Newbie Talking To Newbies

So Let's me just start by saying WOW! I had no Idea that this was going to be this difficult at first. I conducted roughly 6 months’ worth of research before jumping into this hobby. I still under estimated this project and what it was going to take to be successful. 2 things I heard, and should have listened to before getting started were (this is not a cheap hobby)!!! And (you have to be Patient)!! Just FYI I am cheap and I do not have much patience, but I have loved the ocean since I was a kid. I have been a recreational SCUBA diver since I was 13 years old, if that tells you anything. Anyway I’m getting off subject; I have just acquired my Oceanic 110 about 1 month ago and drilled the tank myself for the overflow box and return lines. My sump is 2 plastic tote containers that are roughly 30 gallons (this will be changing soon but we will get into that later). For all the noobs like myself I would like to say spend the money up front and have a lot of patience, it will vital to your success in this hobby. Because of all the cheap initial equipment I bought in the beginning of the build I have now had to go back and buy all new equipment, this will put me at roughly 4000 bucks into now ( only because I went cheap to begin with. Yet and still I could have spent more than that on this second run at equipment I still managed to stay on a budget. I am married so obviously I have a budget cap from the boss lol! I also started the tank way too soon and without really being ready considering I set the tank up that night and have been gone for a month at work. My wife is obviously not too happy about this but she is a trooper none the less. Now I have some simple problems to fix when I get to the house in a couple of days, first I have some small leaks in around the bulk heads, my skimmer crapped out, some pluming has to be changed, my lighting mounts are not the best, my return pump has to be replaced with a stronger one and now I have a bacteria bloom in the tank. I started my tank with Dr. Tim’s one and only and 2 clown fish. Now some people are going to say (OMG I can’t believe he did that) but let’s be honest it works and anyone that tells you it doesn’t has either introduced it the wrong way, had an improper amount or and out of date bottle. It worked perfectly fine for me (except I have a bacterial bloom now). I had a very minute spike in ammonia that did not appear to show any signs of harm to the fish. I have now added a pyramid butterfly fish that will probably have to be taken back to the LFS when I start introducing Corals because they are some serious eaters (or at least that’s what my wife tells me). I have a lot of challenges in front of me to get this tank to where I want it to be but I would like to help all the newbies to the hobby out and maybe you can learn from my mistakes. We might even have a few successful moments along the way. But I want this to help as many people as it can. One thing I have already learned in this hobby is everyone has their own opinion and half of them are wrong. I will not try and hide anything from you guys so follow along and will post pictures as we go through this build together and maybe we can all learn something together.
PS. I have ordered a Neptune apex and trigger systems 39 Safire sump and 5 gallon ATO reservoir to get the new party started I will be taking pictures and making videos for you guys to see the progress thought that process.

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