The Dish's 10g Office Nano

[The Dish]

Decided to say "goodbye" to the last of my freshwater tanks a few days ago... I got into saltwater last August and as I was looking at my dirted 10 gallon during lunch I was uninspired. So I decided it was time. I cut my teeth in freshwater when I was little but marine is so much better (preaching to the choir I know). So I tore everything out and sold my plants (mostly Crypts and Anubias) and my Chilli Rasbora's to the LFS ($51 in credit, hello live rock!)

 

Awkward breakup. "its not you, its me, you're the ones upgrading, not me"

 

kinda let things go the last month, but hello store credit!

 

 

 

I run a Biocube 14 at home and wanted a similar "clean look" with most the equipment hidden. Since this is an office tank I don't have the time to get too involved with plumbing and things like that. Projects have to be done either at home or during lunch. I was inspired by a few tanks who have used PVC cut lengthwise and turned into a internal overflow with a return pump on the bottom. So this is the route I decided to go.

 

Cleaned of all the dirt and ready for conversion!

 

 

4" PVC wrapped to match background, I'm not too concerned about the white overflow holes as i'm sure coraline or whatever will darken them up over time. I had seen other people cut these to fit into corners but since I am crunched for time and need this to be easy I kept it as a whole pipe (and cutting it to the corner doesn't really give me much more room. Cleaner look yes, but more invloved. I need simple). I used a few spare parts from my Rio Plus for the return. Pipe easily accommodates return pump, heater and floss

 

Everything in place. Now the waiting for the silicone to cure. Live rock and sand probably at the beginning of the week (maybe Friday if I get too impatient and feel like coming in on my day off)

 

 

 

Equipment (so far)

 

Lights: Current Orbit Marine PRO

 

Filter: DIY 4" PVC overflow w/ floss (going to try Live Rock only)

 

Pump: Whatever came out of my Biocube 14 (upgraded that to RIo 800+)

 

Plans are to be zoas,palys, softies, and LPS. Really want to make a "zoa garden" in the foreground. Also going to try and slow play it and start with small frags and let them grow in.

[reefernanoman]

Decided to say "goodbye" to the last of my freshwater tanks a few days ago... I got into saltwater last August and as I was looking at my dirted 10 gallon during lunch and I was uninspired, so I decided it was time. I cut my teeth in freshwater when I was little but marine is so much better (preaching to the choir I know). So I tore everything out and sold my plants (mostly Crypts and Anubias) and my Chilli Rasbora's to the LFS ($51 in credit, hello live rock!)

 

Awkward breakup. "its not you, its me, you're the ones upgrading, not me"

 

kinda let things go the last month, but hello store credit!

 

 

 

I run a Biocube 14 at home and wanted a similar "clean look" with most the equipment hidden. Since this is an office tank I don't have the time to get too involved with plumbing and things like that. Projects have to be done either at home or during lunch. I was inspired by a few tanks who have used PVC cut lengthwise and turned into a internal overflow with a return pump on the bottom. So this is the route I decided to go.

 

Cleaned of all the dirt and ready for conversion!

 

 

4" PVC wrapped to match background, I'm not too concerned about the white overflow holes as i'm sure coraline or whatever will darken them up over time. I had seen other people cut these to fit into corners but since I am crunched for time and need this to be easy I kept it as a whole pipe (and cutting it to the corner doesn't really give me much more room. Cleaner look yes, but more invloved. I need simple). I used a few spare parts from my Rio Plus for the return. Pipe easily accommodates return pump, heater and floss

 

Everything in place. Now the waiting for the silicone to cure. Live rock and sand probably at the beginning of the week (maybe Friday if I get too impatient and feel like coming in on my day off)

 

 

 

Equipment (so far)

 

Lights: Current Orbit Marine PRO

 

Filter: DIY 4" PVC overflow w/ floss (going to try Live Rock only)

 

Pump: Whatever came out of my Biocube 14 (upgraded that to RIo 800+)

 

Plans are to be zoas,palys, softies, and LPS. Really want to make a "zoa garden" in the foreground. Also going to try and slow play it and start with small frags and let them grow in.

Great start. I like DIY.

[xHereFishyFishyFishyx]

Looks good so far! I'll check back in on this here and there and see how the progress is coming along.

[The Dish]

Well its been a bit over a month so I decided to update how things are going. I added a nice deep bed of live sand and about 10 lbs of live rock. After the cycle completed I added my clean up crew (going with snails only for the time being) 2 Nassarius Snails, 1 Cerith, 1 Turbo, & 1 Astrea. I also added a "Pink Zebra" Rock Anemone. I'm a little annoyed with him because he scrunched himself back into the rock I put him on. I guess as long as he's happy and I still can see most of him I'll have to live with his choice.

 

I've added an auto top off to keep things nice and stable while I'm away from the office. Went with an Aqualifter and built a simple 12v relay to avoid cutting into the pumps wiring. Aside from one little mishap of the pumps cord keeping my float switch down and ALMOST overflowing the whole tank before running out of R/O, everything has run smoothly.

 

The only issues I've been having is keeping up with the strange ambient room temperature in my office. Since I work at a church people are always around at different times and now that its summer the air kicks on at random times as people come and go. Before we switched the AC on the room temp along with the lights and pump kept everything running at a nice smooth 78 degrees. Once the AC started kicking in as it warmed up outside the tank began to drop to 74 degrees when the AC would be running. I put a Hydor Theo 50 watt into the overflow to compensate for the temp drop, but it apparently decided to stop working correctly (Though it had been in the previous freshwater tank) and heated everything up to 84 degrees when it was set to its lowest setting.

 

A New heater was in order and was looking at the Fluval E-Series digital heaters. My LFS suggested a Eheim Jager 50 watt, which is what I ended up with. It seems to have done the trick and everything is running stable. The only thing that I'm a little annoyed with is it wont fit in my overflow or behind it. I really like that I can "re-calibrate" it should it stray from the correct setting

 

I'll be out of town coming up next week so I don't want to add any fish until I get back, and I dont really want clownfish (already in a different tank) so livestock wise I'm leaning towards an exquisite firefish, Ruby Red Dragonet (I'm farming Copepods) and maybe some type of smaller goby or blenny (Like a hectors goby, lined blenny, or hi fin red banded goby etc.) any thoughts here?

 

Rock Flower Anemone

 

A little annoyed that the heater has to be here, its not horrid

 

FOT