I am starting a new tank and looking for words of wisdom >LOL<. The tank is 65G and not drilled. It will be in the basement and used for Frags only and QT (maybe one fish). It doesnt have to be pretty. The lighting will be T5.
Questions:
Drill it for closed loop?
Overflow box and if yes then drilled or hang on the back. $$
Fuge or no Fuge - i can make one with 20-30G tank so no big deal
Skimmer or no skimmer - $$$
sand or just glass bottom
I have plenty of Live Rock mixing in a barrel.
I have my big DT (120G) and this one is a second tank in the basement that i want to be low maintenance
if it is frags only then i would deff do bare bottom. no closed loop needed. overflow box in tank with hole would be my way to go. hate hang on back overfl.ows. skimmer not really needed if frags just do weekly water changes is my opinion
A lot of the answers will depend on what types of frags you plan on making.
If you’re doing softeies and LPS then I think a closed loop for a frag tank is overkill unless you’re doing it commercially. I also don’t see a need for LR, a fuge, a sump, or an overflow.
I would not recommend using the same tank for frags AND a QT. Many times in QT you end up needing to medicate and that wouldn’t be any good for the frags.
I am setting my frag tank (20L) bare bottom with HOB filter and T5 lights. I’ll add a small Koralia (K2) for flow. Of course I will only be growing out some LPS but mostly softies, zoas and mushrooms (I’m going to corner the market with “Beginner Frag Packs” ;D)
Of course If you are doing SPS then disregard all previous comments ('cept the fuge/QT part) as your are going to want the largest water volume possible, the greatest amount of flow, and as much bio-filtration as you can get.
I have to agree with Craig that while ideal every tank would have a fuge for stability it is not required by far. KaptKen runs all of his systems(I believe three prop tanks now) all with fairly large fuges.
I believe LR adds enough stability that it should be present in some quantity regardless of the system. That being said only a couple of fist sized pieces are kept in some of my prop systems. Though I wish there was more, space is often a limiting factor.
As far as the skimmer goes I will put a bit, “It depends”, on that one. Most of my tanks don’t have skimmers on them. Actually I own 3, one is in pieces, one is still in it’s original package, and the last one has been switched off for a while. If you would like to grow certain things like Duncans, Zoanthids, Paly, Candy Canes, ext that would grow significantly faster with feeding then it would be a great idea to have a skimmer.
Personally when times are busy and I can’t get around to water changes I just feed my fish and ignor the corals and leave the skimmer off. When I have more time to pay attention to my tanks and have salt and water for changes I leave the skimmer on a timer 6-8 hour a night.
While closed loop would likely be ideal, it would be much easier to add power heads in the tank. Power heads will take away from the look of the tank a bit, but since you’ll like load the tank up with shelving anyways appearance of the overall tank is not the goal here. The power heads will shrink amount of room you have for frags as well slightly.(Most efficient way to run them is in the top half of the tank and they will cast a shadow on the bottom half with your T5s)
Just a couple of notes, all my opinion, hopefully we’ll talk soon.
[quote=“Marchingbandjs, post:6, topic:2635”]
Jon, What kind of flow would you recommend for a prop system at 20g. Also, where would you place them.[/quote]
If you don’t mind other’s opinions:
Amount of flow is greatly dependent on the type of frags being grown. Soft corals require significantly less flow then SPS. LPS somewhere in the middle.
For a 20L I will run a small koralia (K1) which will provide plenty enough flow for softies and LPS.
You can always but barriers and deflectors up in front of a power-head to redirect flow if you are going to try to grow out softies, LPS, and SPS at the same time.
drill it, add a sump with refugium. eh… skimmer maybe… no closed loop necessary because as stated above, basement frag tanks aren’t usually geared for aesthetics. a couple powerheads will be fine. you could put some live rock in the sump and then you could leave the whole display area open for frag racks.
