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Josh's 12" cube


justjoshinya

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justjoshinya

20170915_141405.thumb.jpg.c5e92da041c13ec728c1d121bf707de8.jpgcurrent FTS 

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So after a long time out of the aquarium hobby i got bored and decided to build a new tank and decided to do a nano reef tank, i decided i wanted a small tank for my room as i already have a 100g freshwater amazon biotope. i couldnt find a tank i completely loved in stores or online so i decided to have one made, i went with a 12"x12"x12" cube made from 0.5" acrylic it has a black back with 2 0.5" return drilled holes and a built in external surface skimming overflow box that has a 1" drain line, the tank is about 7.8 gallons including the overflow chamber it drains into a 15 gallon barrel sump where the heater filter socks and some media are, it will eventually have a chaeto chamber i think. i had to custom build the stand and lid but luckily my roomate is a carpenter and build me an awesome stand and lid from pine butcher block and maple veneered 1" ply leftover from a cabinet job. the stand turned out great a little small but if i went any bigger the 12" cube would look even funnier on a stand.

 

Lighting i went with a kessil A80 tuna, mounted to the lid about 3.5" above the water line heater is a 75w kept in the sump, also have a hydor powerhead in the sump to keep things moving, the return pump is just a cheapy i had laying around it provides enough return flow to turn the tank over once every 5 minutes and i tested it, it flows 5 gallons down the drain line in 4 minutes 10 seconds. i went with manmade reef rock only 6lbs and 10lbs of fiji pink live sand, current inhabitants are 1 nassarius snail, 1 orange spot turbo, 1 peppermint shrimp. no fish will go in this small tank, but corals will and are corals i have are 2 red mushrooms 1 pink ricordia mushroom and a small colony of zoas that have about 6 pink stardust zoas and 1 mystery zoa that is neon green with an orange mouth. everything is healthy. i just got the tank set up on the stand and lid and moved the sump into the stand, the live rock i cured in a 7gal bucket for 1 month then set the cube tank up with that same water and rock, and added the live sand and a pump, let it run a week then set up the sump and it bloomed a whicked diatom bloom cyano which quickly disappeared and then some algae appeared but my tank got overun with pods all over the glass and rocks and they pretty much ate all the diatoms and algae that was left. i added the 2 snails and the corals next after my algae went away and they have been in there for about a month and a half and are doing good, i just added the peppermint shrimp last week to help control some amphipods that i saw that were getting pretty big, they werent bothering the zoas or anything but didnt want to give them a chance and my tank needed another inhabitant and i dont think putting a fish in a 1 foot cube is cool so i decided on the shrimp.

 

i know this thread is worthless without pics i had an accident and my phone got broken so i lost all the progress pictures of the building of the stand and lid and also lost the pics of the tank when it was dry, i will take some pics using my tablet tomorrow and upload them and see if my roomate has any pics of the stand being built i was going to do a whole build thread but since i lost all those pics decided just to start my tank journal. i would take pics right now but i have to get to work and by the time im off the lights will be off already.

 

i run the kessil a80 at about 45% intensity and the spectrum about 50% to full spectrum the lights turn on at 10am and turn off at 8pm so far this photo period has worked for me but since i just installed the lid i dont know if anything will change as the light dropped about 1.5" closer to the water level than before the lid mount. ive been working the intensity up over the last month i like the look of the light and the ease of operation and it runs cool perfect for a nano tank, im thinking of getting another for the sump when/if i add a chaeto chamber. i still need to get an ATO unit as the daily top offs with RO are killing me, which is why i decided to expand the water column with adding a 15gal sump, and there is actually 12 gallons in the sump, so the total water volume of the setup is just shy of 20gal,

 

-Josh

 

 

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justjoshinya

Heres some pics i promised, sorry they were taken from my tablet and its hard to adjust the colors.. my roomate does have some photos of the building of the stand and lid but i didnt waste my time getting them since its not too interesting lol.

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justjoshinya

yes it is lol, i wanted to do a stand to fit, but that would leave no room for a sump so id have a smaller water column and have to put heater and ato and such in a tiny tank lol i plan on building a computer desk to match the stand lol maybe it will take the focus off the size difference.

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  • 2 months later...
justjoshinya

Here is an updated picture of the tank still battling some algae but everything is healthy I did lose a ricordia but everything else is doing well.

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  • 2 weeks later...
justjoshinya

Here is an updated picture of the tank still battling some algae but everything is healthy I did lose a ricordia but everything else is doing well.

20170627_171206.jpg

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  • 5 weeks later...
justjoshinya

A little update I added some more live rock to make some caves and a shelf I also got a green acropora but it's still settling in. I like the new scape and so does my pseudochromis I also added a few margarita snails

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justjoshinya

Thanks my galaxy s7 takes decent shots and these shots are very similar to what the eye sees it as. My palythoa colony had 2 acan heads and 2 baby acans popping up didn't even notice the acans. Also I found a majano on my flying saucer tubinaria it's only one and it's really cool looking blue with green tips and a green mouth I will chip it off the rock and put it in quarantine on my next day off. I may leave it, it is really cool looking not brown I thought it was a coral at first lol

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justjoshinya

Here is what I think is the majano, I've wanted to take the tubinaria off this rock for a while so this little guy may be my excuse

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  • 4 weeks later...
2 minutes ago, justjoshinya said:

Some updated pics I added some macro algae and it really helped with my Cyano I think. 

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This is really looking good, I like it!!! 

I think Macroalgae is really good at giving us more of a buffer or "safety zone" with our tanks, because it's so good at absorbing nutrients. 

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justjoshinya
4 minutes ago, Weetabix7 said:

 

This is really looking good, I like it!!! 

I think Macroalgae is really good at giving us more of a buffer or "safety zone" with our tanks, because it's so good at absorbing nutrients. 

Yea I like the way it's turning out I'm still trying to pluck out hair algae but with the macro it's outcompeting the others pretty well. I agree about the macro especially in a nano system20170827_104953.thumb.jpg.54fd54738275758b45d94a758da5d8c2.jpg20170827_104953.thumb.jpg.96bf0a0da2af55b40f08d5b1478132fe.jpg

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Took out the gsp had too it started making my zoa s close and taking over them so I took a hammer and screw driver and broke the rock off and got rid of all gsp still 2 stalks have popped out of the sand bed never again will I put it in my tank looks awesome but very invasive lol still feeding my majano and it's getting bigger hard to get a good shot of it but it's a cool anemone so I let it stay unless it starts spreading

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It would start to crawl up the glass I'd scrape it off and that would make a foundation for itself, it spread on top of the sand when I removed it there was a lot of sand permanently stuck to it so it did grow on/across the sand about 2 inches across the sand to the closest rock and once it hit another rock it spread quickly I really liked it and the colors were awesome but the polyps agrivate other corals and smoother them then grow on top of them. 

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