My reintroduction i to the hobby 20g IM build

[dirtin]

So the day is soon here. My first shipment of gear and the tank itself arrive tomorrow. But have I been just waiting? Of course not! I got a mockup of thr display build and sectioned off the rule of thirds to begin my aquascape sculpture on Saturday. Using some of my leftover gear from my previous stint in the hobby along with some new additions

Tank: IM nuvo 20
Powerhead: vortech mp10qd
Light: radion xr30
Skimmer: miniq nano
Control: apex neptune
Pumps: apex dos for AWC

Might add additional dos and a trident in the future depending on calcium and alk demands

I am doing things differently this time. All dry rock from day 1 with ocean direct live sand. Going to actually glue and epoxy the aquascape together as I can't tell you how many times I've had "oh crap" moments in a rock tumble from just stacking. You can never get it just right again after that and boy does ot stress the corals. Wish me luck!!

 

[lapin]

Nice

 

[Jmp998]

That’s a lot of light for a 20g. Planning on SPS?

I think you will be happy with a glued rock scape. I just set up my new tank with glued scape instead of piled rocks a few months ago. Took me forever to do the gluing, I’m not really happy with the overall ‘design’ and would do it very differently if I was starting over (I’m not very artistic or good at visualization), but I LOVE that all the rocks are secure and don’t start sliding everywhere when I am trying to add a frag. I don’t think I will ever do a loose pile of rocks again. I’ve also had rocks shift before, seems like it always happens late in the day, one shifts and then when you try to get it back into place two more start sliding around and then it just turns into a general rockslide and you spend half the night trying to get it back in order.

 

[dirtin]

That’s a lot of light for a 20g. Planning on SPS?

I think you will be happy with a glued rock scape. I just set up my new tank with glued scape instead of piled rocks a few months ago. Took me forever to do the gluing, I’m not really happy with the overall ‘design’ and would do it very differently if I was starting over (I’m not very artistic or good at visualization), but I LOVE that all the rocks are secure and don’t start sliding everywhere when I am trying to add a frag. I don’t think I will ever do a loose pile of rocks again. I’ve also had rocks shift before, seems like it always happens late in the day, one shifts and then when you try to get it back into place two more start sliding around and then it just turns into a general rockslide and you spend half the night trying to get it back in order.

The radion was left over from my previous tank. It's an older generation but still works. I do plan on doing a little SPS but the big must have is clams. So yea, lots of light. I'm right with you on the design. I have the basic build done with superglue and today is getting the extra layer of epoxy on to add even more strength. Not 100% pleased with the design, as like you ik not artistic. But it doesn't really matter when the coral go in and take over eventually. No one is commenting on rockwprk when looking at an ultra grade maxima. This week is making final touches and getting the last of the gear together. Then it's time to get it wet.

 

[clownnut]

Nice. I just returned with the same tank. Going from a fish room and a big tank to a small tank is a change.

 

[kevgib67]

Well thought out! Following, pictures?

 

[dirtin]

 

[dirtin]

So its been a crazy week and a half. Almost all of my free time has been devoted to getting my tank set up. So here are the updates.

1. For a couple days after this picture, I added more epoxy to certain joints on the rockwork. It just seemed a little too unsteady to be handling and I figured a little more shoring up couldnt hurt. Boy do I hate working with that stuff, especially when it is just fully mixed. It tends to stick on my hands more then the rockwork until it starts to get some tack to it. It was worth it though, the structure if very solid.
2. Got the marco rock powder in the mail 2 days after the epoxy was fully cured. I used bonding clue on the epoxy and coated it in powder to make a kind of concrete to add additional strength and cover the grey. I found that glue then powder required like 3 coats to get the powder thick enough to cover the grey, I switched to powder then glue and it worked much better. Luckily a friend of mine left his portable beer pong table at my house after my birthday party which I worked on in the garage. I left little dots of powder concrete all over that thing so no spousal murder in the cards for my wife for ruining our dining room table.

That’s a lot of light for a 20g.

Got that right, The below is with the lights at 60%. PAR drops off 15-20 per 10% reduction. Still not too sure what my final range will be, but I have a good idea on what the PAR is on what setting

3. The time then came to start making my water. My RODI filters are 5 years old and the TDS was showing 1 out of my old but still not fully changed resin. No biggie, filters arent the most expensive thing. Replaced all of the filters and still got TDS of 1 and 2. I spent hours messing with it and spilling water all over the kitchen only to find out that I probably rotated the TDS meter when I changed the filter the first time. Now its reading 0 and I can finally make my water!

4. After almost a full day of making RODI and false starting with "bad" water, getting the last couple gallons to get it to 1.025 seemed like forever. I was tired, cranky from all of the constant tank stuff I had been working on for days. I had a deadline of getting everything in and cleaned up before we had house guests over the weekend. I finally laid the sand bed and filled the tank. Took a quick snapshot. I quickly dosed Tims ammonium chloride and poured 1/2 of my bacteria into the back with the ceramic bio filtration plates and the display.

 

[dirtin]

5. Now time for the cleanup. I dont have enough room in my stand to store my 5g AWC SW, 5g ATO, and dosing tanks so I had to mount all of my equipment on the wall behind the stand. Luckily that wasnt too hard as most of my stuff is new apex stuff and mounting patterns can be printed off. Got the gear mounted and organized all of the cabling using a sticky appliance cord wrapper. Now my mancave was clean enough for guests. Time to take a break and enjoy some time with friends.

6. After the house guests left, back to the tank. I got the apex probe mount the day before so it was time to calibrate and set all of my software through the fusion app. It is really weird having an app that shows my tank parameters at near real time. Kinda data overload (will be posting in another forum about that). But in the past 2 days my ammonia has gone from >2ppm to about .5ppm and am showing high nitrites. The bacteria I had worked fast. Dosed some more ammonium chloride and did a bit more organizing of all the gear.