My 20 Gal Waterbox

[Starganderfish]

After the succesful upgrade of my Pico Tank I wanted to add something a little bigger so I picked up a Waterbox 20 and set it up next to it.

Its a fairly typical build but I'm enjoying it.
Equipment:
Nero 3 Wavemaker
Sicce Syncra 1.0 return pump
AI Prime light
Tunze Eco Chic fuge lighting
100w heater
Auto Aqua AWC Duo

I placed about an inch dry sand as substrate and used white dry rock from the LFS, cycled with a mix of Ammonia drops and water from my Pico. Cycled in about 3-4 weeks.
Clean up crew
approx 12 Nassarius snails
4 Trochus Snails
12 small Turbo snails (a few chucked in the Fuge)
1 small Strombus snail
1 small yellow leg Hermit. (there was a second but he was caught red-handed eating snails so was removed)

Stock
2 x Occelaris Clowns
2 x Coral Banded Shrimp
soon to be adding a Diamond Watchman Goby for additional sand bed cleanup
down the line I will be adding a Mandarin Dragonet once the pod population has stabilised

Corals
1 small green Fungia plate
1 small green Goniopora (transferred from the PICO and seems a LOT happier)
1 small green Elegance
1 small green Hammerhead
1 largeish frag of purple Acan
1 largeish frag of red Favia
1 x small 24 carat gold Torch
I have a collection of single heads of Zoa's coming next week as well - Crayola, Fire & Ice, Rasta, Red Hornet, Scrambled Eggs, Sunny D.
Also contemplating adding a cool yellow tip Rasta Torch coral beside the 24 carat (Like the idea of one with yellow polyps and blue tips and the other with blue/purple polyps and yellow tips - would be a cool contrast)

I set up Chamber one of the AIO with a 3d Printed caddy with filter p[ad (changed every 2 or 3 days) ChemiPure Blue, and Seachem Matrix for bio.
Chamber two is a Chaeto Fuge with the Eco-Chic light and also holds the heater
Chamber three holds the return pump as well as sensors and feed lines for the AWC unit (modified the AWC to use diaphragm pumps instead of regular impeller pumps so they live outside the tank and only need feed lines into the AIO chamber)
The AWC is hooked up to a 30 litre SW reservoir and a 20 litre ATO reservoir and each should last for several weeks with daily small water changes.

It's been a relatively fast build up but thanks to a reasonable cleanup crews and regular water changes with the AWC, things are looking okay. I'm still waiting on my camera filters from eBay so photo's are a little saturated.
Bit of algae on the glass but I just added Copepods so letting that go so they have something to feed on for a day or two.

 

[Starganderfish]

Last night I added a Refugium Pack from a local live food seller - a mix of Copepods, Amphipods, Rotifers and some Phyto. Put the Amphi's all in my 4 gal because I don't want them eating up all the pods in the 20. Otherwise split the Copes and Rotifiers between the two tanks and have added a capful of Phyto to each.
I want to have a Dragonet in the 20 so have dosed Copepods (Harpacticoida), added chaeto to a Fuge in the second AIO chamber, and also shoved a small mesh pot scrubber under the rock to act as a Display Tank pod hotel. I'd be worried that the Coral Shrimp would pick off all the pods pretty quick otherwise. I'll be dosing a small bottle of pods every month for the next few months to hopefully build up the population, and will continue to do so after the Mandarin arrives. It would be nice to get a tank bred one that eats pellets or other foods, but I'm in Aust so stuff like Biota isn't available here. I'll work on trying to train it up, but otherwise I'm content to supplement pods and if it gets too hard, will start culturing them at home.

I did have a shock this morning, a bit like something out of a horror movie. The tanks live in my garage (more of a workshop for building, crafting, 3d printing, woodworking etc, no cars live in there) so its not the most pristine environment.
Popped downstairs while the kids were getting ready for school. Light cycle hadn't started yet and wanted to see if I could spot any pods on the glass.
Instead, I found this:

My first thought was "What the Frak? I stuck the amphipods in the Pico, why do I have giant bugs in the tank!!!"
Closer look and it turns out they're baby-spiders clinging to the outside of the glass. Honestly, that freaked me out even more than thinking it was inverts in the tank!!
Some spider has obviously laid eggs somewhere in the garage and the baby spiders were drawn to the tank for who knows what reason. Brushed them away and have sprayed the glass and the table around it with tea tree oil/water as a hopefully more organic repellent - I doubt it will work but I don't really want to go with pesticides this close to the tank.
Urrggghh, so freaking gross, my skin is still crawling!! Not too worried about them getting in the tank, they'd immediately drown but its not what I want in my workshop.

