New Tank. Sand after or before cycle?

You do not need a filter - particularly if you are cycling.

You only need one source of bacteria to kick start your cycle (LR or live sand or a cup of sand from one established tank, a damsel, a raw piece of shrimp, whatever).

To address your original question, when you are cycling, what you are doing is giving bacteria a chance to grow and populate in your tank. They mostly live in your rock and in your sand. Can you see why you would want the sand in there before you cycle?

This does not happen in two days. Ever.

punctuation dude. the run on sentence is unnecessarily difficult to read.

the hob style like the penguin bio-wheel is pretty worthless on a reef tank. The "bio-wheel" is a small little thing that is trying to replace 50+ pounds of live rock (live rock being your bio filter) Like I said, it's worthless in a reef tank (IMO). This is really for freshwater tanks.

Other than live rock, the only filtration you need is a quality skimmer. This can be HOB or in-sump (mine is HOB). I did not add a skimmer for 3 months... doesn't hurt to add now but isn't really *needed* for a while.

 

I agree w/the advise. Your understanding here is correct.

I don't see that this will have any benefit whatsoever.

 

first off what kind of tank mini reef, fowler, fish only ...................................

 

It's going to be a nano reef tank. I was originally going to follow PeredHill's footstep and get a skimmer sometime down the road or when I can get a good deal on it, specifically, the Remora HOB skimmer.

Thanks everyone for your help.

 

sounds good and good luck

keep us posted

creat a new tank thread with pics it will be fun