Essential Reef set up equipment

[Slipstream]

I never said i was just going to go and buy it, i was just trying to get a freaking base of what to start LOOKING at what to buy. I asked for help, not for a stupid 'go read this book' idea. IM ALREADY DOING THAT as i already said. But i m getting some help from one member.. So thank you to him.

[mark]

hope it's not that 14year old without the tank

[Slipstream]

haha.. funny.. whose that anyways?.

[BC564]

I pm'ed him some stuff to think about and some suggestions.

[michika]

Okay here is your list:

Water
- salt (lots to choose from)
- refractometer or a dialed in hydrometer. Refractometer is more acurate.
- testkits, many people seem to like the salifert brand. For just starting out, you'll need; ammonia, nitrate, nitrite. Eventually for a reef tank you should have calcium, alkalinity, and magnesium. Some people test for more parameters, but these are the basics.

Lighting
- Since you mentioned you want a full reef tank you have lots of options. In essence you are going to want to consider T5s, or Metal halide lighting. You - you may want to do supplemental lighting for color
- you may also consider moonlighting for evening or after dark lighting.

The tank:
- You said no bigger the 100g. Is the size of the display you are stating, or the overall system?

Is this the type of list your looking for?

[Slipstream]

Thanx BC and Michika, that helps.

And yah, its the display that will be 100

[ponokareefer]

One thing you will need as well is lots of flow, usually created by powerheads in the tank. Some less expensive, but really good powerheads that are fairly new on the market are called Hydor Koralia.

[ponokareefer]

Not exactly an essential item, but definitely nice to have is timers for your lights. You can usually pick them up at hardware stores for about $15 each.
You may also want to look at setting up some type of wavemaking device. There are a lot of different ways of doing this, so you may want to investigate them. I used 2 Koralia 3's with a Seio Electronic Powerhead Controller, and that has worked really well for me. The ultimate though is a Tunz Wavebox. You will be looking at $500 to $600 though.

[kwirky]

Ok you never mentioned in your first post you've already done a lot of research. Quite a number of us feel daunted when somone asks simply "how do I keep a good saltwater reef?" Too much to say in one post

I'll try to think of "nice stuff to have". pseudo-luxury stuff that makes life a whole lot easier.

• Large round rubbermaid garbage can for mixing saltwater in with a high wattage heater to heat the water quickly before adding salt. Pump/s for mixing the water too.
• a Reverse Osmosis/Deionizer (RO/DI) unit to purify your tap water. Quite beneficial if you have a reef tank and almost a "need". If you have hard water (dunno how it is in prince george) you might want to buy one of those "whole house filters" from home depot that will go inline before the RO/DI unit. It makes all the cartridges last longer if your water has a lot of sediment. You can also tap into the "RO" portion of the purifier and get drinking water. We have a water cooler and we fill the jugs ourselves.
• You will need a pump and heater for mixing change water in too. That's something commonly forgotten about leading to an impromptu trip to the LFS usually . Heat the water BEFORE adding the salt. Helps prevent strange calcium/alkalinity problems.
• You'll also need a large rubbermaid bin (prefferably a round garbage can style one) to store your RO/DI water.
• A turkey baster or an extra maxijet powerhead to blow off your rock on a daily basis. I prefer the turkey baster. It prevents detritus buildup and helps with algae.
• Automatic top off units for evaporated water are a real nice luxury. the JBJ one is pretty good at $100. Saves a lot of time and hassel and your snails and oysters n such will thank you for it (very sensitive to salinity changes).
• Your initial calcium demand won't be so high to need a calcium reactor initially. You can procrastinate and make your own two part calcium/alkalinity mix. Contact littlesilvermax on the forums here. He has good calcium for a good price. the alkalinity is simple baked baking soda. recipe here: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-02/rhf/index.php.
• Wavemakers are nice. For 60g or larger tanks a tunze powerhead/wavemaker combo (from j&L) or a wavebox if you have lots of $$$ to blow . Smaller tanks you can use a JBJ wavemaker controller and maxijet powerheads. Nano's are benefited from hydor rotating water deflectors. These all do a good job at randomizing your current and preventing detritus from settling. That way your skimmer can remove it while it's in the water column.
• oh! and forceps! giant 10" long stainless steel tweezers! My forceps are one of the most valuable pieces of equipment I have. You can get them from a surgical supply store. Extremely handy.
• A feeding stick is handy too for feeding things or moving things around in the bottom region of the tank. The less your hands are in the tank the less your skimmer acts up.

[adidas]

skimmer
auto top off
mh + actinic lights