TANK CLOSED ~ Hils & Tone tank thread ~ 4ft ~ 37 gallons

[hillie]

Thank you to jrob who has worked out that our new (second hand but new to us) tank "appears to be 176 litres, which is approx 37 UK gallons"

We filled the tank with salt water, added the rocks, heater and pump and left for three weeks. This week we added the crushed coral and attached the Tetratec ex 1200 filter pump.



We started off with two live rocks (the others are the "bone skeleton rocks") and Tone bought a very small deep pink rock for £1.75 which seems to have sprouted some button polyps. (again thanks for everyone in the welcome thread for trying to work out what these are!).




This is the make. Measures 4foot by 15" by 15" so it's quite squat and narrow but sits nicely on the unit at the end of our bed [cursing.gif] actually the sound of the water is quite relaxing believe it or not [003.gif]

Here are the rocks






As said, we bought the tank with various bits and pieces second hand so, if I may, I will post a list of the things given to us to help us understand what they might do!! We are completely new to salty boxes, having a 260litre tropical set up in the lounge.

We are presuming we are still several weeks off being able to put anything live in the tank and it will be interesting to see how the growths on the tiny piece of rock handle the cycling tank [001.gif]

all for now.....
Hils & Tone

[hillie]

OK, so here's the list:

- the tank
- rocks ~ two and-a-bit live
- tetratec ex 1200 filter pump thingey
- 2 x water pumps
- skimmer ~ TMC Vskim 400 protein skimmer (not yet connected)
- 4 x T5 lights ~ two white, two blue (the blue don't shine very brightly is this normal?)
- bottle of Salifert coral food
- API Buffer Max water buffer
- Sera marin iodine component 7
- PO4 Profi Test phosphate
- Nutrafin max marinke flakes
- small bottle of Tetratest PH

and that's about it.

So, this begs the question, what do we need to get next? Can anyone suggest a good testing kit?? ~We've bought a (oops can't remember the name) the ....ometre thingey that checks salinity ( [001_wub.gif] sorry can't remember the name).

Should we add any products whilst the tank is cycling or just leave everything up to the live rocks? I did put a pinch of fish food in a few days ago.....

All suggestions and help will be very gratefully received [001.gif]

[hillie]

ah, Tone also bought a bottle of Coral Flex phytoplankton.... and we've got an RO unit out on the decking with a 100 litre water butt....... plus a box of salt.

[phildavies21]

salt measuring unit is a refractometer. When you start adding coral ull probably need to change your t5 tubes as its suggested there changed every year and as youv'e bought second hand you probably wont know there age? Ull probably be ok for a while but it is recommended you know there age. I can't see anything else you need to be honest once tank cycles. Start enquiring about your CUC.

[phildavies21]

start your skimmer off if your rocks in btw

[hillie]

Start enquiring about your CUC.

what is CUC? [002.gif]

ok... we'll get that skimmer on at some point today hopefully.... obviously we didn't have any instructions so i'm hoping we'll be able to work it out.... any pointers would be gratefully received [023.gif]

[hillie]

just looked in the abbreviations section.... Clean up Crew LOL. Gotta test the water first I think.... might take a batch to our LFS and see what they say and what testing kits they'll advise to buy....

[phildavies21]

Had a look through your pictures and heres what I advise. Firstly what make and model are your water pumps? Do you know the litres per hour they turn over? You have both of these on the 1 side of the tank. Id move 1 to the other side of the tank. And aim both towards the rock. The idea is to get them to push water and particles through the live rock. The bacteria on the rock then breaks down all the stuff we dont want in our tanks. If you have both on 1 side you'll end up with a very quiet patch on the other side of the tank where everything will settle and not decompose. The skimmer needs to be running. This basically skims away again all unwanted cack before it gets chance to pollute the tank. Dont forget to clean the cone on your skimmer regularly. The filter. Media in these things is a no go. There just a place for nitrates to build up. So advice is in your filter have a phosphate remover, a carbon, and filter floss. If you buy a good quality carbon and phos you can get away with cleaning out the filter 1 every 3 months. What test kit you buy depends on what coral you plan to keep. Im just keeping softies and all i ever test for is ph, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and phosphate. If your going to keep corals higher up the chain then my advice would be to get a kit with calk and alk tests also included. I use a API basic marine test kit and find its fine.

[hillie]

Phillipo ~ thanks. I think all that makes sense [009.gif]

The water pumps.... one we had with the tank which is an SEIO M620 super flow pump (don't know how many litres it turns over). The other is one we bought, a Sunsun vibration pump JVP-201 6000 litres per hour and then the Tetratec ex1200 and the skimmer is a TMC 400.

I'll attach some more photos as we've moved the SEIO behind the rocks and will now direct the Sunsun into the rock, rather than making "waves" at the top.

That bit really made sense about pushing the water through the live rock and I love your phrase

skims away again all unwanted cack

[005.gif] . We are quite happy to move the pumps to wherever is suggested, so if you have some ideas, please feel free to tell us where you advise we put them.

Right... about the skimmer. We've managed to get that going today. I say "going" and not "working" because I think we may not have fixed it all up properly. but i'll have to come finish this a bit later coz gotta get The Freds in his bath SORRY!!!

[MonmouthMarine]

full test kit for nitrate, nitrite, ammonia, kH, Mag, Calcium phos .... may have missed a few but a full test kit