55 gallon bliss

[Agent_Orange]

Where to start..
Here is the first picture I have of the setup, just after adding water:

Equipment:
80 pounds crushed coral, sand, sea-clone 150 protein skimmer, mag drive 1200, 1200 gph overflow with aqua lifter pump, Hydor Korralia 4, 2 250w metal halides hopefully with Hamilton 14k's soon, 2 stealth 200w heaters, and emperor 400 filter. I should have a ro/di unit soon, open to suggestions on a good one to get.

Livestock:
~65 lbs LR and ~10 lbs LR rubble:

3 Bartlett's Anthias:

2 gold stripe maroon clowns:

1 orange spot prawn goby:

1 pistol shrimp: no pic yet
1 gold coral banded shrimp:

cleanup crew: astrea snails, sea cucumber, blue leg and red leg hermits, bumble bee snails, fighting conch, and a couple others
and a few forms of algae in the sump/fuge

As far as what's to come I'm unsure. I would like to try an anemone for the GS maroon clowns and maybe other corals, but an ro/di will help. Only time will tell.

[Secondgen]

Welcome to Ohio Reef, you have a great start with the equipment you have. I would suggest an upgrade on the skimmer though.

[micki]

Welcome aboard!  It's exciting to start a new tank!   

[Agent_Orange]

Thanks. I do need to upgrade the skimmer, when I started out I didn't know too much about how important they are.  As for exciting, the live rock alone kept me plastered to the glass during the cycling process, then came the fish and inverts!

[MechanicalEngineer]

Very nice start!  I remember the day I first saw a copepod on the LR while it was cycling...I thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever seen.   

[Agent_Orange]

It is a lot different than freshwater for sure. I am still finding things that I never noticed before and I spend a lot of time just staring in.

[Agent_Orange]

I've ordered a typhoon 3 ro/di unit so that should be here shortly. Hopefully it has some good instructions with it so I know how to hook it up. I will have to wait a bit before I can upgrade the skimmer, would any of the DIY ones work well for my setup?

[REDPYRO]

typhoon from airwaterice.com  so simple to install.  if you dont understand how...call him he will walk you through it.  that guy is awesome!

[Agent_Orange]

It's been a while since I have posted here so I thought I would give an update. I finally upgraded my skimmer today to a terminator II protein skimmer. I still have to tweak it a little bit and get some longer tubing to put it where I want it but I did get it setup. I have also been slacking with the setup of the ro/di unit, but it really wasn't hard at all to install and I'm getting 0 tds. There's also about 25 more lbs of LR in the display.

As far as the livestock goes I have: GS maroon clownfish pair, 3 bartletts anthias, pink spotted shrimp goby, pistol shrimp, a regular and golden coral banded shrimp, sea cucumber, and cleanup crew. The clowns have laid eggs about a week ago but I didn't take any steps towards raising the fry, so they are pretty happy. The pistol shrimp and goby sometimes spend some time together, but they are seperate for the most part. The coral banded shrimps happened when I picked another one up after not seeing the old one for a while and he came out the next day. So far they haven't gone for each other and I'm thinking I should probably move one to the fuge. I'm not sure if being different colors will deter violence between them.

As far as the seaclone 150 is there any way to convert it into some kind of reactor? I've done a little research about reactors but still unsure of their design.