And then I spotted what I first thought was the crushed remains of one coral banded shrimp stuck to the Nero wavemaker. Quickly determined that it's just a moult but it contributed to the freaky morning!!

 

[Nigel35]

Looking good! Keep us updated.

 

[Starganderfish]

And I just ordered a small Maxima clam for the tank. Been planning to add one since Day 1, but they can be hard to get and don't come in stock very often so I was pumped when Gee Marine announced a new order arrived with clams in it. Striaght to the website and picked up what I think is the nicest of the bunch, a pretty blue one, hopefully fairly small (at least to start with). I had a Squamosa almost a decade ago in my four-footer and I just love how unique they are.

Once the clam, zoas and Goby arrive, I think this tank will be done for a while. I'll let it all settle down and find balance, keep dosing pods every month and hopefully within 6 to 8 months the tank will be suitable for a Mandarin. Four small fish, a bunch of inverts and a nice collection of corals and filter feeders like the clam, along with the chaeto fuge and a healthy population of pods, shoud be enough manageable, especcially with small daily water changes thanks to the AWC unit. Give the clam and the volume of corals, I will probably have to start dosing soon though.

 

[dawi03]

this is awesome!! Do you have FB? im from melbourne and have just started my 25 gal peninsula journey!!

your build looks fantastic

 

[Starganderfish]

this is awesome!! Do you have FB? im from melbourne and have just started my 25 gal peninsula journey!!

your build looks fantastic

Thanks mate, appreciate it. Don't really use FB except for a few hobby groups.
Gee Marine are a Qld based online store that has a reasonable stock of fish and corals and ship Australia-wide. They just put up a bunch of corals and clams on their site this afternoon.
There's a few other nice Aussie sites as well. Its always nice to supplement what the LFS has, as they tend to be a bit more limited than many of the US shops.
I'm enjoying getting back in the hobby after a long hiatus and really liking having smaller tanks. The automation these days is expensive but it makes things so much easier and takes care of a lot of the stuff I always hated, like water changes and topping up and such. I can even avoid sifting the sand bed more than a few times a year with the right clean up crew and regular water changes.

Share some info on your Peninsula, I was really tempted to get one of those instead of the cube but it didn't quite fit the space.

 

[dawi03]

Thanks mate, appreciate it. Don't really use FB except for a few hobby groups.
Gee Marine are a Qld based online store that has a reasonable stock of fish and corals and ship Australia-wide. They just put up a bunch of corals and clams on their site this afternoon.
There's a few other nice Aussie sites as well. Its always nice to supplement what the LFS has, as they tend to be a bit more limited than many of the US shops.
I'm enjoying getting back in the hobby after a long hiatus and really liking having smaller tanks. The automation these days is expensive but it makes things so much easier and takes care of a lot of the stuff I always hated, like water changes and topping up and such. I can even avoid sifting the sand bed more than a few times a year with the right clean up crew and regular water changes.

Share some info on your Peninsula, I was really tempted to get one of those instead of the cube but it didn't quite fit the space.

Will do mate once its cycled!! I’m really considering an awc as well haha!

 

[Starganderfish]

Will do mate once its cycled!! I’m really considering an awc as well haha!

I have the AutoAqua AWC Duo and I really like it. It is hands down the most expensive piece of equipment in my tank - more than my lights or Wavemaker, more than the tank itself. But the time I would waste doing weekly water changes is worth more to me, and I feel that being able to do multiple small water changes, more frequently, leads to a generally more stable tank... so I bought one for my 4 Gal Pico and another for my 20 gal.

