Biocube 29 Journey

[kred47]

Hey guys,

So I’m pretty excited about this new tank I stumbled upon and purchased. I saw an ad on Facebook marketplace for a used biocube 29 that was in pretty rough shape and selling for $100. It came with a stand as well, but was pretty gross looking and apparently had some scratches. Well, either way I’m on a budget and saw it as the perfect opportunity to upgrade. I picked up the tank today and it was as described….Rough. Coated in dried algae, and scratches galore. The bright side though, is it came with two nice pumps, an eshopps skimmer, custom fitted LED hood, in-tank media rack and a few other things. After about 6 hours of cleaning, I have it setup in my room. I wanted to polish the scratches out of the glass but I have no experience and heard it’s quite easy to screw that up, so we’re just going to live with the scratches. Im excited to document the journey and budget for this tank here and looking forward to hearing everyone’s feedback! I’m going to post the pictures of before and after today’s clean below and hopefully I’ll have pictures of the aquascape and it cycling tomorrow!

Budget Tracker:
Tank, stand and extras: $100
Sand: $30
Salt and premixed water: $45
Heater (Jager 100W): $35
Total: $210

 

[AJsReef]

Looking good, I still remember my BC14. Great all in one tanks!

 

[Sgchick]

I had a 29 biocube running for 6 years before I moved. Great tank. Just used carbon and perigean in back and did weekly 5 gallon water changes...very low maintenance. Good luck!!

 

[kred47]

Hey guys,

So I’m pretty excited about this new tank I stumbled upon and purchased. I saw an ad on Facebook marketplace for a used biocube 29 that was in pretty rough shape and selling for $100. It came with a stand as well, but was pretty gross looking and apparently had some scratches. Well, either way I’m on a budget and saw it as the perfect opportunity to upgrade. I picked up the tank today and it was as described….Rough. Coated in dried algae, and scratches galore. The bright side though, is it came with two nice pumps, an eshopps skimmer, custom fitted LED hood, in-tank media rack and a few other things. After about 6 hours of cleaning, I have it setup in my room. I wanted to polish the scratches out of the glass but I have no experience and heard it’s quite easy to screw that up, so we’re just going to live with the scratches. Im excited to document the journey and budget for this tank here and looking forward to hearing everyone’s feedback! I’m going to post the pictures of before and after today’s clean below and hopefully I’ll have pictures of the aquascape and it cycling tomorrow!

Budget Tracker:
Tank, stand and extras: $100
Sand: $30
Salt and premixed water: $45
Heater (Jager 100W): $35
Total: $210

So not proud to say this, but turns out this tank is actually a Nanocube 28 . Either way I have the scape setup and tank has been cycling with live rock and rubble from my previous tank for about 3 days now. I threw a cocktail shrimp in there but now I’m wondering if that is even necessary, since I have the rock and rubble from the other tank. So in theory the tank should cycle quickly correct? I just ordered a new power head to go along with my fluval CP1 and everything is going great!


Budget tracker:
Cheap Amazon power head(won’t even use it in the tank because it’s garbage but it’ll mix my saltwater for me so whatever): $12.99

Chinese 300 gph return pump (old one is very noisy) : $17.99

Base Rock: $150.00

LCD thermometer: $7.99

new magnet hydor power head 530 gph: $22.99

subtotal: $210

Total for tank: $420

(all that’s left to buy is the ATO and we’re done!)

 

[kred47]

So not proud to say this, but turns out this tank is actually a Nanocube 28 . Either way I have the scape setup and tank has been cycling with live rock and rubble from my previous tank for about 3 days now. I threw a cocktail shrimp in there but now I’m wondering if that is even necessary, since I have the rock and rubble from the other tank. So in theory the tank should cycle quickly correct? I just ordered a new power head to go along with my fluval CP1 and everything is going great!


Budget tracker:
Cheap Amazon power head(won’t even use it in the tank because it’s garbage but it’ll mix my saltwater for me so whatever): $12.99

Chinese 300 gph return pump (old one is very noisy) : $17.99

Base Rock: $150.00

LCD thermometer: $7.99

new magnet hydor power head 530 gph: $22.99

subtotal: $210

Total for tank: $420

(all that’s left to buy is the ATO and we’re done!)

