46 to 65gal upgrade. New photos added 1/17

I decided to start a build thread to document the progress of our first reef tank.

2-21-12 46 Gallon Marineland Euro Bowfront and stand purchased and setup
Equipment- Fluval C4 HOB filter
Fluval E200 heater
2X Hydor Koralia nano 425 powerheads
Stock T8 light fixture

 

Ordered 40lbs of Pukani dry rock and 8 lbs of Tonga Branch rock from BRS. Took only 4 days to arrive! Pictures to follow

 

Lots of nice rock, not exactly what I pictured to aquascape with but got a ton of ideas

 

for reef ur are gonna need better light unless u plan on keeping low lght corals and that will be sketchy at best

 

Aquascaping was a lot harder than I thought and took multiple attempts. Drove my wife crazy as I kept changing everything she put together.
Original Bridge Idea, not very stable yet

After many hours of sawing, epoxy, and frustration



Another little area we created, 40lbs of Caribsea Ocean Direct sand added


Never did weigh but approx 40lbs of Pukani in tank

Final Aquascape with another 6-8 lbs of Branch Rock

 

Love the bow, have a 26 gal one myself. Excited to see what you do with it.

 

Yea I know, everything cost so much I am spacing my purchases out. This light was free with the tank and will do for a month or so while the tank cycles I do not plan on adding any corals for another 3 or 4 months. Thanks for the advice though!

 

Half full

Had to go out without filling it up, sat for about 3 hours with only a powerhead

Finished filling, nice and cloudy cant even see my scape

24hours after filling with filters running only floss.

 

The tank has been setup for about a week now, tested the water for the first time tonight. No organics have been added besides whatever may have been leftover on the dry rock from BRS.
Ammonia- somewhere between .5-1ppm
Nitrite- about 1ppm
Nitrate- between the 10-20ppm

Test kit was an old ATI, unsure of how accurate the results are so I will be taking a water sample to a lfs to confirm

 

So what do you guys think? Too much rock? Not enough? Enough nooks and crannies for fish to hide or do I need to add purchase and add more pieces?