18g Nano Cube build. Again

[ylreefer]

So. It seems you just can't keep a reefer away from corals. At least not this one.

I was running a nano tank about ohhhhh. 9 months or so ago, which I closed down due to having to manage 2 tanks. Well that quickly got replaced with a Freshwater planted tank, while I turned the 180g reef into FOT. I know, don't say it. .

Now while I'm excited about being able to keep large angels and butterflies I do miss the corals. So when one of our club members offered a free 45cm cube AIO guess who put his hand up.

Oy problem was the living room started to look like a fish store with the 180g, 35g QT tank and the now nano cube, so away with the Freshwater tank and here we go again with a nano reef.

This isn't going to be a very technical build. But rather a super simple, low maintenance setup.

The tank has the usual 3 Chambers in the rear, only this time I'll be opting out of any mechanical filtration, no skimmer but instead using live sand / LR to maintain the tank.
Chamber 1 is reserved as a fuge should it be needed.

BIoload will be small, 3 fish at most and mostly easy LPS corals and Some zoa's with maybe some rockflower anemones and a few feather dusters. (doing my best not to go back to acros )

Set up consists of:
Tank which is 45x45x35cm.
Lit by a Noopsych K7 V2, a simple heater I had lying around and a small return pump that came with it. No wavemaker planed at this stage as the return does provide good movement. Ill be using TMC Bio Actif salt for this one to see how that performs.

Maintenance plan:
5g bi-weekly water changes to start, Dosing of TMC all for reef, again first time to try that out but I've seen good results on other tanks so why not.

Currently collecting RODI so I'll leave you with a pic of how we are and post the final set up once it's ready.

 

[JumboShrimp]

I like your Rockflower Anemone idea for a tank that size and shape. Try to get them to take hold near the front of the rocks where you can see them, because if they happen to stick near the back, have fun getting them to move. Lol.

Best wishes going forward!

 

[ylreefer]

Haha. That's the plan and hopefully they stick to it. I can't say I have seen and here in Hong Kong but I guess I wants looking for them.

And now the boring bit. Waiiiiiiiting......... for the water to clear after the live sand

Aday or 2, or 3 and the live rock can go in. So exciting no matter how make times your dry up a tank. Lol.

 

[chipchipbro]

well brother...
this aint gonna happen.. u can NEVER resist acros once you had them.
but, good try haha

 

[ylreefer]

I will do my absolute best. And then share pics of the acros in a few months. Hahaha

 

[JumboShrimp]

I once was fortunate enough to have three of them settle down in a row at the front of my 20 gallon tank. Sweet!

 

[ylreefer]

I once was fortunate enough to have three of them settle down in a row at the front of my 20 gallon tank. Sweet!

Oh now that's exactly what I'm holding for .

 

[ylreefer]

So sand went in yesterday (16hours ago now) and I'd say she's about 90% cleared up already just with the filter pad in the temp Hob filter.

Ill give it the rest of today then in go the 3 pieces of live rock from. The DT. I hoping this will totally skip the start up cycle but I'll stick an ammonia badge in and let it run for a few days before adding any food, if no. Ammonia shows up (which I expect to be the case) I think I'll be good to go so to speak.

Still contemplating adding some MB7 I have left over. I suppose it can't hurt,but then maybe totally unnecessary and I wouldn't want to cloud the water again with a bacteria bloom.

Will send some of off the scape in a day or two. One of the pieces of live rock have a baby gold torch that grew on its own accord and some leather tissue from a toadstall I removed which is growing back. So they shall be the testers. Haha.

 

[JumboShrimp]

I's funny how beautiful even just sand and water can be!

 

[ylreefer]

It is. Until GHA start taking over. Lol. Fingers crossed I won't have that issue.

 

[ylreefer]

Little update here then.

Water cleared up pretty well after 24hrs so I'm went the LR. It actually has a tiny baby gold torch that was a remnant from my 11 head gold torch so let this be the tester coral. .

Its obviously got a little cloudy again ow but the filer floss in the Hob is doing a cracking job so in a day or two that'll come off and that should be that.

Won't be adding any fish for about 2 to 3 weeks at least, but I do have a few nice zoa's to pick up next week so will update with that when I have them .

 

[ylreefer]

Well it's starting to come to life now, I picked up a few frags over a few days on my travels around town. Funny how you have a tank all mapped out then you go and see some nice coral that wants on your list eh.

Although there isn't going to be a large bioload in this nano I decided to add some maxspect bio balls anyway, so yesterday build a simple holder for them to make maintenance easier.

Ill simple drop these into the second chamber and lift them off when I need to clean them out.

 

[ylreefer]

Just thought I'd post the pics of the bio ball holders installed. This might be of some use to others

Takes up minimal space and super easy to remove when needed. Definitely beats having to fish balls out with Tongs or clean dirty net bags every once in awhile.

 

[ylreefer]

So, the tank is coming to life pretty quick, quicker than most should. But with the amount of mature and cured live rock, live sand, regular weekly water changes and minimal feeding and with regular testing all is going well.