 

[dawi03]

I have the AutoAqua AWC Duo and I really like it. It is hands down the most expensive piece of equipment in my tank - more than my lights or Wavemaker, more than the tank itself. But the time I would waste doing weekly water changes is worth more to me, and I feel that being able to do multiple small water changes, more frequently, leads to a generally more stable tank... so I bought one for my 4 Gal Pico and another for my 20 gal.

nice!! ive got to work out how to have 3 different tanks in my cupboard now for rodi,waste water, and salt water

 

[Starganderfish]

nice!! ive got to work out how to have 3 different tanks in my cupboard now for rodi,waste water, and salt water

Its tricky.
I have a drain nearby so waste goes straight down there.
ATO uses a lot less water so a smaller reservoir for that and then the SW reservoir is the largest.
I use plastic jerry cans. A 20L for RODI and 30L for SW. Although if you can manage with just 20L cans, they're tall and narrow - the 30L is a square and takes up more space. I have two tanks so I'm running both off the same reservoirs. I got two of each (4 reservoirs total), which means I can have spare reservoirs that I can fill up while the other is in use. It takes the better part of a day to fill up both reservoirs with RODI water for me (or a couple of days if I don't want to leave them unattended), so I can have one set in use and spend a few days filling up the others, mixing the salt and getting them ready, then have them standing by in the garage out of the way for a quick swap out. Food Grade Jerry cans are cheap from Bunnings, and work well for smaller Nano tanks.

 

[Starganderfish]

Quick little addition today.
I made a mesh lid for the tank (same material and design as on my 4 gal). Black aluminium flyscreen framing and white nylon bird netting, from the hardware store. Put it all together, got good tension on the netting then sealed the spline and netting in place using silicone. Should stop the netting from being pulled out down the line.
The black frame blends in with the rim of the tank while the white netting is pretty unobtrusive.

And then, the icing on the cake, I designed and 3d printed a little hatch and feeding cup for the netting. Found a decent model for it on Thingiverse and then heavily modified it to suit. Shamelessly copied some of the features of an overpriced acrylic one I saw online, but tweaked it all to make it my own and easy to assemble.
It’s a hexagonal top and bottom piece that go on either side of the netting and are clamped together with M4 acrylic screws. Screw them nice and tight then carefully cut out the netting in the middle, taking care to leave enough “cells" in the netting at the edges so it holds tight. It has a little lid I can pop on or I can remove the lid and put a small feeding cup in - drop a frozen cube of food in there and it will slowly dissolve and disperse. It's also placed just right on the lid so that I can attach a Zacro auto feeder and have it drop pellets through the hatch if we need to go away for a few days.

I had it printed in clear ABS filament, thinking I could vapour smooth it to get it more translucent, but the smoothing made no difference. Still it blends in pretty well and should work nicely.
I didn’t print this myself because my FDM printer is on the fritz and being in the tank water, it’s not really suitable for resin printing.
I had it printed through an online print farm and they did it pretty cheap and had it to me in two weeks.
Now I just need to shrink and adjust the model into a smaller version for the Pico tank.

 

[Starganderfish]

