JavaJacketOC Posted May 15, 2014 Share Posted May 15, 2014 Hi NR,I've been away for a while but recently decided to clean up a couple of my tanks and set up my 5.5 gallon pico after cleaning up the storage area where they were being housed.This tank is not brand new but has been out of commission for long enough to consider it new in general. it was previously used as a contest tank for the Unofficial nano-reef 12" cube contest. Current FTS 08/16/2014 07/24/2014 07/19/2014 Current Side Shot 08/16/2014 07/19/2014 Current Top Down 08/16/2014 07/19/2014 06/24/2014 Top Down 06/24/2014 SetupHardware Tank 12 x 12 x 9 AIO AcrylicDisplay Area = 12 x 9 x 9 Overflows into a 9 x 3 x 9 fuge Return area = 3 x 3 x 9 MaxSpect Razor Nano Lighting Ledtric Par30 20k (however actually has a 14k look) with 120 degree opticsLight mounting item: Desk lamp from Staples Ikea 3 watt LED clamp spot light Waterflow / Temp ControlReturn Pump Rio50 Hydor Koralia Nano Hydor Theo 50w heater Cobalt Neo-Therm 50 watt Iceprobe Chiller (this will be required if I get the tank wet during the summer) Autotopoff.com Nano ATO Aquascape/Additives DisplayApprox 8 pounds of Dry Live Rock (Pics to follow) Bedding - Considering Caribsea Arag-Alive Bimini Pink but not positive yet. Looking for something fine but not interested in any sand storms Ended up using a mixed variety from my LFS's estblished tanks FugeMiracle Mud Cheato Media RackFilter Floss Carbon Chemi-Pure Livestock as of 06/24/2014 Hector's Goby (aka Hex Hectori) Hi Fin Red Banded Goby / Red Banded Snapping Shrimp (or something similar based on avalibility) Small Tail Spot Blenny (or another goby of similar size) Basic CUC with 1 or 2 fancy snails Porcelain Crab Sexy Shrimp Gold/Green Maxima Clam Coral as of 06/24/2014 Nuclear Green Palys Poor Man's Fire and Ice zoas Gold Mouth/Orange Skirt zoas Mint Green zoas Sour Apple Monti Astroturf Green Rhodactis musthroom Maxi-Mini Carpet Anemone Orange, Green/Yellow, Blue/Grey Yuma Giant Pinkish Brown Palys Superman Shroom? Green/Purple People Eater Palys? Link to comment
macscale Posted May 15, 2014 Share Posted May 15, 2014 I've never heard of someone putting a goby/blenny besides a clown goby in a tank this size. Let alone two. Unless you have a larger tank to move them to. Is it common for people to do this on this forum? Sorry, I don't make it on here a lot. Link to comment
pismo_reefer Posted May 15, 2014 Share Posted May 15, 2014 You could get away with the tailspot, with a skimmer; Or, possibly, with heavy water changes. Without some extreme nutrient export measures, I see cyano in your future. Not that it cant be done. Just seems like a problem. Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 15, 2014 Author Share Posted May 15, 2014 You could get away with the tailspot, with a skimmer; Or, possibly, with heavy water changes. Without some extreme nutrient export measures, I see cyano in your future. Not that it cant be done. Just seems like a problem. Yeah, I definately agree that there will be challenges with this. I plan add livestock slowly and hopefully the fuge area would eventually have a large cheato ball would help as well. I had a small skimmer for this tank when I originally set it up and it was terrible, lol. The micro bubbles were terrible and I lost a lot of space in the fuge so I doubt I'll be going that route again. Link to comment
pismo_reefer Posted May 16, 2014 Share Posted May 16, 2014 Chaeto aint enough. Water changes would be. Fyi, if you're doing rnough WC's to keep nitrate in check, you wont need chaeto. In fact, you would just be routinely starving it. The way I see fish in a pico is: - Skimmer +/- Chaeto. -or- - frequent water changes. Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 16, 2014 Author Share Posted May 16, 2014 Chaeto aint enough. Water changes would be. Fyi, if you're doing rnough WC's to keep nitrate in check, you wont need chaeto. In fact, you would just be routinely starving it. The way I see fish in a pico is: - Skimmer +/- Chaeto. -or- - frequent water changes. Once it's up and running we'll see how it goes. If 1 fish is where the bio load stabilizes then 1 fish is what I'll have And on to the important stuff...pictures! lol FTS Top down Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 17, 2014 Author Share Posted May 17, 2014 Hit the LFS today to pick up a test kit and a Rio50 to use for my return. I picked up a piece of shelf rock which I thought might replace the small piece currently being used to create a cave and help kick start the cycle, however the piece ended up being way too big. It's easy to forget how small this tank is. Installed the pump and the ATO. Looking at the pics has reminded me I'll probably need to git the tank another solid cleaning before I get it wet....pics Link to comment