Also made a little refugium mod for the immediately tray, will pick up some chaeto after cycling is done.

 

[kred47]

UPDATE 2/8/22:

tanks been going for about three weeks now and it is doing amazing. Cycling took about a week and I just did the first water change yesterday. I’ll be honest I’ve been moving a little fast and now the stocking of the tank is:
-2 ocellaris clown
-tiger pistol/ ymg pai
- purple firefish
-hammer
-a hybrid coral forgot what they told me
- zoa
- mushroom
- gsp
- Athenia

everything is perfect though and everyone is happy. Water parameters have been good and stable and will continue with 25% to help the bacteria out.

Budget Tracker:
Previous total 420 +

ATO: 68
Controllable power strip: 18
Total: 506
So 506, all in for the tank equipment. Ended up being a little more expensive then I thought it would be, but I’d say it’s still a budget reef. Not going to include livestock in the budget (mainly because I don’t want to know how much I spent on corals three months from now lol)

now just time for maintenance, and let the growing begin.

 

[Snuggs]

i was given one of these tanks last year, who can say no to a free tank? Found the hood to be NOISY! Gutted it and installed a cheap Amazon light, my softies do well in it

 

[kred47]

i was given one of these tanks last year, who can say no to a free tank? Found the hood to be NOISY! Gutted it and installed a cheap Amazon light, my softies do well in it

The hood is incredibly noisy. I keep it in my office so I can tolerate the noise with headphones on. Might try switching out the fans saw a video of someone doing this and it made a huge difference.

 

[kred47]

Update 2/17:

Tank is coming along well. Fish are all great, pistol/goby pair I put in is super interesting to watch (even though I haven’t see the shrimp in about a week lol). But otherwise, corals are all flourishing and the tank has been running smooth.

current stocking:
Pair of ocellaris
Pistol/ymg pair
Purple firefish
Cleaner shrimp
10 trochus
6 hermit

acan
Zoa
Frogspawn hybrid
GSP
Ricordia mushroom
Hammer
Athenia
(Hope I got all the names right, going off what I think I was told)

Only questions I have:

1. In the picture, you can see the power head is attached to the front of the cube. I wanted to use this to create a gyre pattern with the two flows colliding in the front. I would like to move the power head to the back and then change the fluval CP1 to a 500 gph magnetic mounted head. Is there any tips for flow in a cube and is it advisable to have all the flow coming from the back of the tank?

2. I really want to put a BTA on the mid level shelf and then have the front of the shelf be a row of various zoa colonies. Is this a good idea. Read a lot about people keeping btas in 30 gallon tanks, but I don’t want it to interfere with other corals? Will it be aggressive? I do plan on adding a few other frags and want to have the top shelf be all show SPS pieces. Anyone have experience with BTAs in a 28 gallon cube mixed reef like this? Thanks guys and I hope you enjoy the progress!

(PS: turned the light on for the picture which is why the corals were still closed up. I’ll post one tomorrow with everyone open and happy)

Also: could a mod move this to the build thread? I think it is more suited there probably.

 

[WilyGuy]

I have a rainbow BTA and it has been a little painful. It found a spot it likes but it does wave around a good bit and it wants to sting my Montis. It split and I had lots of fun trying to get the two siblings out.

 

[OldRed1]

Also made a little refugium mod for the immediately tray, will pick up some chaeto after cycling is done.

How do you light your macro algae?

 

[saltyfins]

i was given one of these tanks last year, who can say no to a free tank? Found the hood to be NOISY! Gutted it and installed a cheap Amazon light, my softies do well in it

Steves light with a hurricanex game changer! I grow acros in my 32 biocube.

 

[kred47]

How do you light your macro algae?

I’ve since upgraded to a 40 gallon with a sump, but with the biocube I used a little 14000K light attached to a suction cup. Don’t know what it’s called cause I found it at the LFS, but I just positioned it to shine directly onto the macro in media basket. Through the glass back of the tank of course