hickncali Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Right now i currently have a 10g tank that has been up and running for over 5 months. I have had no problems with it at all. But now after i saw a photo shop edited pic of a beer can that looked like a tiny beer can tank, i got the idea of how small can these things be made. So i plan to go pick up a cheap Mr. Coffee at Walmart for around $20. For lighting I plan to use 6 leds, 2 of them being blue and the rest being white. But that is just a rough estimate on how many leds i will use. I am going to put live sand on the bottom and break some live rock from my 10g and put it in their. I would like to use the back end of the coffee maker as a somp sort of thing, mainly so that the total tank size will be a little over 1 gallon instead of just being 10-12 coffee cups. The one problem that i am running into when I think this out is how am i going to circulate the water. I know I have to remove the current water pump sistem which is not actually a mechanical pump but more of a thermal pump. But the problem becomes were can i get a pump small enough to work without creating a wirl pool. Other than that I have it all figured out. When I start building it I will post some pics. If you have any ideas or suggestions please post them. Quote Link to comment
Rene Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Well, you might want to consider doing something other than LED lights. I'm not sure if you can get them in the right spectrum, but they -do- make 9watt PCs which you could probably use by setting them above the pot where the water would drip out. And regarding that, why not take a close look at the current coffee pot drip system and figure out how to run that? Seems like if the components are plastic and nonreactive they'd be perfect for circulation and water surface agitation. Or along those lines, maybe a small spraybar return for the coffemaker sump? It's scarey you should mention this. While doing a search online for a small computer fan to put in my nano hood, I discovered the world of modded computers. How cool would a nano set into the plastic housing for a hard drive be, with an acrylic window so you could see it all? Mmmm. Yum. Quote Link to comment
hickncali Posted April 17, 2003 Author Share Posted April 17, 2003 i have to go to Home Depot and take a look at one of those lights that everyone is bragging about. My only fear is that it wont fit were the drip thing is. The problem with the current drip system is that it requires that the water be boiling on the theory of water expanding when it gets hot and preventing it from going back into the main resivor by use of a one way valve. go here it explains it clearly. http://home.howstuffworks.com/coffee-maker3.htm So i will just have to use a small pump. But as for puting a nano tank in a computer there is always the problem of water with electronics. I have my own modded computer and as is they can produce alot of heat inside the case. mine right now is all clear acrylic but if you could find a way of effectivly removing heat from the processor without heating the tank then you would be set or if you really want to make things intresting you could use your processor as a water heater. People have water cooled computers and all you would need is a processor heat sink that is made for a water cooling. Then the computer would have to be on all the time. but in the end it would be very cool Quote Link to comment
Rene Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Yeah, the ones that everyone loves would be the Bookworms, but those are 13watts and about 9" long. I'm waiting for a pair of them myself in the mail. The 9 watts you'd have to get elsewhere, but they're a little bit shorter, around 8" I think? Something like that, but if you have room, hey, go for a 13 watt pc. A single one may do it for a tank that small and shallow. The problem would be where to mount it, but if you could get a long enough coffeemaker it should work. Worst comes to worst, you could mount it diagonally in what would be the "hood" of the tank over the pot itself and figure out some other way to return the water to the pot. As for the drip system in the coffee pot, I know it depends on heated water etc so that wouldn't be feasible, but as you said you could rip out the guts and use a very small powerhead to move the water up from the sump to the drip area so it flows down into the tank from above. I'm only pushing this because it seems that even a very small pump inside the actuall coffee pot part would be huge and space is a consideration. And if the drip plate for the coffee maker is metal, you could probably get some plastic, cut holes in it, and silicone it in there instead. Could cause problems with whatever lights you use though. Other concerns: metal parts in the coffee maker or on the pot. Duh, but I'm thinking aloud here. Salt creep could be a PITA. Evap WOULD be. Stupid and/or drunk and/or young people attempting to remove the coffee pot part from the coffee maker and pouring themselves a cup of reef. And as for putting a nano inside the HD, I was thinking a little less ambitious than that, but I'm sure it could be done. Just by someone with a lot more ambition than me and a lot more electronics knowledge. Water and electricity mix all too well I just wanted to get a defunct case, gut it, and stick the nano inside. But a nano running inside a "live" computer would be very, -very- cool, if it could be done relatively safely and in a way that you could get to it for maintenance and feeding and in such a way that condensation wouldn't form all over the hardwear inside the computer... Too scarey for me though. Let another daring soul try that one. Salt creep and water and evaporation and lots and lots of copper wire and current? I don't think so. Quote Link to comment