Phew, It's been a day of chaos and nightmares.
I was expecting two deliveries from online fish stores today.
One a Fire Goby/Firefish for my Pico along with some Zoa frags. The other is a Chocolate Goby (Amblygobius Phalaena), assorted snails and a Maxima clam for my 20 Gal. About 9.30 am I received a call from a random person about 45 minutes away who had received my Zoa order by mistake. Sure enough, 3-hours later her order of a pair of Clown Fish arrived on my doorstep. We exchanged details and arranged to meet halfway between our respective houses for a handover. Got home after that and to my dismay, while the zoa frags were there, no sign of the Firefish. I called the shop and turns out that as well as slapping the wrong shipping labels in the boxes, they'd totally forgotten to pack the Firefish. So that's coming tomorrow.
At the same time that this other person's ClownFish arrived to me, my other order arrived, with the Clam, Chocolate Goby and snails. I set them up to drip acclimate while I drove off to do the swap.
Got back, finished acclimating the Chocolate Goby and dropped him in the 20 Gal (I'm taking the gamble in not Quarantining him because there's just way too much other **** to deal with - see below). I checked on the Maxima clam and realised that I'd stupidly forgotten to turn off the ATO on the Quarantine tank I was drip-acclimating the Clam from. I'd ended up dumping a litre of freshwater into the (fortunately unoccupied) Quarantine tank, dropping the salinity to about 1.020. Fortunately, it was a slow drip to the clam so the water in his bucket was unlikely to be unaffected. Still, bit of a mad panic while I raced around trying to work out what exactly had happened. Decided to quickly check the Salinity of the water in the Clam (foolishly hadn't checked it or the Choc Goby earlier, due to the rush to go do the fish-swap.)
Imagine my surprise when I found the Clam water wasn't low but actually crazy high!! What the heck? Checked the water in the Choc Goby's bucket (though he'd already moved over to the 20 Gal) and it too was high. Was the fish store's salinity that badly off? Nope, my bloody refractometer had drifted completely off calibration and the water in all three tanks (20 gal, 4 gal and QT) was low, 1.022 low.
First step - dug out my spare Rafractometer and an old bottle of calibration fluid and checked them both. Used the Fluid and the water from the Fish store to recalibrate both refract's. Drained 1/2 of the water from the QT tank and topped up with higher salinity water until I got that sitting at 1.025, and then recommenced the Clam's drip acclimation. Thanks to the missing Firefish, my Pico only has a few corals and some inverts so I was able to slowly bring up the salinity on that to 1.025 as well. I'm gradually adding some high salinity water to the 20 gal and slowly bringing it up over the next day as well. The clown and inverts in it seem fine so far, as do the corals so they weren't suffering too much from the low salinity, but the poor Choc Goby went from normal salinity, was drip acclimated to low salinity, into the low salinity tank and is now going to get slowly re-acclimated to normal salinity again. Luckily he's a pretty big fella and seems robust so fingers crossed he survives.
The Clam's been fully acclimated, scrubbed clean and is in my QT with (hopefully) accurately calibrated water. There's a small heater, a little micro powerhead and a bubble sponge filter in there, along with a recalibrated and re-set-up ATO, so he should be right for a couple of weeks of Quarantine.
I still have to deal with the snails and then dip all the corals, and this is all in-between a full workday (luckily I work from home at the moment.)
Such a mess.

Fortunately, the clam seems relatively happy and has already started to spread his mantle. He's a gorgeous little blue fella, hopefully just big enough to survive the rigours of transport and my half-arsed circus of acclimation! The Choc Goby settled into the 20 gal (I've seen about a dozen different names for this fish online but I like Choc Goby so I'm sticking with it.) He's already evicted my two coral banded shrimp from their big cave under my rock work and dug himself a little burrow with a huge mound of sand in front, so I doubt I'll see much of him for a few days.
Now to deal with the corals and snails!!

 

[tinyfellows]

What is your Nero set to im setting up the same tank and going to have a Nero 3 as well once I can find one In stock

 

[Starganderfish]

Have mine on the rear wall, right in the middle. It’s pointed directly at the back of my main rock structure so the flow kind of hits that and flows around to either side.
I’ve just got a really basic pulse going at 50%.
I was hoping to get more of a back and forth wave going but I don’t think it’s practical the way I have it set up, pointing at the rock.
I actually just ordered two of the Jebao MLW -5 wave-makers from Aliexpress and I’m going to try placing them on either side of the tank in Master/Slave Mode and try to get a proper side to side wave. If that works I’ll probably pull the Nero 3 out and keep it as a spare. The price on the Jebao’s is really good and I like that they have a proper physical controller as well as App control.
The Nero’s great but it’s pricey, the single button controller is lame, and I hate that feed mode doesn’t switch it completely off. We’ll see though. Everything’s reasonably happy on the tank so I’ll probably regret changing things!!

 

[dawi03]

h

Have mine on the rear wall, right in the middle. It’s pointed directly at the back of my main rock structure so the flow kind of hits that and flows around to either side.
I’ve just got a really basic pulse going at 50%.
I was hoping to get more of a back and forth wave going but I don’t think it’s practical the way I have it set up, pointing at the rock.
I actually just ordered two of the Jebao MLW -5 wave-makers from Aliexpress and I’m going to try placing them on either side of the tank in Master/Slave Mode and try to get a proper side to side wave. If that works I’ll probably pull the Nero 3 out and keep it as a spare. The price on the Jebao’s is really good and I like that they have a proper physical controller as well as App control.
The Nero’s great but it’s pricey, the single button controller is lame, and I hate that feed mode doesn’t switch it completely off. We’ll see though. Everything’s reasonably happy on the tank so I’ll probably regret changing things!!