spazizz Posted May 17, 2014 Share Posted May 17, 2014 100% water changes are really easy on a tank this small if you worried about it. I like your scape. That flat rock that's bridging the two pieces would also look cool in front of the bigger piece on the right side. Im so partial to islands Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 17, 2014 Author Share Posted May 17, 2014 Doing some final hardware setup before I give the tank another cleaning then start the cycle. I got this Ledtric Par30 20k with 120 degree optics from another NR member, nothing fancy but it should do the trick and I really like the color. for a 20k bulb it's actually much closer to 14k. The color represented in the pictures has no white balancing and it's actually pretty close to the color in person Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 17, 2014 Author Share Posted May 17, 2014 Hit the LFS today to pick up a few final things before I got the tank wet. I thought it might be nice to start with some filtered seawater for the cycle. I will most likely do close to 100% water change once the cycle is complete and I've never used filtered seawater before so I thought I might give it a try. I'm sure there are plenty of bad things about filtered seawater but I thought it might also contain a few good things Came home with: Filtered Catalina Seawater 5lb of mixed sand from a couple of the the store's established tanks 1 gallon or RODI for ATO (I need to replace the membrane in my RODI so I will be buying water until then) Pics: Uncured slab of Live Rock in the back to help kick start the cycle Water test of the filtered seawater. Not surprising it's a little dirty. And finally FTS Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 18, 2014 Author Share Posted May 18, 2014 I picked up a task lamp from Office Depot which doesn't seem to have any issues holding up the Par30 bulb. It's currently about 12" off the water surface and slightly angled back so there will be a little spill over into my fuge area. Once the cycle is done I plan place an order with ReefCleaners for a small cuc and ball of cheato. To the right of the tank is the ATO and reservoir. My return area is approx 4 x 3 x 9 and I've been losing about 1.5" due to evap per day with the tank sitting at 80 degrees, which doesn't seem too bad. I'll be picking up an aqualifter pump in the next couple days then get the ATO all set up and ready to go. I'll be testing the water later today, I'm curious to see how long the cycle will take when starting with ocean water and sand from an established tank. Hopefully not too long! Pics: Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 19, 2014 Author Share Posted May 19, 2014 Water test #2, already some movement Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 19, 2014 Author Share Posted May 19, 2014 I decided to drop the light down a little closer to the water surface. The Par30 bulb has 120 degree optics and I was getting a lot of spillover. Any thoughts on the distance from the water surface? I've come across a couple threads that suggest 6-8" for 120 degree optics. After this adjustment the light is at 6" from the water surface and I think the light coverage in the tank looks a lot more consistent. The picture a few posts up was about 10" from the water. Feedback? Pics: Link to comment
kylhcky Posted May 20, 2014 Share Posted May 20, 2014 the rock placement is pretty killer. Link to comment
