Canister Filter

Hope u guys have the guts to read all this and help me out a little...no laughing. I have a 55 gal. reef tank. Its beening sitting behind me at my business for 5 years. Recently closed my business and moved my tank home. Guess what...I get to look at my tank now. So all the things I've had on my wish list or have tried and failed with keeping alive, i'm trying to get ALL my tank perimeters in line and up grading things where i can.
4 inch sandbed
2 powerheads for water circulation
75 pds. live rock
emp. 400 filter
weekly water changes of 13 gallons
power compact lighting 50/50 actinic/ 10,000
amm. 0
nitrite 0
calcium 480-500
ph 8.3
sal. 1.025
NITRATE 20 (THIS I DONT LIKE FOR MY WISH LIST)
my weekly water change bucket sits for 1 week with a filter running on it then the last 3 days i change the filter for a phos. ban product .
AND i've always had problems with diatoms
Now your going to ask about my wish list...(1) hard tube coco worm (2) cleaner shrimp ...i've had 2 in the past 5 years, last one just died a few months ago...i've always had pretty good luck with them (3) purple tipped anemone (this is really who i'm doing all the work for) (4) purple tipped frogspawn.
In my tank now...minus the clark clown fish who jumped out of the tank AFTER i got my tank home (he came with a carpet anemone ((that lived for 3 months)) hermits crabs, snails, HUGH hairy mushrooms, red msh, green striped mshs, all these multiply like crazy, yellow tang, phill. tang, clown, royal gramma, firefish, 2 coral beauties, 3 four stripped damsels (fixing to get rid of these, getting way to aggressive and a colt coral that was beutiful when i got it but looks pretty bad right now, I think he's barely hanging on. I can't even get metallic green star poylps to grow, oh i forgot about my brown button poylps (they are good).
hope i got it all
Now is the don't laugh part...I'm building a canister filter...yes i'm very mechnical...it's big. 60 inches tall x 4 inches around. I'm going to have around 48 inches of space to use for filter media...what will be the best media and in what order should i plan on putting that media.

Never to old to learn...this should keep u guys busy for about a week or two. LOL;D I dont see how but if i forgot something let me know. Oh, I know i should but i haven't started testing for PO4 yet, i will as soon as i can.

 

i will be totally honest, i did not read everything.... but how old are your bulbs? and you didn't specify what number 2 was on your list.

 

opps, bulbs just changed about 2 months ago and 2 is cleaner shrimp ty

 

n/m got bored and read it all, I don't know how good of an idea is to have 2 coral beauties in a 55 gallon, but right now I would say you might be pushin it with how many fish you have...

 

what type of lights?

 

i know that i shouldnt have 2 coral beuties in that small of a tank, but they've been in there together for a least 2 years and absolutely no problems at all...no fighting or anything...thats why i want to get rid of the 4 stripped damsels BIG trouble makers. Hateful little buggers.

 

compact flor. 50/50 actinic/ 10,000

 

I am guessing you are making your filter out of a 4in pvc pipe. If you are planing to have 4ft. of media to filter through it is going to be like pulling a peanut through a straw, you will probably need one hell of a pump to do this. Also the inital contact area is only 4in in diameter that sounds like it may produce a lot of clogs. Also this will cut down on gas exchange. I maybe wrong in my thinking but would check this out before going any further.
As far as the rest of your tank keeping a purple tip anemone is going to be hard without a metal halide. Add the anemone and it will clear up your damsal problem right away(yum yum). Calcium seems to be a bit high. Need to add skimmer, this for me was major in reducing all diatoms and started getting the gunk out.
What size is your power heads? you might need more circulation.
Hope this all helps good luck

 

I don't have to build the canister filter this tall thx for the suggestion, i had a protein skimmer (it broke) it was a Remora it did nothing for the diatoms, I have 2 power heads one from the protein skimmer that broke (Maxi Jet 1200 rated for 295 gph) and one that i bought for circulation an AquaClear 70 rated for 400 gph. Still i need to know what order to put my media in.