, this past Sunday my wife and I came home from church to find the tank looking extremely desolate with steam rising off the top.
It appears I had a thermostat failure that resulted in the water temp rising to ~ 120F. Needless to say, this past weekend was not the best one I've had in a while. I've essesntially lost my entire tank and I'm now faced with starting over.
While I'm very sad at my loss, I'm also excited with the prospect of having the opportunity to start over and improve on my system given the experience gained in maintaining my initial system.
My first tank was a 46 gallon bow front with no sump. As a result, I had to rely heavily on hanging equipment for system stability. Not only was this unsightly, but it led to what I feel was an inordinate amount of maintenance work as I was performing water changes at least once a week and constantly topping off evaporated water. My plan this time around is to minimize these tasks as much as possible in order to spend more time viewing and less time working. I'm also upsizing a tad and going with a 135 gallon tank this time around that will have 2 overflows and a 38 gallon sump. I felt the 46 was a little over crowded and I was never able to get coral to grow the way I really wanted it to. I'm also upgrading the lighting and I think I'm going to go with metal halides instead of power compacts as my coral proliferated throughout the tank but never turned the pretty colors I expected. I've read this could be a sign of insufficient lighting and I do plan on finding out.
I'm looking for advice though on how to maximize my new system in order to fully realize it's potential.
A few questions:
1) I really like the look of white sand similar to that found in Siesta Key Fla. Would it be ok to use this as a substrate for my new tank and where is a good place to get it from.
2) My first tank had ~ 90 lbs of live rock and I think I'll need to add a little more. Even with my predicament, I think the rock should still be ok. Can I just add more to the new tank and give it time to cycle prior to adding new livestock?
3) I have no experience with using a sump but I'd like to keep algae from growing within the display tank. I'm looking for ideas on using the sump to meet this requirement. Any ideas?
4) I really want to automate water top offs as I grew extremely weary of doing this chore manually throughout the week. Are there any recommendations for automating RO/DI topoffs?
Thanks for your help.
Chris
