New tank Build, Innovative Marine 30L

Hugo Garcia · Jan 10, 2018

Hey guys, how is it going? I’m here to share my new tank, I’ve upgraded from a DIY 20 gallon petco tank with a HOB to an Innovative Marine 30L. I had to upgrade the pump to a Sicce 2.0 because the pump it came with was broken during shipping. I have a Tunze 9001 Skimmer, that is not working well, if anyone have any tips on it please share them. I’ve added a quart of marine pure sphiers to the back, using custom caddy and the innovative marine media. Also ruining the desktop reactor with GFO. The light is one Kessil A80 Tuna Blue, thinking on adding one more. For the substrate and rocks I’ve used live sand and some of the sand I had on the previous tank. And used all the live rock/dry rock and added another pice. Right now I have 2 clowns, 1 spotted goby, 7 hermit crabs and 4 Trouchas Snails.

Looking forward to adding a refugium light and some clean Chaeto soon.

Please give me your feed back and suggestions for upgrades.

Also, I plan on getting a Mandarin at some point in the future.

Thanks,

Hugo Garcia

Best Fish-Jake · Jan 10, 2018

Love these tanks! Mine's been running for just over 2 years now and I couldn't ask for anything easier to maintain. I run an IM Aqua Gadget SkimMate Skimmer in the back left chamber (you'll have microbubbles for the first month or so), Matrix in the second chamber on the left, and I transformed both back right chambers into a refugium with LR and caulerpa (my fuge light is just a 3W red Solar Flare). For flow, I have two Voyager Nanos along with the included~450gph return pump.
I also rigged up some sponges on the top of the innermost baffles for some mechanical filtration.

Jack Eskay · Jan 10, 2018

Awesome tank man, looking forward to following along! Looks like you got a pretty good plan set up so far. Also don’t mean to disappoint but your going to need a much larger and established tank to keep a mandarin. Unless you get them eating prepared foods their diet is specifically pods the grow in your tank. They can unfortunately wipe our the population in a tank your size in a matter of days. I made that same mistake in my 40. The only you could manage is if your personally buy or growing pods and adding them every week or so. Good luck!

JBKReef · May 21, 2018

Things look very sleek. Did you add that second A80? I'm planning through a nano build right now, and I have 2 A80's on a 20 long as it is, so its tough for me to choose which tank to get.