Crazyju's Nuvo 40....I think

[Crazyju]

Been out of the hobby almost 10 years after I lost everything in my 240 reef after a flood. Got the itch for another tank, but wanted to start small. First of November I purchased a 10 gallon bow front and stand, 15lbs of live rock and started the cycle.

In less than a day, I realized i hated the bow front. Distortion was terrible. Off to Petco for the 20g H. Moved everything over and Its looking good. Picked up a Xr15 with diffuser, An icecap 1k for flow. I put a cpr small HOB refug with chaeto and a H80 flora.

I set up a 20 gallon RO storage tank In my office/fish room and wired the smart ATO pump 50ft away. I also ran tubing for a future auto water change.

Should have stayed off of the Marketplace.... found a great deal on an IM Nuvo 40 that I could not pass up. 4 hr round trip driving and another tank transplant.

It is a tight fit, but it works. Got everything set up filled with water and moved everything over. Turned the light on and I notice a scratch!!!! Dead center middle front pane. The first question I asked before buying was asking about scratches. I looked it over before we loaded, but I did not notice it until I got the Led's turned on. I think I am going to try to buff it out. It is not terrible, but it is noticable. So this may or may not be the tank for now. The icecap 1k makes a terrible wining noise when it ramps up and down and Is not going to work in the bedroom. I just ordered 2 mp10 with reef link. The IM 40 is very quiet though and if I can live with scratch is a very nice tank.



Current Equipment

Nuvo 40
xr-15 gen 4 pro
Smart ATO micro
(2) MP10wqd
Reeflink
H80 flora for refug
BRS 150g RO/DO
20 Gallon RO tank
47 gallon mixing barrel.
Auto water change in the works.

 

[Tahoe61]

Now that is quite the journey! Hopefully the scratch is not a deal breaker. What type of flow?

 

[Crazyju]

Right now it has a sicce 1.0 or 1.5 on it. I have a 2.0 that I could use there. I am running the 1k at around 60%. Will put the MP10s on this week.

 

[czhao1009]

Is the scratch on the inside or outside of the glass? Good luck!
No skimmer? Interested in your plans for the auto water change

I have the same light and tank, what is the purpose of the diffuser, less shimmering?

 

[Tahoe61]

I replaced the stock return pump which is 415 gph to a sicce 30 which is 750 gph. Tight fit but doable.
Added a Tunze DOC skimmer, best skimmer for this tank IMO.
I have this tank as well.

 

[Crazyju]

Is the scratch on the inside or outside of the glass? Good luck!
No skimmer? Interested in your plans for the auto water change

I have the same light and tank, what is the purpose of the diffuser, less shimmering?

Scratch is on the outside. Not very deep , but it does grab the light. Going to try no skimmer and do large weekly water changes. 15-20 gallons. I used the word Auto, but should have said, not manual. I am going to place a rigid black tube hooked to an airpump that will syphon the tank. I have the tube plumbed directly to a drain. Turn on airpump and it will drain down to where i set the syphon break. I have a pump in the fish room in my mixing tank that will pump water 50ft through the floor to the tank. I used it to fill the tank this weekend and it worked great. I have the air pump and water pump on a wireless switch and can do the water change through my phone. I will be getting an apex and will then fully automate.

 

[Crazyju]

I replaced the stock return pump which is 415 gph to a sicce 30 which is 750 gph. Tight fit but doable.
Added a Tunze DOC skimmer, best skimmer for this tank IMO.
I have this tank as well.

Do you think I will need that much turnover while running 2 MP10's?

 

[Tahoe61]

The only draw back to these AIO is turn over from back compartment IME.
Two MP 10s should be perfect though, but for 100 bucks I went with increased flow through back.

 

[Crazyju]

The diffuser combines the different color leds better and spreads the light a little more. Without it, I could see individual LED colors, especially on the bare bottom. Now It is one uniform color. You do lose some intensity though.