Was passing a LFS the other day, saw 3 purple fire fish in the window tank, went in to check them out and at 8USD a piece I just had to have them. They are 2 of the 4 fish I planed for this tank and have been very difficult to come by in recent years, here for some reason. So I snapped them up. Ended up taking all 3.

Now thoes who know me will turn over in their graves knowing that I didn't qt these fish, I usually spend a good amount of time doing so. And I advocate it religiously. However, as this is not really going to house many fish at all and I'm not to concerned about having fish in here or not, after a 30 min inspection in the LFS and watching them eat I decided I'd give them a better home. Knowing that if there was a problem I'd have to go fallow for 3 months.

Luckily enough I think I struck the lottery, they are all out and about, taking food on day 2 and no signs of any illness.

Would I do this again. Not a chance if I intended to add multiple fish to a system.

PO4 was testing 0.19 on the hanna today (probably from the LR that was in the FOT). So grabbed some cheato from a clubmember and got the fuge online. Will continue to monitor that.

No3 is good at 1.2ppm and All for reef is doing its thing for the 3 big ones.

Also got a nice selection of 13 types of zoa on a plug from a buddy, not sure how they will grow out but will be nice to see.

That is all for now then.

Update as it grows or problems arise .

 

[AnotherReefHobbyist]

Looking very nice!

 

[ylreefer]

Hey guys. So time for a little post I think. Not much has changed to be honest as I've been to busy for coral shopping and getting the qt tank back online for the 180g.

The cheato had been doing its job pretty well, I harvest a tennis ball size ball about every 2 weeks at the moment and po4 is around 0.08.so pretty happy with the fuge.

Still working on getting the doser online which should happen by next week, Just fine tunning the amount I need to dose of the all for reef.

The ATO has used about 1ltr of water in 5 or 6 weeks Thnx to the acrylic cover, which I don't normally use. So super happy about that.

All in all this tank so far is proving to be the low maintenance tank I was hoping for, not having any mechanical filtration to change hasn't given me any cause for concern so far and the water is already crystal clear.

So I'll leave you with a few closer ups for now and a FTS

 

[AnotherReefHobbyist]

Hey guys. So time for a little post I think. Not much has changed to be honest as I've been to busy for coral shopping and getting the qt tank back online for the 180g.

The cheato had been doing its job pretty well, I harvest a tennis ball size ball about every 2 weeks at the moment and po4 is around 0.08.so pretty happy with the fuge.

Still working on getting the doser online which should happen by next week, Just fine tunning the amount I need to dose of the all for reef.

The ATO has used about 1ltr of water in 5 or 6 weeks Thnx to the acrylic cover, which I don't normally use. So super happy about that.

All in all this tank so far is proving to be the low maintenance tank I was hoping for, not having any mechanical filtration to change hasn't given me any cause for concern so far and the water is already crystal clear.

So I'll leave you with a few closer ups for now and a FTS

Looking great! Wouldn’t expect this to be a low maintenance tank, because it sure looks pretty amazing!

 

[ylreefer]

T

Looking great! Wouldn’t expect this to be a low maintenance tank, because it sure looks pretty amazing!

Thnx. It is early days yet and it's lightly stocked. I never planned on more than 4 small fish so not a heavy bio load,

Low maintenance for me was mainly not having to clean or change our filter floss or socks, so I dont have any of that.

30 min every 2 weeks for a glass cleaning and 5g water change and I'm done. Thats pretty low maintenance in my books. .

After all we should spend more time enjoying viewing our tanks than we do tinkering with them right .

 

[ylreefer]

Hey all. Little update then.

Did a little shopping. Managed to build a tiny torch garden. Small but pretty. Lol.

Another new addition was the Kamoer x1 pro2 doser for thr all for reef now that I had finally got the dosage calculated.

I won't go into it but connecting this pump to the WiFi made me use up every bad word I have in my vocabulary. No joke.

Was up till 5am with this thing. Fyi. You cannot connect it to 5g so if you buy this pump makes sure your router can run 2.4ghz independently of the 5g. Something my linksys router UI won't allow me to do while in mesh mode. In the end I gave up and set up the old Asus router just for the doser loll.

 

[AnotherReefHobbyist]

Hey all. Little update then.

Did a little shopping. Managed to build a tiny torch garden. Small but pretty. Lol.

Another new addition was the Kamoer x1 pro2 doser for thr all for reef now that I had finally got the dosage calculated.

I won't go into it but connecting this pump to the WiFi made me use up every bad word I have in my vocabulary. No joke.

Was up till 5am with this thing. Fyi. You cannot connect it to 5g so if you buy this pump makes sure your router can run 2.4ghz independently of the 5g. Something my linksys router UI won't allow me to do while in mesh mode. In the end I gave up and set up the old Asus router just for the doser loll.

love it! I have always wanted to keep torches but been to scared to take the plunge.