30 gallon reef help

[fishguy007]

i want to set up a 30 gallon reef tank.

going to put live rock, some fish and corals in it.

my problem is that i dont have room for a sump. i am thinking of using a hang on back filter and a canister filter. i do have a hang on back protein skimmer.

can anyone give me any advice if this will work with minimal maintenance?

i dont want to be having to do water changes all the time.

any help is appreciated.

[MMAX]

What kind of skimmer do you have? You can run carbon in your hang-on-back filter but get rid of all your media and foam in your cannister and run live rock rubble.

[Doug]

Originally Posted by fishguy007

i want to set up a 30 gallon reef tank.

going to put live rock, some fish and corals in it.

my problem is that i dont have room for a sump. i am thinking of using a hang on back filter and a canister filter. i do have a hang on back protein skimmer.

can anyone give me any advice if this will work with minimal maintenance?

i dont want to be having to do water changes all the time.

any help is appreciated.

Nothing wrong with a hang on filter. My 90g has two on it and a Tunze 9010 skimmer. I run carbon and phosphate remover media in the filter and sometimes run the particulate filters that come with them to clean. I have a Regent type and the largest Aqua Clear.

I dont like canisters myself, although they work fine if kept clean.

[fishguy007]

do you find with the hang on's that you have poor water quality as opposed to a sump. are you always running phosphate sponge and carbon sponge?

[Doug]

Originally Posted by fishguy007

do you find with the hang on's that you have poor water quality as opposed to a sump. are you always running phosphate sponge and carbon sponge?

Not at all. A sump is more convenient in some case but thats about it. Large overflows do a better job on o2/co2 exchange but there are other ways to help it in a sumpless situation.

I did run a good quality skimmer for one thing. Also lots of water movement with stream pumps and/or something like the Hydor pumps churning the surface.

I ran the same amount of Phosban and carbon either way, sump or sumpless. Amount just depends on tank size and bio load amount.

[fishguy007]

can anyone make any other suggestions to help me out with this and avoid a crash.

[fkshiu]

Originally Posted by Doug

Also lots of water movement with steam pumps and/or something like the Hydor pumps churning the surface.

"Steam pumps"? And here I thought reefing was a high tech thing.

[MMAX]

Go slow. If your live rock is cured you can put that in right away to start your cycle. Get yourself some good test kits and I wouldn't add any fish for at least a month, longer for corals.

[fishguy007]

i used all dead rock. the guy at the store told me that this was the best. he said that it would come alive without the curing period and that i could add fish and corals asap.

[Snaz]

Originally Posted by fishguy007

i used all dead rock. the guy at the store told me that this was the best. he said that it would come alive without the curing period and that i could add fish and corals asap.

Your LFS is stupid or corrupt or probably both. That said you will need to start over, sorry.