Hey mate!! I gave my pm25 the flick and bought a wb20!!! im in the midst of getting all the gear for it but with your awc, what pumps did you use to modify so you can just have the tubes in chamber 3? i need to look into this Would also love to see an updated pic!

Thanks!

 

[PNW_squidz]

Very nice! Just curious, what is your light setup? I have the same tank and light and am trying to dial in my light settings.

 

[Starganderfish]

h

Hey mate!! I gave my pm25 the flick and bought a wb20!!! im in the midst of getting all the gear for it but with your awc, what pumps did you use to modify so you can just have the tubes in chamber 3? i need to look into this Would also love to see an updated pic!

Thanks!

No worries, I bought the pumps off Aliexpress. They're really cheap but took a month and a half to arrive.

1.54US $ 23% OFF|1pcs Micro Water Pump 12v Dc Motor 370 Small Mini Water Diaphragm Pump Self-priming Pump Vacuum Pump Carbon Brush Pump - Pumps - AliExpress

Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com

www.aliexpress.com

I also bought some barrel plugs online.

https://au.element14.com/pro-power/ppw00020/lead-dc-power-2-5mm-plg-bare-end/dp/3498417

Just wire the pump to the plugs and they plug straight into the controller. Easy as pie. It's a bit slower to drain and fill as the stock pumps but it's nice to have them out of the way.
I designed a 3D printed box to hold the pumps neatly.

Aquarium Water Change - Diaphragm Pump Holder by Starganderfish

I use an AutoAqua Smart AWC water change unit on my aquariums. Unfortunately, the pumps that come with the unit are trash. They are flimsy, burn out incredibly easy and the design of the unit means you have to place the pump inside your tank, and inside your water reservoirs.I replaced the pumps...

www.thingiverse.com

The box is stackable so if you have multiple tanks or units, you can print several. I have a 20 gal and a 4 gal going side by side and each has a modified AutoAqua AWc - they work great. The one weird thing is that of the 6 pumps I have going across two tanks, 4 are really quiet, barely a low buzzing while one is kind of noisy and one is almost deafening. I think it's just something in the build of these cheap Chinese pumps. Buy a bunch extra just in case - they only cost a few bucks.
I've been doing daily water changes in the 20 gal and its neighbouring 4gal. 30 litres of fresh saltwater lasts me a week. No siphoning or stirring the sandbed, parameters are nice and stable. Though I have started dosing All-For_Reef because the tank is pretty heavily stocked at the moment.
I'm currently battling algae in my tank (annoying me because Nitrates are at 0.0 and Phosphates at .07 (Hannah checkers). My Chaeto withered away and some Ulva I bought also dissolved in just a few weeks, but I keep getting hair algae all over the fuge chamber in the back. I've scraped it all out, and am adding new Chaeto this week and will see if I can get it to outcompete the nuisance algae. Lawnmower Blenny and Abalone also coming this week.

Very nice! Just curious, what is your light setup? I have the same tank and light and am trying to dial in my light settings.

I use an AI Prime with the David Saxby profile. I have it dialled up to max because I have a Maxima Clam and a Bubble Tip Anemone in the tank so want goo strong lighting. The Maxima has grown substantially in the month and a half it's been in there. The Anemone was settled happily in the font of the rocks but I stupidly started futzing with the wavemakers and the changing flow pattern bothered it and it's been moving around the last few days looking for a new preferred spot.

 

[Starganderfish]

Also, as an addendum to the above, we just took a week's holiday and I left the tank completely unattended. The AWC kept the water changes churning over perfectly and the salinity spot on. Lights are all automated.
I installed a Zacro automatic feeder on the side of the tank with a mix of pellets and flakes and set it to drop just a small amount of feed in once a day.
Everything was happy and healthy when we returned, parameters were still spot on, and a full tank of fresh saltwater lasted a full week of water changes on the two tanks.

