completly new to marine aquariums and need help

[trippinonreality]

I recently received a 55 gallon aquarium set as a gift and would like to begin my journey towards establishing a healthy and lively saltwater aquarium. As of now it is set up in my dining room with only the water and DSB. The water is a steady 76 degrees has a specific gravity of 1.024 and the DSB is made up of agra-alive which I purchased from my LFS. It is roughly 80 pounds. I also have 2, 200 watt heaters placed on either side of the tank and an emperor 400 filter which will be removed and put on a 20 gallon nano as soon as I learn what I am doing. Also I have the stock florescents that came with the setup but will be getting scrapped for power compacts as soon as I get things going.

I was told at my LFS to purchase about 1.5lbs per gallon of live rock for the setup, which I will be doing online (since they only carry fiji). What I would like to do is eventually have a black cap wrasse and 2 or 3 other fish as well as a crocea and some electric blue and orange hermit crabs. However first things first.

I plan on having 3 kinds of live rock 40 pounds of my main rock and 20 pounds of 2 other kinds. I definatly know I want tonga deepwater for one of my secondarys but have not decided between kaelini or marshall island for my other secondary. I am also trying to decide between lalo and malenisian for my primary rock. Lastly because of a misshipment an online retailer gave me a credit that I would like to use to order the main rock but would need to do that soon. My question is could I cure the primary live rock in the tank and then 2 or 3 weeks later cure secondary rocks in the tank. Please note I wouldn't plan on adding the actual livestock until later in the summer so no actual fish or inverts would be put in harms way. Also if I put a few pieces of raw shrimp in right now would it help at all being that I could start developing bacteria right now?

[tendar]

Basically all rock does the same thing so rock choices are more on different stuff that comes in on the rock and what you like in the looks of different rock. I go with 1 lb per gall to start with and see where that leaves me and add more if I feel I need it.
2 200 watt heaters is a bit much but should be fine. I would increase your temp to 78-79 degress since 76 is a bit low for salt water. Now is the best time since there is nothing in there to stress over a temp change.
You will not have a problem with curing different batches of rock at different times. It will actually speed up the process on the rock you add later on with some cured rock allready in the tank.
No real need for the raw shrimp since you will be curing rock in it before long all it will do is make a mess.
You will be needing some extra water flow in the tank once you get some live rock in there though. You should shoot for a good 20x tank turnover per hour or more.

[mbeach66]

not that big of a deal, 1.024 is a good salinity level, however one would strive for a salinity rating of 1.025