First Salt water tank

[nolan71416]

So I'm new to the reefing community and have been wanting to get one for years. I finally gave in since my new, and first, baby loves fish tanks. I was able to get a used 36 gallon bow front tank and stand and fin lay got water and rock in it. I'll post on here updates prob every couple days and look forward to any advice from y'all. So I have read to put the sand in after the rock and before water to help with cloudiness. I however didn't do that bc I forgot about the sand until the tank was 2/3 full. I'm using a aquaclear 70 HOB filter and have a 1400 GPH powerhead for the tank. I'll prob have to get a slimmer soon and plan on fish and coral for the tank. The rock is dry rock and the sand is fiji pink live sand plus I put a bottle of bacteria in the tank to help the cycle start up. Here are pictures about 10 hours after I filled it and it's starting to clear up already which I'm excited about.
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[aquaworld75]

Welcome to the community.


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[nolan71416]

Tank has cleared up a bunch over night.
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[lazlodawg]

Welcome! What are you using to create ammonia for the bacteria? Some use a piece of shrimp, but I had great success using Blue Ribbon ammonia.

 

[nolan71416]

I used a bottle of BIO-Spira start up with live nitrifying bacteria.






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[bcavalli]

Welcome to the community. Ask lots of questions and keep the pictures coming.

 

[nolan71416]

Thanks to both of you. And I will ask lots of questions once this tank starts to cycle and plan on posting pics every 2-3 days. Fixing to add some more rock that will go into a 10 gallon tank for my hole office desk. That tank will prob be a hospital tank or might put a small pair of clowns or damsels plus a few corals. Figured the rock got cycle in the big tank and then I'll move 5 gallons or main tank water plus new saltwater to the 10.


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[nolan71416]

So just to confirm I should have the heat in the tank quite high to help the cycle?


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[ff337]

I'd run it normal. You also need an ammonia source to feed the denitrifying bacteria. Piece of shrimp, a cube of frozen food will work too. When it rots, it will release ammonia which starts the circle of life.

Good luck with your tank.

 

[nolan71416]

Thanks I'll get me a pic of raw shrimp tomorrow.

 

[nolan71416]

Day 4 with my new tank and it looks the same as day 2. I did add the rock that will go into my 10 gallon tank. I did this to get the rock live and ready to just slide over to the 10 once the cycle is complete. I'm looking at getting a HOB overflow and putting a sump in the bottom of the stand. This will allow me to put the HOB 70 in the 10 which will be plenty of filteration for it. I plan on a small fish and some corals in the 10. Ill post more pictures
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[Adam]

Hi Nolan, welcome to ARC and the joys of saltwater tanks.

As others have posted you will need to have an ammonia source for the bacteria to feed on or the cycle wont start. If you use a piece of raw shrimp don't use the whole thing cut it in half. Also put it in the end of one of your wife's old nylons. Tie it in, trim the excess back and toss it in the tank. This will make it easier to remove after a week to 10 days.

Good luck and ask any questions you have. Plenty of good people here to help.

 

[nolan71416]

Ok so I have upgraded to a 75 gallon tank now lol. So while my tank cycles I'll be cleaning a getting the 75 ready. So the tank needs a pump for the sump and I was curious what GPH would be recommended for the tank. I plan on getting 2 jaebo RW8 so flow won't be an issue so really just trying to see if anyone else has a similar setup to help me pick out the right size pump. I'll post some pics this weekend once I get the tank cleaned and the wife paints/stains or whatever she wants to do with the stand. As for the ammonia source I used pure ammonia from ace to get that going. Got it above 8ppm about 48 hours ago and now it's showing right at 8ppm. Not posting pics bc nothing has changed yet.

 

[nolan71416]

Here's the before on the 75 gallon tank I got. Now I'm hoping to have it cleaned and ready Saturday to move into the house.
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[bcavalli]

You could go with a Jaebo DCT 6000. It's a DC pump which will allow you to adjust the flow with the controller.

 

[nolan71416]

Ok so I got a issue with my saltwater tank water. It's going through the fishless cycle using pure ammonia to assist the bacteria grow. I stopped adding ammonia 4 days ago to check and see if the nitrate and nitrites would get back down. The nitrites and nitrates went down within 2 days and the ammonia went to zero. Since then the nitrites and nitrates are off the chart high. Is this because I quit adding a source of ammonia to the tank. I only have rock and sand in the tank. Any advice would be awesome.


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[nolan71416]

Nolan71416;1110412 wrote: Ok so I got a issue with my saltwater tank water. It's going through the fishless cycle using pure ammonia to assist the bacteria grow. I stopped adding ammonia 4 days ago to check and see if the nitrate and nitrites would get back down. The nitrites and nitrates went down within 2 days and the ammonia went to zero. Since then the nitrites and nitrates are off the chart high. Is this because I quit adding a source of ammonia to the tank. I only have rock and sand in the tank. Any advice would be awesome.


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Also if anyone around the winder would be interested in coming by one afternoon to help me setup my sump properly and give advice on what else i need for it. I have a skimmer but missing the pump so I was going to try and fed it from the main return pump. Seem to be the cheap way right now. I'm willing to work on it if I knew what I was doing with it.

I'm up to option as far as doing the sump with bio balls, ceramic pieces or rock or going with the refuge type. I have a 20-25 gall sump shown below. Bought a DCT-6000 pump for it I only have 1 drain and 1 return to and from the tank.

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I start tomorrow night re attaching the front panel on my tank and then get to paint the entire thing before starting the water test in the 75 new tank. I really have to get this tank up and running Saturday morning. Got a lot or work to do. Any builders, water guy and gals close by who would be willing to stop and check my tank out please let me now. 7709906781 or here below is my 75 gallon bow from getting his complete make over. the tanks has been completely stripped down a resealed.

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[lazlodawg]

Nolan71416;1110412 wrote: Ok so I got a issue with my saltwater tank water. It's going through the fishless cycle using pure ammonia to assist the bacteria grow. I stopped adding ammonia 4 days ago to check and see if the nitrate and nitrites would get back down. The nitrites and nitrates went down within 2 days and the ammonia went to zero. Since then the nitrites and nitrates are off the chart high. Is this because I quit adding a source of ammonia to the tank. I only have rock and sand in the tank. Any advice would be awesome.


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Okay, so just to go over the basics of the process. You want a large enough bacteria population in your sand and rock that any ammonia gets turned into nitrites and then to nitrates fairly quickly. The nitrates are then lowered by water changes. There are tank setups that will eventually support a place where bacteria can survive that turn nitrates into nitrogen gas, but this takes a longer time to develop and a low oxygen zone such as a true deep sand bed.
You just need to be able to convert about 2 ppm ammonia to zero ppm ammonia in about 24 hours. Once the tank can do that, do a huge water change to bring nitrates down to where you want them and you are ready to go.

 

[nolan71416]

Ok. Thanks so I'll be making water tonight then for my water change plus extra water needed for my upgrade to my 75 gallon tank.


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[nolan71416]

Ok so I got my sump pump today and was going to plumb everything and I need to know how important is a slimmer at the start of a aquarium setup. Bc my current sump won't hold the skimmer unless I rig it up in the first section where the water drains into the sump.

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I'll have bio balls on the very bottom and then a layer of ceramic pieces with filter sponge on top of the ceramic. No filter socks so I'm thinking I might could place in the first section if I use some egg crate to separate the media on 1 side and the skimmer on the other side. If I could get away without a skimmer for a couple months I'd probably just build a acrylic one that fits better. Any suggestions?


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