I've been considering a reef for a while now, and am thinking of moving forward. It does seem to be a little labor intensive. I've kept rift lake tanks for about 15 years, and have had good success, and some failures after bloat and columnaris. I currently keep a 180 Tanganyika and a 110XH Malawi. The 180 is on a 40 breeder sump that I made, and has been running about 10 years, so I'm not new to sumps or aquatics, but reef and salt. In fact my first Malawi tank was a 75 gallon marineland corner flow and sump converted from salt that loved to leak from the bulkheads.
I've been debating a 40 breeder as a staring point, and also looking for some used good quality equipment. Everything I run now I've bought used and scored great on.
Recently I've stumbled across a less than year old ProStar90 and a couple older red sea reefers. I'm kind of thinking the prostar might be a good deal, because its 36" wide, the same as I'd carved out for the 40B project, and the ask is 700.00 for the prostar 90 set and a top. I figure I'd have at least 300-350 into the breeder by the time I either drilled and sumped it, (or got some kind of corner insert which takes up space) and got a stand. So 350 or so more gets me the prostar 90 that's less than a year old. That seems like a no brainer and a huge upgrade for a couple hundred bucks. Does anyone have any insight on that size tank for a first / 5 year reef plan?
There's other equipment available, a Bubble magus curve 5 elite skimmer, 2 nero 5 powerheads, and a vectra s2 pump. Those items are 500 extra. I know not much about these (I use mag drive pumps in my fresh sumps with DC drives, and have no real insight on skimmers, and I've always used Korelia powerheads in my rift tanks) Any insight here?
Are these shut up and take my money deals or should I keep looking?
The next question is that of water. I am on a well in a semi rural area. The water has a little iron, is hard as can be, before my seoftener and hard. My PH is about 8.5. I've watched a couple of the BRS videos on water. Is RODI a must or should definitely have for this endeavor?
The last question is that of live wet rock vs dry rock. I'm patient and don't need it 'now' and have fired up cycles several times in my rift tanks. The cost difference seems substantial. Then again I've never started up a reef before. Ive read things that say I wont need lighting for a couple months until the tank cycles and the rock is prepared. I worry it wont have that nice purple coral algae on it, but I have also seen products that seem to add that? Any suggestions here would be well received.
Lastly, what's a good budget here for lighting (LED) that one would expect to spend without breaking your budget? I still haven't researched corals, so I can't speak to that yet, but I'd like ones that are easier to start with, like the BRS 5 minute video on starter corals.
Thanks in advance.
I've been debating a 40 breeder as a staring point, and also looking for some used good quality equipment. Everything I run now I've bought used and scored great on.
Recently I've stumbled across a less than year old ProStar90 and a couple older red sea reefers. I'm kind of thinking the prostar might be a good deal, because its 36" wide, the same as I'd carved out for the 40B project, and the ask is 700.00 for the prostar 90 set and a top. I figure I'd have at least 300-350 into the breeder by the time I either drilled and sumped it, (or got some kind of corner insert which takes up space) and got a stand. So 350 or so more gets me the prostar 90 that's less than a year old. That seems like a no brainer and a huge upgrade for a couple hundred bucks. Does anyone have any insight on that size tank for a first / 5 year reef plan?
There's other equipment available, a Bubble magus curve 5 elite skimmer, 2 nero 5 powerheads, and a vectra s2 pump. Those items are 500 extra. I know not much about these (I use mag drive pumps in my fresh sumps with DC drives, and have no real insight on skimmers, and I've always used Korelia powerheads in my rift tanks) Any insight here?
Are these shut up and take my money deals or should I keep looking?
The next question is that of water. I am on a well in a semi rural area. The water has a little iron, is hard as can be, before my seoftener and hard. My PH is about 8.5. I've watched a couple of the BRS videos on water. Is RODI a must or should definitely have for this endeavor?
The last question is that of live wet rock vs dry rock. I'm patient and don't need it 'now' and have fired up cycles several times in my rift tanks. The cost difference seems substantial. Then again I've never started up a reef before. Ive read things that say I wont need lighting for a couple months until the tank cycles and the rock is prepared. I worry it wont have that nice purple coral algae on it, but I have also seen products that seem to add that? Any suggestions here would be well received.
Lastly, what's a good budget here for lighting (LED) that one would expect to spend without breaking your budget? I still haven't researched corals, so I can't speak to that yet, but I'd like ones that are easier to start with, like the BRS 5 minute video on starter corals.
Thanks in advance.