[Innovative Marine Nuvo 24] April Giveaway Build Thread

[defender.TX]

I'm heading to the LFS today and I'm kind of unsure what direction I should go in right now. On the one hand I have a good layer of detritus starting to cover the rocks and sand and on the other I'm having a nitrate problem that I can't seem to resolve with water changes. I'm thinking the nitrate problem is die off from the live rock as the rock I got from the Austin Aquadome was very live. To combat that I'm planning on throwing some chaeto in the sump with a JBJ Nano-Glo fuge light, but I don't know if they will have that in stock at the LFS. I'm also going to grab a Red Sea Nitrate Pro test kit so that I can get a little more accurate look at what's going on with my Nitrates.

 

The detritus really is starting to look gross though. Does anyone think it would be a problem to add a snail cleanup crew with nitrates at 20 ppm?

[joel sandoman]

Just siphon it out.

[Jay Wee]

I just siphon mine out and after 2 full weeks I added my CUC. Get it from reefcleaners. I opted for the 15 gallon package and it's more than sufficient. They gave me a whole lot more.

[defender.TX]

Just siphon it out.

I just siphon mine out and after 2 full weeks I added my CUC. Get it from reefcleaners. I opted for the 15 gallon package and it's more than sufficient. They gave me a whole lot more.

 

Thanks guys, that's the plan. I picked up the Red Sea Nitrate Pro kit so I'm just going to keep siphoning out the detritus during my water changes until I see the Nitrates stabilize a bit. Hopefully soon!

[defender.TX]

I just tested with the Red Sea Nitrate Pro kit and I'm pretty shocked at the difference between the API. First, if you've never used a Red Sea test kit before, there really is a world of difference between them and the API kits. The Nitrate Pro kit comes with instructions for a low range and high range test and color cards for each. The low range test has comparison colors that are only .25 ppm apart which is really nice. The API kit showed 40 ppm before the water change, roughly 20 ppm after. The Red Sea kit showed 1 - 1.5 ppm Nitrate. So either I'm testing wrong with the API kit (not likely, I've used it quite a bit), the API kit has gone bad, or my nitrates had some unexplained drop. Anyway, I feel a lot better about these results and I'm really happy that I bought the Red Sea Nitrate Pro kit.

 

Heres a quick shot of the color card/comparison device for anyone who hasn't seen it before:

 

[Jay Wee]

I think I need to get my hands on this red sea test kit too. My API has been testing 20 - 30ppm for the pass week. I've done everything from daily water top up to 50% water change before adding the CUC.

[defender.TX]

I think I need to get my hands on this red sea test kit too. My API has been testing 20 - 30ppm for the pass week. I've done everything from daily water top up to 50% water change before adding the CUC.

 

The API kit has two reagents and the Red Sea has three - so I'm wondering if the API kit can pick something else up in the water and read it as nitrate. I don't know enough about the chemical reaction going on in the test to have a more educated guess.

[defender.TX]

I'm heading to the local fish shop to get my cleanup crew tomorrow and I had a quick question. Do you guys specifically feed your cleanup crew? I'm thinking I won't since they have tons of algae to eat right now on the rocks and by the time that's gone I plan on putting in the clowns who will be fed and producing waste. What do you think?

[spartan1391]

I never fed mine when I started with my nuvo 8. The only problem I had we're with nassairius snails. If there isn't left over food for them to eat they won't make it. Mine didn't I would add those if you wish to later as they are great sand sifters. I'm going to add two more to replace mine as I feed my corals and shrimp now.

[Jay Wee]

I'm heading to the local fish shop to get my cleanup crew tomorrow and I had a quick question. Do you guys specifically feed your cleanup crew? I'm thinking I won't since they have tons of algae to eat right now on the rocks and by the time that's gone I plan on putting in the clowns who will be fed and producing waste. What do you think?

I think the algae buffet will last them quite awhile. When they're done with the rocks they'll start burying into the sand bed for another menu of algae.. I've been feeding my clowns frozen brine shrimps and whatever the clowns missed the snails tend to jump at the opportunity and dash for the brine shrimp. I swear they communicate with one another "HOLY #### SHRIMP SHRIMP SHRIMP!!!!" and within a min I see 5nassarius snail all over the shrimp.

