Salt to fresh

[BuggyNutt]

The Tunze autmatically controls water flow, dosing reactors (3rd pic(?) , auto topoff, light periods (including moonlight simulation) and a host of functions needed in reef tanks to make life much easier and less fidgety, once figured out.
The Tunze run about $250 new, but I think newer more user friendly technology has taken over these days (maybe not,I'm not a reef tank person), so they may be reconsidered obsolete by some.
The 3nd pic may simply be where salt water was mixed.
Of course for fresh water fish, many of these things may be overkill by most casual aquarists, I guess it depends on how deep you want to immerse yourself in the hobby, what kind of fish you keep (as far as difficulty and need in maintaining certain water parameters)
An example might be if you want to keep and breed Tropheus, but your tap water is too soft, and mineral poor, then you may want to use one or more of the reactors to buffer pH and alkalinity, and have the Tunze do the work.
Or if you want an Amano style planted tank, and you want to dose ferts, and have certain photoperiods, flow fluctuations or even seasonal replications.
Or...if you wanted to keep a blackwater Cardinal tetra, wild caught angel tank, and dose tannins you mix up in the bin in the 3rd pic from an RO unit.

Thanks for the info. The smaller canisters are for mixing stuff to dose? Also do I setup my rodi water filter or just ro filter? I think we have decided on a peacock cichlids tank, so it will probably some of these. Correct? Sorry for asking so many questions. I shut all my tanks down about 6yrs ago and feel like I'm really behind on tech. Thanks again.

 

[duanes]

When you say Peacock Cichlids , do you mean the rift lake Africans, or Peacock bass (genus Cichla)?
If its the rift vally type, the tank is perfect, and there should be no need for an RO unit. These cichlids come from high mineral content, high hardness (above 250ppm Total Hardness) high pH water (pH above 8).
If your tap water is soft, using one of the reactors so hold some kind of calcium buffering material might help with colors and health, using something like aragonite sand, or crushed oyster shell in one or 2 of them as a buffering media.

As far as Peacock bass, if your tap water is hard, mixing tap with RO might help, most Cichla come from the softer mineral poor water regions of South America. In hard water they are often prone to HLLE ( chronic hole in the head scarring over time) in combination with high nitrate from too few weekly water changes.
Tank water quickly degrades in tanks under 300 gallons for Cichla as adults, and also there are the space issues, I'd find a 180 gallon too small a tank for Cichla as adults.

 

[BuggyNutt]

When you say Peacock Cichlids , do you mean the rift lake Africans, or Peacock bass (genus Cichla)?
If its the rift vally type, the tank is perfect, and there should be no need for an RO unit. These cichlids come from high mineral content, high hardness (above 250ppm Total Hardness) high pH water (pH above 8).
If your tap water is soft, using one of the reactors so hold some kind of calcium buffering material might help with colors and health, using something like aragonite sand, or crushed oyster shell in one or 2 of them as a buffering media.

As far as Peacock bass, if your tap water is hard, mixing tap with RO might help, most Cichla come from the softer mineral poor water regions of South America. In hard water they are often prone to HLLE ( chronic hole in the head scarring over time) in combination with high nitrate from too few weekly water changes.
Tank water quickly degrades in tanks under 300 gallons for Cichla as adults, and also there are the space issues, I'd find a 180 gallon too small a tank for Cichla as adults.

I was more thinking the rift lake cichlids. I was looking at crushed coral for substrate. Is the crushed sea shells a better choice? I'm looking to figure it all out in the next.couple months as I'm building the tank into a wall in my basement so construction should be done by end of month. Thanks

 

[i Aqua]

I have a 260gal saltwater tank with tons of stuff. It was given to me a few years ago and I never seem to have time to set it up. I think I'm going to convert it over to fresh water as I know I won't have time to maintain a saltwater tank. I think all I need to run is the sump with filter socks and get rid of skimmer and all the other stuff. I have so much stuff and I don't know forsure if I should keep some of it for freshwater setup. Anyone know of a good place to find what I should keep and what needs to go? I can get pics of all the equipment I have later in the week if needed. Thanks

You wont regret switching to freshwater. Salt water is boring and it is to expansive to maintain. Go with African Cichlids bad@ss fish to have

 

[duanes]

I was more thinking the rift lake cichlids. I was looking at crushed coral for substrate. Is the crushed sea shells a better choice? I'm looking to figure it all out in the next.couple months as I'm building the tank into a wall in my basement so construction should be done by end of month. Thanks

Crushed coral, crushed sea shells, crushed oyster shell (usually less expensive) all work, they are all basically the same.
Since I already hard hard, calcium rich tap water, I mixed pool filter sand with aragonite (fine crushed coral) for substrate.
Where I live now, I just out whole sea shells Collect at the beachin sumps.

 

[Swim_Shady_1970]

Actually, pool filter sand seems to be the "go to" substrate for Rift Lake Cichlids. Great grain size and not abrasive. Crushed coral or aragonite really isn't necessary. If you need to buffer your water, look into adding baking soda (Google).