Brand New Tank Questions

[mseferowicz]

Hi everyone, I very new to salt water tanks so excuse some of the questions. I just got my tank up and running it’s a 65 gallon all glass with the mega flow system including the model 3 sump with a Mag 7 pump and a Coralline Protein Skimmer. So far I think everything is good, started out with RO/DI water, and got 60 pounds of live rock and 80 pounds of live sand.

Anyway here are some of my simple questions:

Is there a correct way to position the water feed jets? Should they be pointing levels or down or does it not make a difference?

I included some pictures of the rock does it look good? I got it for 4.90 a pound and I really liked it because it had some nice big pieces.

How do folks do water changes, should I put the new water in the sump?

So far its only been up for 4 days and so far this is what I have

Day 1
Temp 72.5
SG 1.021
pH 7.8
Ammonia 0.3
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0

Day 4
Temp 75
SG 1.024
pH 8
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 10

Does this look alright, what do I do now? Everything just seems to be lining up but is that because I have not had any decaying matter, I read on this site a recommendation to add a dead shrimp and let it decompose to force a cycle or should I just wait and see what happens?
On the same subject is there a better way to do water checks, I’m using the Marine Lab kit and I’m having a hard time judging the colors are there easier methods or is this pretty much it?

Also what should I be aiming for on a all fish tank, are the numbers above ok, the reason I ask is even in the two books I read so far one recommends a specific Gravity of 1.022 while another a 1.025, right now I got it to 1.024 and was planning on maintaining that.

Finally am I supposed to take out the bio-balls in the sump, it seams that I keep on reading on this site to remove them, if I remove them should I put anything else there or just leave the sponge and that’s it?

I know these are some simple questions but so far I’m just reading as much as I can (love this site, lots of great info) and trying to make sure I’m following the correct steps to a nice successful tank.

Thanks
Mario.



http://home.comcast.net/~mseferowicz/Fish/IMG_0038.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~mseferowicz/Fish/IMG_0048.jpg

[sir_dudeguy]

[welcome]
do not add a dead shrimp. You dont need to add anything to jumpstart the amonia when you've already got live rock. As you can see, you've already got the amonia going. You need to wait for that to go to 0 before doing anything really tho.

Also, you need a lot more flow. Just 1 single return will not be enough. If its a fish only tank, you should at least go for 15 times turnover per hour, but in my opinion you cant go wrong with more and it will only help.

So you'll need at least around 1000 gallons per hour all together with all the pumps combined (not the skimmer tho). And you also need to take into account the head loss on the return pump (and by the way, they way you have them positioned is fine...you just need more powerheads). I'm not sure what the rating is on your pump...but for this sake, we'll just say like..600. Now if its having to push water all the way up to the tank, it will not be putting out 600 gph. Maybe 500 or even less in some cases. Depends on how high and powerfull the thing is.

Also, you need to bump your temp up to right about 80.

last, on the bioballs, yes take them out NOW while it wont affect anything :) If you wait too long, they may have already caused a problem and at that point, you'll have to remove them slowly. Do it now before they even start causing the problems (high nitrates). Live rock is all the filtration you need (along w/a skimmer and in some cases a fuge). How much live rock do you have by the way?

And yes, there will be someone that says "bioballs are perfectly fine" or something like "i've been using them for 18 years no problems"....thats one case tho. When the majority of the people on this site say not to use them, i would not use them. Some people break the rules and it doesnt apply to them...most dont tho.

[mseferowicz]

Ok so the first thing tommorrow the bio balls are comming out, do I also take of the blue filter that the water flows over before the bio balls, it seems to be caching some nasty bigger gook?

As far as the water flow the pump is 700gph and goes up about 4 feet from the sump. The question is how do I add more flow sice there is only the one pipe going up, a bigger pump?

The only other thing is you mentioned wait till the amonia gets to zero and that was kind of my point it's already at zero and that seems to be too quick?

Thanks for the help...

[TekCat]

No need for bigger pump. Faster moving water through the sump could be too fast and microbubbles will get to the display tank. Ugly.

Just add a couple of powerheads to the tank at the oppostite ends of the tank to supplement needed water flow.


You could leave "Blue filter" for a while to catch gunk, but it HAS TO BE CLEANED/REPLACED REGULARY!!!!!!!! I had a filter sock catching drain water, then I removed it... no problem :)

Instead of bioballs you could put some more LR for added bio-filtration.

Agree, boost the temp to 77 - 80. If you plan to keep inverts then I'd boost salinity to levels of natural sea water: SG 1.0264 or 35ppt.

Other than that you're fine ;)

[saltycreefer]

That looks like awesome live rock!

[asm481]

Your rock looks good. You don't want more flow through the sump as others have stated and yes add more flow to the tank via powerhead or closed loop.
One thing I would change is the position of at least one of those loc-line returns. Put it right below the surface to agitate the surface more. This does a couple good things, breaks up scum that will form, and most important acts as a siphon break in the event of power failure to stop sump floods. I know there are siphon breaks drilled in the pipe on that setup but they fill with gunk in a hurry. And yes rip out the bio balls and blue pad.

[mseferowicz]

Thanks everyone, looks like I'm on the right track. I'll post some pics once I have some more activity in the tank. For now I'm going to make the recomended adjustments, keep on reading and wait.