New equipment for a 150 Gal

[evilbob22]

Hi there! I am a semi-newbie, I had a 55 Gal Reef tank for about 9 or 10 months before a week long power outage killed everything. Except for a hair algae problem, which I plan on fighting with a RO filter, everything was in good shape. I now have a 150 that I got from an ex-roommate with a canister filter, a couple of heaters and not much else (he had it set up for fresh water). My question is this: If you had to setup a 150 from scratch, what would you use? I know there are a lot of options, but I'm looking to see what types of setups the "experienced reefers" would recommend. TYIA!

 

[robchuck]

The first few things I would add are as much live rock as possible, as big of a skimmer as you can afford, a sump with a large return pump, and a high capacity closed loop for circulation. After the tank cycles, you will have time to figure out what type of tank you want to keep, which will give you a better idea of what type of lighting to purchase (assuming that the setup came with normal output lighting that you can run during the cycle just to see what's going on in the tank).

 

[jlem]

Originally posted by RobChuck
The first few things I would add are as much live rock as possible,
I does not take very much live rock to filter a properly stocked tank, so I would avoid sacrifising swimming room and water volume for to much rock that will actually add to the bioload and deteriorate water quality.

 

[evilbob22]

The stand was custom made and nailed together, so I pretty much have to pick my lighting now, or at least put in VHO ballasts. My basic plan was to get the ballasts, if not the lights, now, the protein skimmer, RO filter, wet/dry filter, whatever power heads I'd need, and 50 lbs of live rock to start. Depending on how it looks with 50 lbs of rock, plus the old, now dead, rock from the 55 gal, I may get more. Then once everything is cycled I can start adding the livestock. I know that I definetly want to keep inverts, and probably soft coral (not so sure about the hard coral yet) so I'll have to get the lights when I start stocking. How does that sound? Anything I missed?
I guess what I'm really after is a list of stuff I'll need (with an option or two) so I can plan it all out without missing anything.

 

[scott9311]

As far as the lighting, you may want to consider using MH's. 150 gal is a pretty big tank with (I'm assuming) a depth of 24", which is a bit too deep for VHO's. I'm looking to upgrade to a 150 within the next couple of weeks, and will be using two 250w 10k MH's along with two Super Actinic VHO's.

 

[pacopetty]

I didn't think LR added to the bio load or deteriorated water quality. I thought it did the exact opposite.

 

[jlem]

Originally posted by pacopetty
I didn't think LR added to the bio load or deteriorated water quality. I thought it did the exact opposite.
Live rock has constant die off no matter how long it has been in the tank. Anything can be done in exess which is why there has to be a happy medium

 

[jjlittle]

I use a big sump with mag 18 return pump , 4 power heads 1200 maxijets,Large skimmer made for a 400 gal. I just added a 30 gal refug. I have 4 -17in VHO's and you can look at the pic below thing are doing fine yes the tank is a deeper tank but I have clams as you can see on the bottom and I alos house acra's on top as you will see.

 

[evilbob22]

lol This post is a year old, I was surprised to get a notification that someone replied to it today...

The tank is STILL not setup, although I have pretty much all the dry goods I need for it. I built my own stand with room for a 55 Gal refugium, 30 Gal sump, and 15 Gal automatic top off resevoir. The MH lights are already purchased and at the house. When I orginally posted this, I didn't know what a refugium or a sump were used for or how to build an ATO or plumb anything. I've come a long way baby... :happyfish
I still need to empty the gravel out of the tank, move it to the stand, build a canopy, and setup the plumbing. THEN I can get my salt mix, base rock, live rock, base sand, and live sand and cycle the tank.

 

[jjlittle]

Wow year old still gettting replys cool well best of luck when you get things going.