220 Gallon tank blank slate, do i take the plunge?

[xblade]

I say go with the 50 gal and 20 gal sump for your first kick at the can.
It'll be a much cheaper setup and you can always do the big tank later if you decide.
JMO

[abcha0s]

The question is, can i make this low cost and low maintenance.

Uhm. No.

A tank that size will cost you some real money. You can cut corners and keep costs down initially, but if you go that route you will end up doing everything twice as you upgrade your hardware. The cheapest way to build a tank this size is to buy the hardware you want right out of the gate.

I say go for it, but don't have any illusions of this being a cost effective tank. Your costs will tripple your wildest expectations. It will suck every spare dollar you have for the next 5 years. It will become an addiction.

[jzz30tt]

Agreed that the costs would run quite high if taking the typical route of doing things. But i think i've come to the conclusion that i really don't have the will power required to keep it low tech and fish only with some live rock.

I know myself better than that. It just wouldn't happen. Some sort of small softies would make their way into the tank somehow or other and I'd slowly work myself up to more hardcore drugs... er corals... Soon enough i'd be sitting staring at it for hours and in the few hours i'm not staring at it I would be behind the wall on the equipment side pouring cash into the sump.

I've bought a better camera instead and will be working on photography instead as a new place to spend my need for a hobby. Plus i have a gorgeous little 8.5 week old daughter that i need to take pictures of.

I'll just do the tank freshwater or a huge paludarium instead.

Here's some of the new hobby to leave off with.

The storm that came through edmonton last night. (straight off the camera, absolutely 0 post processing... I love storms)

[Palmer]

I am new to SW so shouldn't be giving advise but I will throw this out there and see what the experts say. If you are planning on doing a FOWLER (with some softies) and you want to keep the water changes down how about a wet dry filter with a large surface area for biological media? The live rock should really help with nitrates but for primarily fish only tanks that may have a significant bioload I was under the impression that large biological surface areas with high flow is the way to go?

I was reading about fish farm indoor recirculation systems where you want to cut down on water wastage due to the high costs associated with water replacement and they use biowheels and bioballs etc in these applications. This includes both SW and FW fish farming. I know when wanting low nutrient environments such as in SW reef aquariums these are now frowned upon but in a FOWLER I would think it would be fine? Would it just depend on the soft corals someone may want to keep?

Palmer