adinsxq Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 i don't mean to ruin your fun, but why make this tank? :| Quote Link to comment
lizbeth Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Originally posted by adinsxq i don't mean to ruin your fun, but why make this tank? :| Why? Because it's fun. Because it's a challenge. Because it's never been done before. Why am building two more tiny tanks right now? Because I want to. Quote Link to comment
BallPy Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 here is a tank you might be interested in looking at. Reef Bowl Quote Link to comment
adinsxq Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 liz: okay as long as the critters are happy /me goes and hugs a tree with one arm and his 1.5g nano in the other Quote Link to comment
offsprg01 Posted April 21, 2003 Share Posted April 21, 2003 hey dude get the 6500k coiled florescents at home depot. they are in a blue package. the bulbs justscrew in to a regular lamp socket (B2 base) balast and bulb are in one package. $8 bucks total. you could mount it in the coffe filter holder. (looks at coffee pot in dorm thoughtfully) you can buy one of those foutians form walmart and gut the pump out of it. it should be about the right gph for a coffe pot nano. aw crap dud. now you've got me thinking about how i'm gonna turn my coffe pot in to nano! no wait better idea 20 oz coke bottle! Quote Link to comment
blue fishies Posted April 23, 2003 Share Posted April 23, 2003 hey i might copy your idea with the soda bottle??? ...hmmm.... Quote Link to comment
csf Posted May 19, 2003 Share Posted May 19, 2003 I tried a goldfish in a larger absolut vodka bottle (well cleaned, of course). The fish didn't do so well, but it did get me hooked enough to try larger tanks - and take proper care of my fish and plants. Quote Link to comment
maroonclown Posted June 12, 2003 Share Posted June 12, 2003 Have you considered the 7 watt palm light by AZOO? It is designed for small tanks, and the 7 watt PC bulb is about 6,500 k. The only problem would be locating replacement bulbs. Quote Link to comment
ADHybrid Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 I've heard of this being tried before. When I get my own house, I'm gonna do a few appliance nano's and have them all over kitchen. Coffee maker, blender, set-it and forget-it roticery roaster, OH YEA!!! Quote Link to comment
foo Posted July 12, 2003 Share Posted July 12, 2003 I kind of like hickncali idea of using LEDs. I bought some blue LEDs that output in the 470nm to 480nm range off of eBay a while back with the purpose of making a moonlight but maybe using a whole bunch of them would work on a pico reef. The LEDs they produce these days do put out quite a bit of light. 470nm is at the high end of the blue spectrum but I would guess be okay for most corals. Ideally something with a shorter wavelength of around 430nm would probably be better but you have to take what you can get with eBay. Quote Link to comment
Integracer Posted July 14, 2003 Share Posted July 14, 2003 I imagine you could use the makers built in heating element to warm the tank. It might be too powerfull though. If you wanna take the maker apart you could probably solder a resistor in series with the heating element to reduce its power output. It would be trial and error to see how big a resistor you needed. It would be pretty neat if you can get the whole thing to work using just the modified maker and no extra pumps or heaters. Quote Link to comment
Integracer Posted October 3, 2003 Share Posted October 3, 2003 Did you ever do the coffee nano? How did it turn out? Any groggy early morning accidents? Quote Link to comment
tylernt Posted October 3, 2003 Share Posted October 3, 2003 Any groggy early morning accidents?Man, this coffee tastes terrible! Quote Link to comment
JLTRUK Posted October 3, 2003 Share Posted October 3, 2003 I have some thimbles lying around...you guys wanna give that a shot? do you understand the insane amount of work this tank will be. I have to agree and ask why you would even want to do this. For the "sake of doing it" is a pretty weak answer. I could fill up a plastic cup and put a fish in it too, but would it be happy...no Quote Link to comment
offsprg01 Posted October 3, 2003 Share Posted October 3, 2003 <----- sings *we're digging up dead posts, dead posts, yes we're diggin up deaaaad posts* dude i had so forgotten about this post and besides that i lost that coffee pot in oone of the moves since then. Quote Link to comment
Daniel-J Posted March 16, 2020 Share Posted March 16, 2020 What model coffee maker do you use? Any of these? Quote Link to comment
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