suphew

if you leave the fans running then the heaters have to run more wasting power costing you in the long run. you can connect the fan to the light timer but adding a heat controller has made heaps of difference to the temp in my tank. no more swings between 24- 29 degrees. A good investment in my boks.

CAn I risk adding, Timers for lights, pumps, topup, etc $100 RCD $120 power boxes $30 temp controller $120 fish food $50+ (for a mix of dry and frozen) box of salt incase its been raining and you cant get water $60+ carbon, phos-sorb $50 I also think $50 for plumbing is a bit low, bends cost about $5 each, taps $30+, glue or clamp things $20, plus tube/pipe, adaptors, bulkhead, standpipe parts.

I would say a temp controller is a must have, not only means you can use whatever cheap crappy heaters you can find without worring, but also turns on your fans/chiller etc. I think I paid $120 for mine, dont know what normal retail is. timers, good quality that will handle lights etc retail at about $30-$40. I currently have 6 on my tank. RCD $120, I have two could get away with one. Oftem forgotten but would you put a fan heat on the edge of your bath without one?? Yet people are happy to stick their hands in a tank full of 240v heaters and pumps.

I wait for 3 days of no rain to be sure there is no run off from farms, storm water etc. lately I have also been taking 60 lliter black barrol thing as well as 3 x 20l containers and using the barrol water a week later if the weather is no good, this allows me to do 15odd percent weekly changes. My water params look pretty good so I willl proberly slow down the changes as it gets more difficult to get fine patches.

shea, I have a king 4 in my tank runing my skimmer, its been going for about a year and still works, BUT it is starting to rust (the impela (sp)) and is noisy (p@$#$ me off). im using a eheim 1060 for my return plus another for a closed loop, plus a seio (rated at i think 3000lph). The going rate for secondhard 1060's is about $100-$120, they are as good secondahrd as new cause they are quality to start with. I have about the same size tank as you are looking at. I got a local tiler to drill my tank, you just need to find someone with a daimond tip drill bit, and carefully explain that it is all at your risk, alot of glasiers dont like doing it cause they feel that if they break the glass they will end up with the job of fixing it. I strongly sugest that you at very least get a hole done for your standpipe and plus a couple for a closed loop. I have 4 holes in my tank (closed loop output goes to 2 hole) and would happily have another closed loop

The main things to look out for with marine pumps are that they are completely ceramic, any metal bits (shafts etc) even stainless steel will rust. You then have to look at the application of the pump, ie some pumps don't like back pressure, so while it might have a good LPR rating as soon as it has a load on it (i.e. return pump to tank) it drops right off or become noisy etc. IMHO unless you are welling risk the $ trying odd pumps out stick to the tried and tested brands.

Well to be honest I think Petplanet pretty much covered the requirements of a basic setup, and there have been some good comments for extra things that should really be added. The problem with trying to do this in this format is that it gets very long and confusing for a beginner to read. Maybe we need to have a sticky post (or similar) edited by only one person (a moderater?) for each level of setup, with a seperate post like this one to argue the merits and get some level of agreement (hahaha :lol: ) for what should be included.

Yeah I'll get round having a clean out soon!

Go for it dude, from what I have seen you have the aptitude to get a really sucessful setup going. Just remember to do lots of research and planning, as you know theres some bigs costs involved, if you work out what you want now and get the right gear you will save lots in the long run. I made the mistake of thinking I would start with a small cheaper setup and now have a bunch of cheap crap gear that just wasted $.

You can make them pretty silent, my whole setup is in the sitting room right by my bed room door. Once you have the design right ie standpipe etc. For me the biggest problem seems to be getting quite pumps. I have one cheap one running my skimmer that makes more noise than the rest of the system put together, all the other cheap power heads etc that I have now removed also rattled and hummed.

Sounds like your onto it. I assume you know you only need to let your water sit if it has chlorine in it? Otherwise just heat it up and put it in.

To get this posting back on track, Misnoma why dont you update your location (through I wouldn't blame you if your scared now :lol:) I'm sure who ever is local to you will happierly show off their setup, which is the best way to get an idea of what you want to do therefore giving you an idea of costs. If your anywhere near Wellington, PM me and we can arrange a visit.

Just a question control, I'm not trying to wind you up. I believe YOU can easierly run a little standalone tank with a couple of clowns in it, but you have (I asumme) a few hundred liters of clean stable water in your main tank to use for regurlar large percentage water changes plus (I also assume) a few years of expericence with marine. Dont you agree that it would be difficult for someone without the benifit of all this to run such a setup long term? Isn't the point of this posting to advise a beginner the best, safest, most cost effective (NO not cheapest) way to get started??

Yes the peat will turn the water yellow, it is a good indicator that it is working, when the water starts to go clear you know iit is time to replace the peat. If you leave the carbon in it will reduce the yellow. There is a bit of debate over the correct order to put the media, personally I don't use any filter wool, just the mechincal filter (sponges) and noodles. If you put the filter wool first it will help catch stuff before it gets to the noodles stopping them from clogging so fast, reducing the need to rinse them. But as you have found it will get full itself requiring you to remove everthing to clean it.

The cloudy water is caused by a bacterial bloom, which is feeding of the waste from your fish (or some thing else in your tank, like rotting food etc) normally the good bacteria would process this before it was able to be used by the bad bacteria hence limiting there growth. If some thing in your water supply like pesticide is killing the good bacteria, you will get the bloom of the bad. In your other tanks perhaps the bio load is low enough that the (depleated) good bacteria is able to keep up.

