ESHOPPS Deskmate 3.8g Pico build

mje113

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As part of a planned rip-cleap of my Fluval EVO 13.5, I wanted to get rid of a piece of live rock that I felt wasn't aesthetically pleasing in the existing aquascape. I didn't like the idea of just pitching it, and had recently seen these cute little picos showing up here and there and decided, why not start a new tank?

I found a good price on the Deskmate, so ordered one, and started seeding some extra Xport BIO Cubes in my EVO. After a month and when all gear had arrived, I tore down the EVO, replaced the sand, cleaned rocks, and rebuilt the scape. Then I set my sights on the Deskmate. I started with washed sand from the EVO and that singular piece of live rock. Added a handful of BIO Cubes and off we go!

Current Equipment

Lighting: Stock (I think this is enough light, however I wish the balanced the blues with the whites better. I may need to replace at some point in the future but fine for now)
Pump: Replaced stock with a Sicce nano
Heaters: 2 50w Aqueon preset heaters
Controller: Shared Hydros Collective of an X2 and X3
ATO: Hydros ATO
Thermometer: Hydros thermometer
Power: Hydros wifi power strip that currently is not working correctly

The intention is to get as much automated as possible. Once I can figure out what's wrong with my wifi strip (or get it replaced) the plan is to power the heaters, lighting, and pump via the Hydros collective.

Current Livestock

Fish: none
Coral: none
Inverts: All hitchhiked from the moved piece of LR
  • 2 Emerald crabs
  • Bumblebee snail
  • Some other random snails
  • Feather dusters
  • Spaghetti worm
Planned Livestock

Fish: none
Coral: Mostly soft, zoas and mushrooms
Inverts: Mantis shrimp

I had a small mantis hitchhike on some KP LR and it's been living in the EVO for the past few months. I think it's responsible for a bunch of snail deaths but there's also been some mysterious fish disappearances. I have no idea if I'll be able to trap it, but if I can I hope to make this pic its new home.

That's if for now! I'm on week 2 and never really had a cycle, so I plan to start moving some coral over from the EVO soon, which will free up room to try to trap the mantis.
 
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mje113

mje113

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Looks like I'm already upgrading the light!


I was eyeing the Kessil A80 Tuna (seems popular for this tank), but was dissatisfied with lack of schedule/ramping out of the box. The K7 mini was only $79 shipped, with a R2R coupon code.
 
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mje113

mje113

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Finally got the additional Hydros wifi strip working correctly--literally had the ordering of the outlets reversed, so once I figured that out it was a pretty easy fix.
 

TheSheff

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love the build so far! Did you have issues with the flow rate of the return pump being too high ?
 
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mje113

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I did! In fact water level has been tricky. Between restriction of the filter sock, dialing in a new ATO, and just general high volume pump has resulted in almost flooding, periods of too much evap, etc. I do think I'm pretty close to having it dialed in. But I need to figure out what to replace the filter sock with.
 

TheSheff

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Yeah that's my only thing about this tank. I feel like they could've done more thinking about the pump situation. I expect a pump to be able to work on max out of the box. I replaced the filter sock with a filter cup bit I still have to turn the flow almost all the way down on the pump.
 
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mje113

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The stock pump? I'm running the Sicce Nano turned all the way up and as long as I have the sock removed the flow is fine... so now I need to find a replacement for the sock. What kind of filter cup are you using? I was considering 3d printing something but not very good at custom designs.
 

TheSheff

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That's crazy, I have never been able to run the pump at full speed even without the sock or anything in that filter compartment. I use the sicce Nano because I'm a sicce loyalist at this point lol. I just got the kraken reef filter cup the other day and it is really nice, but I have the same issue. The pump is running at like 40 gph probably less which is not nearly enough flow for what I want to do. Do you have the skimmer that they recommend installed too?
 
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mje113

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What's your water level in the return chamber? I try to keep it just a bit under the divider so it sorta waterfalls into it. I found that when I went higher than that they water level in the display ended up a lot higher than I was comfortable.

tempImagetpeJmS.png


Edit: No, no skimmer, just plan on doing large water changes once I have more bio-load.
 
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TheSheff

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I'm not home right now so I can't send a picture of what the water level is, but mine stays about 1 inch above the return pump. That's about as high as I can get it. Can you send a picture of the whole AIO section of your tank?
 
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mje113

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Not a huge update but I added my first intentional addition to the tank, a RFA! It looked a lot better under the blue lights at the LFS. Looking forward to getting the NooPsyche light.

tempImagehBBU9B.png


When I have the time I'll be starting to move a bunch of mushrooms and zoas over from the EVO. That will free up space in the EVO to start attempting to trap the Mantis.
 

TheSheff

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ill have to try to see if I can run the pump all the way with no sock again. DId you say you keep your water level right to wear it waterfalls into the drain weirs?
 
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mje113

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Yeah, water level in the return chamber is roughly an inch lower than the rest of the sump area. I think that keeps the level low enough to move enough through the overflow. When I went lower than that I was getting a lot of bubbles in the display.
 
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mje113

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Quick Update:

I did about an 80% water change yesterday in anticipation of moving a bunch of mushrooms/ricordea over from the EVO. There was a bunch of white slimy stuff all over the acrylic, so I put the filter sock back in and did a lot of cleaning before the change.

I thought I made a big mistake with the mushroom transfer. Since I've been battling every kind of nuisance algae in the EVO, and had some GHA on some of the plugs I decided to do an H2O2 dip before transfer. I made a ratio of between 3:1 and 2:1 tank water to H2O2 in a small bucket, then placed the shrooms in. Lots of bubbles and after 10 minutes moved them all to the Pico. They all looked VERY unhappy and had excreted a lot of slime that was holding onto some of the bubbles. So much so that some of the shrooms were floating! My St Thomas mushroom looked the worse--it excreted its guts and shriveled up and looked just terrible.

Luckily this morning everything was looking a lot better. Well, they actually look terrible under the stock lights, but hopefully that'll be corrected as soon as the NooPsyche mini shows up (speaking of which, where is it? I ordered on the 28th and still don't have shipping info).
 

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I'm glad other people use the hydrogen peroxide dips, it's so effective. I'm excited to see how well this light works if it ever comes in!
 
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mje113

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The other nagging equipment issue I've been dealing with is my hydros wifi power bars losing connectivity. I know this is an issue that plagues lots of hyrdos users, but lately for me it seems they are inoperable the majority of the time. Didn't care as much when it was rare, but now it's interfering with daily maintenance tasks.

Today I will be installing a dedicated 2.4ghz only router.
 
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