Reefkid88 Posted May 20, 2014 Share Posted May 20, 2014 the rock placement is pretty killer. +1 that scape is super good looking man. Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 20, 2014 Author Share Posted May 20, 2014 the rock placement is pretty killer. +1 that scape is super good looking man. Thanks! Now I just need to figure out what to put on them, lol Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 22, 2014 Author Share Posted May 22, 2014 I haz diatoms! It actually looks kinda pretty with the LED's, lol Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 24, 2014 Author Share Posted May 24, 2014 I got my replacement filters and membrane from Air, Water & Ice yesterday, along with a hand held TDS meter so I decided to try it out on a few different water sources and came up with the following results: Tap Water = 264 Old RODI Filters/Membrane = 15 New RODI Filters/Membrane = 0 LFS RODI Water = 195 (this kinda pissed me off since I've been using their RODI since I set the tank up and I would have been better off just using the water from my old filters! I will share the information with this during my next visit) I'm sure the bad RODI top off water contributed to the continued diatom outbreak pictured below, however with the new filters and membrane I mixed up a batch of Instant Ocean to 1.025 salinity yesterday then did a 100% water change this morning. I did a quick water test and everything looks good, as expected. I removed the uncured LR from the fuge area and plan to test the water again in a couple days to see if there is any shift in water quality. The dry rock I used for my scape had been RODI soaked, Vinegar bathed then RODI soaked again about 2 weeks before adding it to the tank...I expected some die off but not much. Pics: Post water change test results: Diatom outbreak pre water change Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 27, 2014 Author Share Posted May 27, 2014 Following the 100% water change and ATO top off water that is at 0 TDS, the Diatom bloom had noticeably faded in 1 day and is looking even better the second day. I decided to hit a different LFS to snoop around and came home with a couple inexpensive frags and an astrea snail. I'm also considering adding a National Geographic PF20 HOB Filter (which looks surprisingly similar to the Eheim Liberty 100 Filter). I thinkI can make a couple mods and use it for Carbon and Puragen as well as a mounting spot for an Iceprobe Chiller if needed. Pics: FTS Link to comment
Justind823 Posted May 27, 2014 Share Posted May 27, 2014 Tank looks good. If you haven't already, I would put some kind of guard on that float switch to protect from snails climbing on it. It may seem difficult for them to get into the back chamber but they'll find a way. Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 27, 2014 Author Share Posted May 27, 2014 Tank looks good. If you haven't already, I would put some kind of guard on that float switch to protect from snails climbing on it. It may seem difficult for them to get into the back chamber but they'll find a way. Thanks, I don't have the full CUC yet but I think I'll be looking into using a film canister or piece of PVC. I have a few more days before I get my order from John at Reef Cleaners. This astrea hasn't' left the large rock on the right, it's cleaned about 3 inches..he's a little slow. I'll also be adding a screen top that will sit flush on the false wall, which means that inverts should only be able to get in via the overflow and through the fuge area. If the fit is pretty night i may just add some mesh 4to the overflow teeth which may really deter them from getting back there, we'll see. Edit: My name is also Justin and I also live in Socal, lol Link to comment
Justind823 Posted May 27, 2014 Share Posted May 27, 2014 Thanks, I don't have the full CUC yet but I think I'll be looking into using a film canister or piece of PVC. I have a few more days before I get my order from John at Reef Cleaners. This astrea hasn't' left the large rock on the right, it's cleaned about 3 inches..he's a little slow. I'll also be adding a screen top that will sit flush on the false wall, which means that inverts should only be able to get in via the overflow and through the fuge area. If the fit is pretty night i may just add some mesh 4to the overflow teeth which may really deter them from getting back there, we'll see. Edit: My name is also Justin and I also live in Socal, lol Okay sounds like you have it all figured out. Hi5 fellow Socal Justin Link to comment
JavaJacketOC Posted May 27, 2014 Author Share Posted May 27, 2014 Okay sounds like you have it all figured out. Hi5 fellow Socal Justin I wish I had it all figured out, lol...I just hope for the best! I'm in North OC, you? Link to comment
Justind823 Posted May 27, 2014 Share Posted May 27, 2014 I wish I had it all figured out, lol...I just hope for the best! I'm in North OC, you? Haha good enough. I'm up in Santa Monica Link to comment
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