Hmm interesting.... I still wouldnt pull down the tank just yet, there are still a few things to look at. Plus there aren't really any 'bugs' that would be causing your problems, there is something funny going on with the water and we need to work out what this is. Its interesting that your PH chnages so much between your tap and your tank. Try putting some peat in a stocking and put it in your filter, just be warned it will make your water go yellow. Are you able to get water from somewhere else for a while? I assume you are living rural? Maybe you have some pesticide etc leaching into your well water, has there been rain lately, has there been any spraying? This could explain all you problems, but is really hard to test for so the easiest way is to use different water for a while.

Sorry I'm not sure, it doesn't make sense to me to ship heavy wet rock, to then have to dry it out making it half the weight. Also if it did come in properly live I think we would see alot more hitch hikers magically appear in peoples tanks!

What about all the other small items you would need for this setup, nets, water containers, PH buffer, phos-sorb, carbon, plumbing bits, fish food, glass cleaner, grabber, salt (?) etc etc. Each of thses ideas would average about $20-$30 retail so you need to add another $250. I don't think its fair to say to someone yeah you can setup a tank for $500, which they save for and then find that they get an empty tank and have to spend another couple of hundred to put water into it. then on top of that another$100 plus for a fish or two. We need to be able to say, to have a complete setup with a couple of average/cheap fish and EVERYTHING you need for the short term (ie first couple of months so they have time to save for the next round of stuff they'll need) will cost you this. Please are you ready to put the $500 tank to rest, I think petplanet has conviningly proved that a "Budget Beginners 3ft System under $500(recommended fish only or fish and hardy corals)" actually costs more like $1000. Also please note, I'm not saying I would agree with recommending anyone run a setup like this, I would like to at least see a small skimmer added to this system, plus I think it is too limiting and that few people would be able to keep this without wanting to add a few corals etc after a very short time. So would involve upgrading most of the setup making it a waste of money.

Hi Shelley, I would be careful about cleaning your filter out too much, I would suggest that you take it apart and have a good look through it to make sure there is nothing in there and pick out any larger bits of rubbish then put it back on. To fix your problem you need to find the root cause, which could be something rotting in the tank, like cucumber, fish food, maybe a plant thats not doing well, or too many fish too soon, a poor water supply? Once you have minimsed the cause as much as possible you then have to wait for the bacteria in your filter and tank to catch up, this is why cleaning your filter to much isn't a good idea, you will also clean out all the good bacteria. I wouldn't rush to CHC just to get a NO2 test kit, there isn't much you can do about it (other than lots of water changes) until the ammonia starts to drop, since ammonia is the start of the biological cycle. Just a couple of other things, firstly I noticed that you said you removed and cleaned all the rocks etc when you did a water change, I hope you dont do this often? You shouldnt really do it at all as it will kill a lot of the good bacteria each time. Secondly have you tested the water beofre you put it into the tank. I assume your in the country maybe on tank water or bore water, it could be your water supply. Does your water get treated? If your on mains supply do you let it sit overnight, this is really important when your doing very large daily changes.

Not sure if pies is reading the DIY stuff at the moment so will answer for him, sure he will correct me if I get it wrong. Upstairs tank about 1400l downstairs (refugium, sump, skimmer, plumbing (don't larf you'd be surprised how much water 20 odd meters od 40mm plumbing holds ), etc) about 1000l. The web site has gone.

Are you asking for non DIY or non yeast? If non DIY then you can get nutrafin system for around $35 or so, I think you would need at least a couple for a tank that size. Personally I wouldn't recommend yeast system (either DIY or purchased), YES they DO work, but IMHO they are such a pain the A@#$ to run. If you DIY a gas bottle system and can pick up some second hand parts you are still looking at a couple of hundred plus. To DIY a system from new parts cost $400 or so, excluding bottle and defuser. Complete prof systems start at around $600-$700 for a pretty basic setup.

Do the calc and check the graphs, the zero head LPH ratings are pretty meaningless for what you want to do as different pumps handle head better than others. I have a number of pumps and powerheads rated over 1000LPH which proberly wouldnt pump any water to the head you need. A cheaper option might be to get a big cheap pond pump, like one of those resun king 4 or 3's (should only be around $125 if you shop round), since you will only be running it for a few minutes a day and I assume noise isn't a factor.

The 'light bulb man' now on boulcott st usually has both of these in stock. I nornally pay around $25 for 3footers

FYI most 'live' rock in NZ starts out as dead rock anyway, its not possible (or all that practical really, given fright costs) to import 'proper' live rock into NZ because of MAF. Dead rock is put into tanks with 'live' rock and left for a few months to cure. There is no problem with you mixing them in your tank to save some $ but be warned it will increase the cycle time significantly.

The piece from Pies tank did perk up for a couple of days then, over a day went limp again, next morning there was no trace of it. The bad news is this morning I noticed my two largest pulsing Zenia look like they have the same thing. Shame really cause the bigger one had just started to branch and was looking nice. I can't remove the rock they are on cause its the base of a stack, unless anyone has any better ideas I think I will leave them for a couple of days to see what happens then if they dont look like they are improving give them the chop and remove them. With my smaller water volume (~400l)I dont really want them breaking down in the tank. Damn, if they die I'll have an empty spot that will need to be filled with a new coral