New to OVAS

[Reefguy]

      Hello all. Well I am new to the OVAS and I was thrilled to see all the great information you all have. I have joined other sites that give in best little to no help at all. Once I got here I was amazed. OK so I have a 5 gallon setup with live plants (2 anubias, 1 money worth and a massive marimo ball) I also have some driftwood in there as well. I use an aqua clear 20 as a filter with a pre filter sponge on the intake tube. I use black aquarium rock substrate with black background. I have a 50w heater that I will be downgrading to a 25 watt eventually. The live stock that I have is currently two crystal red shrimps and 7 neon tetras. Had this set up for about 3 months now.

      I also just purchased my first cool looking tank with a Fluval Edge 6gallon tank. I am and have been re searching the Salt/reef set-ups, how to, and everything needed to make a reef/salt water tank. I know what I need for the most part. I will be ordering some live rock (maybe 5 pounds), some live sand, a salt water treated water for the first attempt then gonna buy the salt and do my own mixtures. I know the fundamentals as in you must wait a good 6-8 weeks before introducing the live stock. I will be getting the salt water test kit also the apparatus that tells you where your salt level is at. I also know to do water changes every 4 to a week with it.

    I still need lots of information that I have no doubt will find on this site. So I am happy to be part of this OVAS and hope to hear from you all and thanks.

Reefguy

[sas]

Hi and welcome to the forum portion of OVAS.
Sounds like you've got a good start.
Feel free to post your tanks in the Freshwater Tank Builds forum
and also the Saltwater Tank Builds forum when you start the salt.

We all like to drool over new setups.

[Darth]

welcome to ovas!!!

Okay now for some advise 
A 6 gal tank is gonna be rough for sw. only because a lot can go wrong real fast, and 4 gals of water (after dispersment of sand and rock ) is not a lot be able balance swings, as nelly frutado would say when it comes to saltwater "the bigger the better" okay maybe she meant big hoop earings but the advise is still the same 
live sand? to me its a gimic, live means there is beneficial bacteria in it, and I dont know anything that sits on shelf in a sealed bag will have anything alive in it =) just get some reg crushed coral/argronite whatever I prefer sugar grade myself nice fine sand.
with the amount of water you need you can purchase water already pre-mixed ro/di I am sure some members would be able to help you out.
For salt aparatus stay away from swing arm hydormeters and invest in a refractometer.
A good test kit as you stated
Live rock awesome
u can get it already cured which cuts down your cycle time
and 6-8 weeks to me is a long time to wait. once your levels are good you can start to add livestock in a 6 gal tank add sloooooowly start with a clean up crew a few at a time, as you add you are gonna change the chemistry on the tank I would then wait a week between adding anything   

so have you thought about livestock are you gonna go reef? what are you gonna do for lighting

[Feivel]

Welcome to the group

Good advice darth. i wouldnt recomend starting smaller than a 30g with a sump myself.

you can check out aquariumID app on android or iphone good references.

[Stussi613]

First of all, welcome!  If you can, try to come out to a few meetings and get to know some of the other members of the club.

I have a Fluval Edge 6G as well (planted with CRS and chili rasboras - build thread here http://ovas.ca/forum/index.php?topic=54303.0 ) and I also thought about going salt. After reading online and asking for advice here, I decided against it for a few reasons:

- As Darth said it's very easy for things to go wrong and happen fast.

- The opening is very tight and its hard to work in the tank.

- The lighting on the Edge is not the best for salt water. I upgraded my lighting to the 42 LED kit for the 12g Edge and its still very directed to the center of the tank.  It grows algae very well under the lights though . Some people have changed the lights and modified the tank to get salt to work, but the cost of the lights alone when trying to keep the stock look would be the same as starting with a much bigger tank.

Not trying to dissuade you from giving it a try, just pointing out some of the things I found after months if scouring the interwebs looking for the best way to set mine up as a saltie tank.

[Darth]

now lets hope we didnt scare you away, I mean it can be done I kept a 5 gal nano for over a year before I sold it you can check my gallery pics here for some pics of it