 

[czhao1009]

Scratch is on the outside. Not very deep , but it does grab the light. Going to try no skimmer and do large weekly water changes. 15-20 gallons. I used the word Auto, but should have said, not manual. I am going to place a rigid black tube hooked to an airpump that will syphon the tank. I have the tube plumbed directly to a drain. Turn on airpump and it will drain down to where i set the syphon break. I have a pump in the fish room in my mixing tank that will pump water 50ft through the floor to the tank. I used it to fill the tank this weekend and it worked great. I have the air pump and water pump on a wireless switch and can do the water change through my phone. I will be getting an apex and will then fully automate.

Sounds like a plan! I'm still doing it with some 5 gallon buckets

 

[Crazyju]

Here are the scratches. I am going to try tonight buffing with cerium oxide and hope I dont mess the whole thing up.

 

[Crazyju]

Spent a couple hours buffing the scratches. Good news the bottom scratch is completely gone, Bad news, the top one looks exactly the same. It actually felt like the bottom one was the deeper scratch. I think I will search for another tank and try then try to sand this one down while it is empty. The MP10's came in and I put one in last night and got the reef link set up. The pump and Radeon connected through reef link no problem. I am having trouble getting ecotech live to program the MP10. When I hit save it just locks up the program. Installed app on phone and using web app on PC. Same results. I am connected to the MP10 and can change the mode through the app, but when I hit program it locks up?

 

[Crazyju]

Whew, what a weekend. Found another IM40 just over a 2 hour drive for a good price. Went and picked it up Saturday morning and moved everything over again. Hopefully this is my last tank purchase for a while. The RO/DI unit pressure has been dropping, so I decided to investigate. Pressure reducer valve coming into the house was leaking. I replaced it and when I turned water back on the hot water heater started to leak. 10 hours late, a few trips to home depot and I now have a whole house tankless water heater. Not how I planned to spend the weekend, but now I have 60psi throughout the house and the RO unit is churning out water. I had to switch over to chrome to get ecotech live to program the MP10's. Firefox worked fine for the Radeon. I changed my aquascape around and I think I like this better. Going to make one more attempt at fixing the scratch on the other tank now that it is empty.

 

[Crazyju]

Cleaned the tank and did a 20 gallon water change. The corals seemed to have loved it an they posed for a few pics.

 

[Crazyju]

Did a 20 gallon water change over the weekend. Everything seems to really like the large water changes. Taking out a fist full of chaeto each week. Pod population is insane. So far no ugly phase yet. Picked up a new 3 head acan. Duncan has sprouted two small heads.

 

[Tahoe61]

Wheww, talk about tank drama

New tank and scape look awesome. The scratch would have driven me nuts.

 

[btmedic04]

What a journey! If anything, you can use the nuvo 40 with the scratch as a QT for corals and inverts (too nice of a tank even with the scratch to expose it to copper imo)

 

[Crazyju]

The non manual water change is working great. Takes about 10 minutes total. I am using a siphon hose hooked directly to the houshold drain and then using a wireless outlet switch, I turn on the pump in the fish room and pump in fresh saltwater. In the past water changes had been such a chore they were skipped frequently. I picked a 4 head blue candy cane this weekend. Found a new LFS that just opened a few miles from my house. We really needed one. Also found a deal on 2 more xr15's. I put another on the 40 and it really made the whole tank look better. I turned down the intensity and now am running them at 40%. I will have to pick up a difuser for the new ones. It is really noticeable with one like with and one without.

 

[Crazyju]

What a journey! If anything, you can use the nuvo 40 with the scratch as a QT for corals and inverts (too nice of a tank even with the scratch to expose it to copper imo)

I have another scratch removal kit on the way. It really is too nice of a tank to just toss.

 

[Crazyju]

Another week, another 20 gallon water change. Tank is staying very clean. Was in Atlanta this past weekend and brought back another acan and a few zoas. Still waiting for the uglies to show up, but so far so good.