Hello I am new to nj reef and I would like to know if there anyone that can help me out here I set up a 90 gallon tank but Im really not that experienced I had a 55 gallon and I upgraded all my equipment long story but what im trying to see is if someone can come by my place and take a look at my setup and shed some tips as far as see if I have everything running well I dont know anyone that does this hobby so its me and the forum and youtube and I would like to make a friend that know this stuff and ask a question if something comes up I have my tank on youtube I will post the link if no one can make you can message me with advice by viewing my channel thank you very much and gladly appreciate.
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Anyone around woodbridge nj
- Thread starter marrero412002
- Start date
Welcome. There are a lot of people spread out all of NJ so I'm sure someone is close. A lot can be done via posting pictures. The folks on this forums have a wealth of experience and I do believe in the "been there, done that" for almost anything reefing. Start a build thread and post some pictures, you'll probably get suggestions/comment like it or not 
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Edwardw771
NJRC Member
Hire aquatic obsessions to come maintain it. They are great and right down the road.
mrehfeld
Officer Emeritus
Trivan is correct there a number of members in the area, we recently had or annual frag swap at the convention center in Edison, it would have been a great opportunity to ome out and do a little networking. We have monthly meetings posted on the calendar on the home page to the right.
Edwardw771's advise is also very sound. If you haven't been to Aquatics Obsessions you should go. I personally can't speak to the in home service they provide but have heard a number of members praise the work they do.
Whether you persue the individual member or the vendor route you can't go wrong. You can go wrong watching a guy on you tube and mimicking what he does because you don't know his back story or his circumstances, yours will most likely be different. At the very least why not start a tail of the tank thread this way you can get feedback from members who may not be in your immediate area.
Good luck with your journey.
Edwardw771's advise is also very sound. If you haven't been to Aquatics Obsessions you should go. I personally can't speak to the in home service they provide but have heard a number of members praise the work they do.
Whether you persue the individual member or the vendor route you can't go wrong. You can go wrong watching a guy on you tube and mimicking what he does because you don't know his back story or his circumstances, yours will most likely be different. At the very least why not start a tail of the tank thread this way you can get feedback from members who may not be in your immediate area.
Good luck with your journey.
Welcome to the club. Unfortunately, you won't be able to post a link to your youtube because our forums are setup so that only paid members and sponsors can post links (to prevent spammers from reaching our guests). However, if you want to include the link, you can PM it to me and I'll add it for you.
I agree that you should start a tale of the tank thread. This is a section of our forums where our members post up the "build" of their system and can sort of keep track of progress. This is the best way to show the rest of us what you have and how your system is setup so if you ask questions it will be easier to answer you more accurately.
If you can't find a local member to come take a look at your system and give you advice, Aquatic Obsessions is a good 2nd option. They are a sponsor of our club and they have a good reputation for helping setup a system correctly. However, I would caution you to not hire them to do your maintenance for you. NOT because I think they can't do it well (they certainly can) but, in my opinion, it's better to learn how to care for your own system and actually know how it all works and what everything is doing to help keep your system clean and healthy. It will give you a better respect for what's going on if you learn how to do it for yourself.
Obviously, you won't know everything right away so it's ok (actually a good idea) to ask for help in the beginning to make sure things are working correctly. But in the long run, you want to know when something isn't working right so that you can fix it before it's too late. In time, you will pick up little tips and tricks that make things easier for you and begin to anticipate problems before they happen.
Besides all of that, my advice is to take it slow and don't rush anything. That is the number one reason for new hobbyists to fail. They see all these beautiful tanks and want that right away. The truth is, it takes months to years to get a tank healthy enough to sustain being fully stocked and if you don't get the biological filtration established all you will do is kill whatever you put in the tank. You will get frustrated and waste a lot of money if you don't take it slow!
Good luck!
I agree that you should start a tale of the tank thread. This is a section of our forums where our members post up the "build" of their system and can sort of keep track of progress. This is the best way to show the rest of us what you have and how your system is setup so if you ask questions it will be easier to answer you more accurately.
If you can't find a local member to come take a look at your system and give you advice, Aquatic Obsessions is a good 2nd option. They are a sponsor of our club and they have a good reputation for helping setup a system correctly. However, I would caution you to not hire them to do your maintenance for you. NOT because I think they can't do it well (they certainly can) but, in my opinion, it's better to learn how to care for your own system and actually know how it all works and what everything is doing to help keep your system clean and healthy. It will give you a better respect for what's going on if you learn how to do it for yourself.