[defender.TX]

Yea, I don't think I'm going to feed them just yet. I'm going to be heading over there in just a bit as soon as I do a water change. I'm also thinking about tearing down my Fluval Spec III planted tank to use as a quarantine later on. To be honest, keeping up a planted tank that needs to be trimmed weekly and this tank is just too much time. So I figure I can take the Spec III (2.6 gallons), put the foam filter block in the sump on the main tank, and I can fill it up and have a cycled filter whenever I need to acclimate/quarantine. I'm going to put it under the display in the cabinet and run an AccuDrip to it - should be the perfect quarantine setup.

[Jay Wee]

That's a good idea. Totally understand what you means with the upkeep of planted tank. My used-to-be nice bonsai fluval edge garden turned into a java moss nightmare.

 

But my Crystal Reds are happy.

 

Also have a Spec III planted betta + Cherry red shrimps tank. Slightly better maintained but losing interest.

 

[defender.TX]

Cleanup Crew

Nice looking tanks JayWee! I finally made it to Austin Aquadome today - picked up some stuff. I let them talk me into picking up some "reef safe" hermit crabs - we'll see about that. I observed them for 10 minutes or so in the coral tanks there and they definitely weren't bothering the coral so I figured I'd give them a shot. In all I picked up the following cleanup crew:

• 6 Hermit Crabs
• 1 Margarita Snail
• 2 Cerith Snail
• 2 Nassarius Snails
• 1 Mexican Turbo Snail
• 1 Fighting Conch

I dropped the hermits right in the tank with just a quick temp acclimation and it seems like all but one of them are fine. One is hiding in a little cave and I don't know if he's just hanging out or dead . I drip acclimated the snails for about an hour:



I'm pretty sure my one Cerith Snail died before I even put him in the tank. As soon as they all dropped in he sunk right to the sand and hasn't moved. I'm going to give him until tomorrow and if he still hasn't moved I'm going to assume dead. The rest of the snails shot all over the tank immediately. The Fighting Conch is especially interesting to watch! He sifts through the sand eating stuff (sounds more boring than it looks). Both of the Nassarius Snails immediately shot up out of the water and are now just hanging out upside down on the glass lid. I don't know if that's normal or not.

Some Hermits with the blues on and off:







Mexican Turbo:



Fighting Conch looking at me with his wonky eye :



Cable Management

Next up I have to finish wrapping up all my cords. I wanted to mount all the power strips up on the wall of the cabinet to give the maximum amount of room in the cabinet for my quarantine tank and supplies. I also knew that I didn't want to directly screw the power strips into the cabinet since I'm going to be replacing them soon enough with Digital Aquatics PC4s. I figured that zip ties would be the best solution. I mounted a piece of black egg crate to the cabinet with some black plastic standoffs so that it's about half an inch above the surface - this gave me something to zip tie equipment too. It was too dark inside the cabinet to take pictures of it in progress. I was able to mount the power strips and LED drivers with zip ties to the egg crate. Keeps everything off my floor and I won't have to drill new holes when I move over to a RKL! Excuse the mess, I'm going to be fixing this soon:

[kriskristofferzen]

nice looking tank! I am thinking of selling of my ADA drilled 60p as Im moving and want an upgrade. Quick question, The mounting legs under the tank; are they attached to the tank or part of a mat/stand that the tank sits on? Thanks

[Jay Wee]

Ha that conch is amazing. I need to get me one.

[defender.TX]

nice looking tank! I am thinking of selling of my ADA drilled 60p as Im moving and want an upgrade. Quick question, The mounting legs under the tank; are they attached to the tank or part of a mat/stand that the tank sits on? Thanks

 

I've got to be honest man, I don't know if I would sell an ADA 60p that's already drilled for a Nuvo. The Nuvo is a very nice mid-level tank and possibly the nicest mass produced all-in-one tank, but the glass clarity and color cannot compare to an ADA. The "mounting legs" are actually an acrylic stand that it comes with. The stand is two pieces of black acrylic with some clear acrylic columns sandwiched between them.

 

Ha that conch is amazing. I need to get me one.

 

You should! He's pretty interesting. He looks really heavy and cumbersome but sometimes I catch him up on my rocks.

[kriskristofferzen]

Thanks! so you dont need the stand then? I'm not sure if I want to use it. I'm guessing just put some padding under it If I chose to do so.

Yeah, actually I drilled my ADA 60-f...it was a typo . I am moving in a few months and just got married. Going from 1 to 3 kids plus we're expecting. Plus one of our kids is special needs and LOVES water and having the overflow worries me a little bit along with a sump if the tank got a little bump.... Requires a little more planning but I like the nuvo b/c of the AIO factor and not having a sump would be nice for a little while.