If you really like the fuge idea, do a fuge with LR in it and skip the skimmer. Then you can light the whole “sump” and only need to hide or shade the return pump.(If you can do external you won’t even need to do that) In my opinion fuge/sump combos which implement a skimmer near the source of light adds another significant maintenance concern.(again significant in my opinion, IE cleaning the skimmer from algae grown by the light)
John, I would have to agree with Craig in that it depends, but disagree with the K1. I love the Hydor Korillias, but the 1 and the nanos, in my personal opinion, suck. I would use a Number 2 and I actually do use a K2. Scratch that, I actually have 5 20gallon QT tanks set up and run K2s in three of them.(I would use one in each if I had then funds to) I often times use both a K2 and either a small aquaclear or maxi jet. This is because the Hydors which are currently available often times have trouble getting started after a power outage and the small second power heads while not powerful enough for a 10g reef tank, would keep the tank from being completely stagnant during a power outage.(Hydor is rumored to be releasing another power head which won’t have this issue) The other option vs using a second power head is to use a small HOB filter.
You dont need an overflow box, especially for a frag tank. All you need to do is put on elbow on the inside of the bulkhead. It wont be the most quiet setup but it will work just fine.
a 65 seems like an excess of deep water and smaller foot print for a basement frag tank. why knot try a shallow horse trough… like maybe the tractor supply Tuff Tub 40 gallon Oval stock tank, or the Rubbermade 50. easier to drill and plumb and wont break. and best of all, you wont be temped to waste a lot of time cleaning the glass, since they are O-Paque.
Just hang a 1000 watt MH in a Luminark reflector about 4 feet over this baby and let the frag farmin begin!
I also like Houdsbaymans cost friendly Sterilite under bed shallow storage bin frag tanks . what’s that $15 tops? about the same foot print area as a 65.
He is considering using it for QT as well, so top down only view would not be a good idea in my opinion. Observation is a HUGE part of QT.
I’ve weighed the costs of a top down only tank vs a glass tank and decided repeatedly I would rather be able to see my tanks through the sides. And as far as the cost savings of the initial investment, Rich has the 65g sitting in his basement and would cost him $0 and time to get it in his basement. My next tank may be top down only.
[quote=“Rich_17, post:16, topic:2635”]
The more i learn the more i feel like an amacher. just when i think i “got it” i get another eye opener.[/quote]
Get used to it, lol. The more you know, the more you realize how much you don’t know.
As far as the tank being deep, just consider the bottom 12", extra water volume, and a great place to color up some base rock and frag plugs. Could even place some corals on the bottom such as Kenya tree which rely more on feeding then light for energy.
If you really want to do it cheap for the time being, you can do a fairly simple set up. I would personally go with just a small layer of cheap sand on the bottom. The reason for that is if one of your frags falls to the bottom, it can be a pain to have it grow on the bottom before you pick it up (if your like me and you dont clean the tank every day) With the sand, any frags that fall wont attach to the glass.
I would definatley do a powerhead over a closed loop for a frag tank. Closed loops are mainly used for looks (ie. no powerheads in the tank). If you already have a bunch of powerheads, look into a flow kit for a maxi-jet. One would give you all the flow you need in that size tank for softies/lps/probably sps. You would just have to be careful of placement, so that it doesn’t blow frags off the rack.
If there are no fish, which in my opinion is preferable for a frag tank, then you don’t need much/any bio filtration. You could just throw your rubble/plugs in the tank on the bottom or in a bag until you need them and that will probably be enough. The nice thing about corals is that since they are heterotrophic in addition to photosynthetic, they actually actually use more nutrients than they give off. That changes a little if you are feeding your frags, but if you are just using the tank to wait until they are healed, you don’t need ANY filtration, just light and flow.
I know some people may argue that statement, but I have sucessfully run quite a few frag tanks with just water changes from the main display tank… no LR, no skimmer, no fuge. And thats with water changes that are on my usual schedule… about 1x a month.
Edit: I do maintain water quality with dosing. I was just talking about nitrates/phosphates.
Yeah, I’m back. Glad that colony is looking good for you. We have been paying a lot better attention to water chemistry now and have SPS growing quite nicely in our little 20g under PC’s. Lost most of our stuff, but its all coming back nicely now.