Best of all, this holiday proved to be a perfect test of my disaster plan. On the second day away, we had a 12 hour blackout. All power was lost. No one was around to intervene. The tank was fine.
I use a 20,000 Mah Rechargeable battery that is permanently plugged in and charging. The battery has a pair of USB A ports on it and I have a pair of 5v USB powered mini pumps connected, one in each tank. The battery is on permanent charge and the pumps run permanently in the tank. When power goes out, the battery takes over and runs the tiny pumps, while everything else is off. It's not a lot of flow but enough to keep water moving in the tanks for about 24 hours. The constant charging will wear the battery out after a couple of years, but it's easy to replace and has now already paid for itself !!

 

[dawi03]

No worries, I bought the pumps off Aliexpress. They're really cheap but took a month and a half to arrive.

1.54US $ 23% OFF|1pcs Micro Water Pump 12v Dc Motor 370 Small Mini Water Diaphragm Pump Self-priming Pump Vacuum Pump Carbon Brush Pump - Pumps - AliExpress

Smarter Shopping, Better Living! Aliexpress.com

www.aliexpress.com

I also bought some barrel plugs online.

https://au.element14.com/pro-power/ppw00020/lead-dc-power-2-5mm-plg-bare-end/dp/3498417

Just wire the pump to the plugs and they plug straight into the controller. Easy as pie. It's a bit slower to drain and fill as the stock pumps but it's nice to have them out of the way.
I designed a 3D printed box to hold the pumps neatly.

Aquarium Water Change - Diaphragm Pump Holder by Starganderfish

I use an AutoAqua Smart AWC water change unit on my aquariums. Unfortunately, the pumps that come with the unit are trash. They are flimsy, burn out incredibly easy and the design of the unit means you have to place the pump inside your tank, and inside your water reservoirs.I replaced the pumps...

www.thingiverse.com

The box is stackable so if you have multiple tanks or units, you can print several. I have a 20 gal and a 4 gal going side by side and each has a modified AutoAqua AWc - they work great. The one weird thing is that of the 6 pumps I have going across two tanks, 4 are really quiet, barely a low buzzing while one is kind of noisy and one is almost deafening. I think it's just something in the build of these cheap Chinese pumps. Buy a bunch extra just in case - they only cost a few bucks.
I've been doing daily water changes in the 20 gal and its neighbouring 4gal. 30 litres of fresh saltwater lasts me a week. No siphoning or stirring the sandbed, parameters are nice and stable. Though I have started dosing All-For_Reef because the tank is pretty heavily stocked at the moment.
I'm currently battling algae in my tank (annoying me because Nitrates are at 0.0 and Phosphates at .07 (Hannah checkers). My Chaeto withered away and some Ulva I bought also dissolved in just a few weeks, but I keep getting hair algae all over the fuge chamber in the back. I've scraped it all out, and am adding new Chaeto this week and will see if I can get it to outcompete the nuisance algae. Lawnmower Blenny and Abalone also coming this week.

I use an AI Prime with the David Saxby profile. I have it dialled up to max because I have a Maxima Clam and a Bubble Tip Anemone in the tank so want goo strong lighting. The Maxima has grown substantially in the month and a half it's been in there. The Anemone was settled happily in the font of the rocks but I stupidly started futzing with the wavemakers and the changing flow pattern bothered it and it's been moving around the last few days looking for a new preferred spot.

nice!! ill look into getting this awc organised for sure!!
In regards to lighting when you say max what do you mean? 100% UV?

 

[Starganderfish]

nice!! ill look into getting this awc organised for sure!!
In regards to lighting when you say max what do you mean? 100% UV?

No, I just added the profile in the App (https://www.aquaillumination.com/signature_series/david-saxby and ran with it. Originally I shrunk it down a bit (pinching in the IOS App sometimes lets you "compress" the whole profile, reducing every channel equally, because I though it would be too powerful for a small tank, but with my Maxima needing strong light, I just left it as is. The only change I made was to drag the whole thing to the left in the timeline so it starts at 8am rather than starting to ramp up at about 10:30. I leave for work before nine so I need the lights on and the tank up and awake for their morning feed.
There's a bunch of cool profiles on the AI SIgnature Series page, so play around with them till you find one you like?