After researching for quite a long time, I finally purchased a reef tank and it was delivered today. I have a 2x2 foot corner in my office so I opted for the Red Sea Reefer 200 G2. Honestly, I'm a little overwhelmed with the size. And the black stand is very sleek, but it shows fingerprints like crazy. I'd probably get the stand in white if I were to do it over again. Although, the black stand should look pretty cool in the dark. And I'm starting to feel my wallet cringe as I load up my BRS shopping cart haha. Maybe I should have gotten a desktop AIO to start with? Although I hear those are trickier with fluctuations in water chemistry.
Anyway, I'm sure once everything is set up that I'll be happy I opted for the "buy once, cry once" route. And I'm sort of all in on the reefer 200 at this point.
I've kept freshwater tanks since 2020 and I've really enjoyed that. I have 2 high tech planted tanks that I'm still fine tuning. Even though the freshwater tanks still need improvement, I wanted to start a reef tank while I have the time and money to do so because it's a much longer journey than planted tanks where the plants are all grown within 3-4 months.
Putting together the Red Sea Reefer stand was honestly kind of a pain. It looks nice, but I felt that things didn't fit together perfectly at times and I had to make it fit with some gentle hammer taps. And it took forever too... but that could just be me. Also, I vastly underestimated how heavy everything was. When it was delivered, my roommate was away so I had to get it up my steps and into my house by myself. I gently rolled it up the steps because I figured it was padded well, but in hindsight that was pretty dumb to do. Knock on wood, the tank is fine though from what I can tell.
I'll probably continue to put everything together tomorrow once my roommate can help me lift the aquarium up onto the actual stand. Then I can start purchasing the other equipment for it. Here's some photos of my progress so far!
Anyway, I'm sure once everything is set up that I'll be happy I opted for the "buy once, cry once" route. And I'm sort of all in on the reefer 200 at this point.
I've kept freshwater tanks since 2020 and I've really enjoyed that. I have 2 high tech planted tanks that I'm still fine tuning. Even though the freshwater tanks still need improvement, I wanted to start a reef tank while I have the time and money to do so because it's a much longer journey than planted tanks where the plants are all grown within 3-4 months.
Putting together the Red Sea Reefer stand was honestly kind of a pain. It looks nice, but I felt that things didn't fit together perfectly at times and I had to make it fit with some gentle hammer taps. And it took forever too... but that could just be me. Also, I vastly underestimated how heavy everything was. When it was delivered, my roommate was away so I had to get it up my steps and into my house by myself. I gently rolled it up the steps because I figured it was padded well, but in hindsight that was pretty dumb to do. Knock on wood, the tank is fine though from what I can tell.
I'll probably continue to put everything together tomorrow once my roommate can help me lift the aquarium up onto the actual stand. Then I can start purchasing the other equipment for it. Here's some photos of my progress so far!