Obviously, you won't know everything right away so it's ok (actually a good idea) to ask for help in the beginning to make sure things are working correctly. But in the long run, you want to know when something isn't working right so that you can fix it before it's too late. In time, you will pick up little tips and tricks that make things easier for you and begin to anticipate problems before they happen.
Besides all of that, my advice is to take it slow and don't rush anything. That is the number one reason for new hobbyists to fail. They see all these beautiful tanks and want that right away. The truth is, it takes months to years to get a tank healthy enough to sustain being fully stocked and if you don't get the biological filtration established all you will do is kill whatever you put in the tank. You will get frustrated and waste a lot of money if you don't take it slow!
Good luck!
Hey guys I want to thank you all for the responses I actually go to aquatic obessions often and. i was actually at the store when that frag swap ended and I didnt know about nj reef when I asked the owner where was the event held he told me about it. if you guys go there i am the guy that goes with my two little girls to go buy fishes dont know if you noticed since they are loud when they go in there. but hope I can make lots of friends on here as far my tank I really want to master this stuff on my own.and I will start a build thread so you guys can see what I am working with. Thank you all
Where should I start the build thread in general
mrehfeld
Officer Emeritus
You can start your new thread in the Tale of the Tank forum section.
In the meantime, Marrero (reefer Joey?) asked me to post his youtube vid link so here it is:
[video=youtube_share;gcroCErgbyg]http://youtu.be/gcroCErgbyg[/video]
If you start a tank thread over there, let me know and I'll post the vid for you there too.
After watching your video, I noticed towards the end you were asking for help on the sump level fluctuation. Here are some questions that I have for you to help figure out the specific situation before trying to give corrective advice:
1. Is that valve on the drain line into the sump closed at all or is this how you are trying to control flow through your sump? Most people don't put a valve in-line on the drain because you don't want any restrictions in flow. The only reason you would have a valve would be if you split the drain line to divert some water to a refugium, and the valve would go on the piping going to the refugium only and not the straight pipe into the filter sock area (so overall, there is ultimately no restrictions).
Side Comments for this question (Please excuse me if you already understand this, but since you say you are a beginner I thought it would be worth noting this):
If you were looking to use a valve to regulate flow through the sump, it should go between the return pump and the bulk head going up to your loc-line returns.
Think of the whole sump in terms of a gravity feed system (which is what it technically is). The water only goes into the sump when it goes over the overflow wall and reaches the height set by your drain elbow opening. If you have no water entering your display tank (DT), it will only drain until the water level drops below the elbow opening. Now, as you pump water into the display (from the return pump) it adds water into the DT and as that level rises, it again starts gravity feeding back down into your sump. So, the way you control the flow through the sump is to control the rate of flow from the sump back into the DT (using a valve on the discharge piping side of the return pipe).
If you restrict the flow going into the sump instead of the flow going out of the sump... you have no control because the pump will be working at a fixed rate this way. So, if the rate of flow from the pump to DT is faster than the rate you restricted coming into the sump from your valve... you have a problem with the return section emptying faster than it fills up.
You should never have a need to restrict water coming down into the sump due to it being too fast... because as stated above, it only drains down at the rate you are filling it.
2. Where does your Tunze osmolator (ATO) pump tubing discharge into? Is it at a height that is above or below the clean water storage container you are using?
Side comments for this question:
If the end of the discharge tubing is below the water level in the storage container (in other words, you are pumping downhill), then it will cause a siphon even after the pump turns off. This might be an issue you are having that could be causing level fluctuation in the sump.
Another possible issue would be when you are pumping uphill and only if the end of the ATO tubing is submerged in water at the discharge point. In this case (assuming it is above the water level in the storage container) then there will be a siphon in the opposite direction. What happens this time is when the pump shuts off, the remaining water in the tubing going up to the discharge point will fall back down the tubing to the pump, causing a siphon and drawing water from the end of the tube... until the water level drops below the end of the tubing and it is no longer submerged.
Hope all of that makes sense. If any of that relates to your situation or if you need any further explanation, please let us know and we can go into the specific situation with more details.