...Dont worry, I'll be getting another larger ADA but converting it back to planted iwagumi with ferts and CO2

Thanks for the response...

Do you like the overflow inserts? I saw inTank had some stuff in the works and was looking at going that route. ...

[defender.TX]

Thanks! so you dont need the stand then? I'm not sure if I want to use it. I'm guessing just put some padding under it If I chose to do so.

...

Do you like the overflow inserts? I saw inTank had some stuff in the works and was looking at going that route. ...

 

No the stand is not necessary. I used it to lift the tank another few inches because my cabinet is not very tall. It does kind of give the tank a cool look though, it almost looks like it's floating. I personally have some foam mat underneath the stand and then the tank directly on the stand. It's stable and looks great.

 

I think the stock filter baskets and media are fine for now, but as soon as inTank comes out with the media baskets and fuge baskets I'm going to be adding them with Chemi-Pure and Purigen.

[defender.TX]

Good news! Everything that I dropped in the tank yesterday is alive and doing well as of today. I thought that the Cerith was dead because it was just sitting there not moving for 8+ hours, but when I woke up this morning it was digging through the sandbed. Also, the hermit that I thought died is also eating algae.

 

So barring anything catastrophic I plan on getting something new this weekend. What would you guys do? Get a coral or a fish? Austin Aquadome has a great Zoa/Paly tank and I can get a decent sized colony on a piece of live rock for $39. Also, I plan on having an Ocellaris Clown pair, goby/pistol shrimp pair, and a Firefish - which should I introduce to the tank first?

[Jay Wee]

No the stand is not necessary. I used it to lift the tank another few inches because my cabinet is not very tall. It does kind of give the tank a cool look though, it almost looks like it's floating. I personally have some foam mat underneath the stand and then the tank directly on the stand. It's stable and looks great.

 

I think the stock filter baskets and media are fine for now, but as soon as inTank comes out with the media baskets and fuge baskets I'm going to be adding them with Chemi-Pure and Purigen.

Why wait buddy. Improvise!

 

 

Good news! Everything that I dropped in the tank yesterday is alive and doing well as of today. I thought that the Cerith was dead because it was just sitting there not moving for 8+ hours, but when I woke up this morning it was digging through the sandbed. Also, the hermit that I thought died is also eating algae.

 

So barring anything catastrophic I plan on getting something new this weekend. What would you guys do? Get a coral or a fish? Austin Aquadome has a great Zoa/Paly tank and I can get a decent sized colony on a piece of live rock for $39. Also, I plan on having an Ocellaris Clown pair, goby/pistol shrimp pair, and a Firefish - which should I introduce to the tank first?

 

 

I say you get that clown pair and a couple of frags. Ben Stiller says "DO IT, DO IT, DO IT."

[Eckozulu]

Do it

[defender.TX]

Why wait buddy. Improvise!

 

I think I'm going to do exactly that this weekend. My water has a little bit of a yellow/brown tint to it if you look from the side across all 3 feet of it. I'm hoping some better filter media will help to clear it up. I'm also having a micro particle problem - I have a ton of micro particles suspended in my water column. Not sure what to do about that.

[ticklem]

^{I think I'll be going the purigen & Chemi Pur route as well alont with the filterfloss I already have in there. Not very fond of the sponges that come with the tank they seem cheap.}

[defender.TX]

^{I think I'll be going the purigen & Chemi Pur route as well alont with the filterfloss I already have in there. Not very fond of the sponges that come with the tank they seem cheap.}

 

I have to be honest, so far I love this tank, but the stock filter media seems pretty bad. Fine that the tank comes with it, in my opinion, because if it came with better media I would still probably replace it and the tank would just be more expensive, but the stock media is bad. My water has a yellowish tint if you look from the side (across all 3 feet of water) and I'm having a huge microparticle problem right now. My Nitrates are .75 ppm, which I think can be attributed to all the detritus stuck in the filter that I can't really get out. The top yellow sponge doesn't do a good enough job filtering out the particles and they get into the lower two sponges where they presumably just turn into nitrate.

 

I ordered some Poly Filter Floss from InTank and some Chemi-Pure/Purigen. I'm going to fit them in the stock media baskets for now until the InTank ones are released and I think that should help a lot.

[spartan1391]

Hopefully the intank ones come out soon. I really like both of mine. Is there going to be a fuge basket for the 24?