Nuvo 10 desktop reboot. Third now Fourth time is a charm

[btmedic04]

Hey folks, this will be the third time in the past 15 months that I have set up this tank. The first tear down was when I combined everything into my 40b build (which will be getting a massive update to my thread soon.)

The second time I set it up as a little frag tank but tore it down again and moved everything to a 20L. Now that MTS has set in, the third reimagining will be a desktop tank.

With that said, I want this to be as low maintenance as possible and have ordered my equipment accordingly.

Nuvo 10
Auto aqua smart ATO micro
IM mightyjet 326
Vivid aquatic 1/2 RFG with IM to locline adapter
50w ehiem thermocontrol-e
Kessil A80 with timer
Magnetic thermometer
10lb fiji pink sand
10lb Marco reef saver rock
Fritz turbo start

I'm primarily planning on softies with a few pieces of LPS for lots of movement but we'll play it by ear. Fish and invert stocking is as follows;

Tanaka's pigmy possum wrasse (arrived today and will be in QT until the tank is ready)
Tailspot blenny (who will go through the same QT procedure)
5 trochus snails (arrived today, currently in 40b refugium)
6 astrea snails (arrived today currently in 40b refugium)
4-6 nassarius snails (when required)
Maybe a cleaner or fire shrimp. We shall see

Desktop location

Snails enjoying refugium algae

Tanaka's pigmy wrasse receiving an education

Proper quarantine is a must in this hobby

 

[Peace River]

It looks like you have a lot of good equipment coming! I also have a IM 10g as part of my MTS collection so I am interested to see how this tank develops. Good luck!

 

[btmedic04]

It looks like you have a lot of good equipment coming! I also have a IM 10g as part of my MTS collection so I am interested to see how this tank develops. Good luck!

Thanks Peace River! I'm excited for this build. I wanted to keep the display clean by not having a powerhead so hopefully the mighty jet and rfg work well enough and I wanted to remove the temptation of keeping sticks and associated dosing pumps by choosing the Kessil A80.

 

[Peace River]

Thanks Peace River! I'm excited for this build. I wanted to keep the display clean by not having a powerhead so hopefully the mighty jet and rfg work well enough and I wanted to remove the temptation of keeping sticks and associated dosing pumps by choosing the Kessil A80.

I'm curious if the Mighty Jet 326 and RFG will be too much even if the pump is turned down based on some of the feedback that I have read. I do have RFGs on other tanks and like the random flow of the water. My IM 10g is mostly stock at the moment and have been considering similar upgrade, but leaning toward one of the small Sicce pumps because of the power of the 326. Let us know what you experience - good luck!

 

[btmedic04]

I'll definitely let you know how it works out with the mighty jet and rfg.

Goodies arrived today for the most part. I'm waiting on my fritz turbo start to arrive but I may get some from my lfs tomorrow. Also BRS sent the 19mm adapter instead of the 16mm so I'll have to call them monday to get that squared away. In the meantime I have the stock nozzle and a spinstream to play with. Let the aquascaping commence!

 

[btmedic04]

Aquascape attempt 1. Thoughts?

 

[Peace River]

There appears to be good platforms to put corals and some decent hiding spots/caves for small fish to hide in. The visual part is really your personal preference. Additionally, it is hard to tell how far away from the sides that the rock is, but you will want to make sure that you have room to clean the glass all of the way around.

 

[btmedic04]

There appears to be good platforms to put corals and some decent hiding spots/caves for small fish to hide in. The visual part is really your personal preference. Additionally, it is hard to tell how far away from the sides that the rock is, but you will want to make sure that you have room to clean the glass all of the way around.

Awesome, thanks! Also thank you for the reminder to check how much space I have between the glass and rock. Just did a quick check and it looks like I have between 1/4 to 3/8 of space between my rocks and flipper nano and the glass. I wont be able to really use any other algae scraper though because overall I have maybe half an inch of clearance on the left and maybe 3 quarters on the right

 

[btmedic04]

I just finished securing the aquascape with nyos reef cement. This stuff takes some getting used to but seems to be pretty secure. I found wetting my fingers before picking up the putty ball gave me a little more time to play with it before it set. We'll see how it holds up in saltwater.

Speaking of saltwater, I'll be mixing some and getting this tank wet tonight.

Lastly, I'm not too impressed with kessils gooseneck for this light. It's not flexible enough to get the light where I want it and theres no adjustment to correct the location of the light other than tightening it down and twisting the gooseneck until the light is close to level. AI definitely has a better gooseneck for those who are curious.

Heres the current state of everything

 

[Peace River]

Take your time but I look forward to watching this tank mature!

 

[CubanB]

Following this build. I have this tank in the closet in my fish room. In the past the most success I've had with this tank is growing copious algae. I wish you luck and can't wait to see it running.

 

[btmedic04]

Thanks peace and Cuban for following along!

After initial set up things are going to slow way down while it cycles. I personally believe it is our first responsibility to ensure the critters under our care have healthy conditions and long happy lives.

Here's my last pic of this tank when it was a bedroom nano to tide everyone over!

 

[btmedic04]

We have water now and things have cleared since last night. My initial impressions with the mighty jet are this thing puts out a lot of flow with the stock outlet. There's more than enough to remove the need for an in display powerhead. Fiji pink is just borderline with this combo as there are always shifting grains, but not enough to create a bare spot. It also has a pulse mode which you cant change the intensity, but you can increase or decrease the length of the pulse. I'll have to play with it some more once my rfg adapter comes in. Lastly, when I first started it, was quite a bit louder than my sicce 0.5. It seems to have quieted down a bit overnight but we'll see if it reduces further once it's broken in.

I am now able to say that I've seen the kessil shimmer and wow what a difference it is. So far i like 40% color at 100% intensity but I'm going to withhold judgement until I get corals in here.

That's all for now folks. I'm off to the LFS to pick up some Fritz Turbostart to begin the cycle.

 

[btmedic04]

I added the Fritz turbo start and dosed my tank with ammonium chloride to 2ppm yesterday at about 3pm. As of right now at a little before 1, the tank has dropped the ammonia to between 0.25 to 0.5 ppm ammonia and registers 2ppm of nitrite. I didn't bother testing nitrates as I didnt think it would process this quick based off of my past experiences with Dr Tim's and biospira. Going forward, it's going to be Fritz for sure!

 

[btmedic04]

Tested tonight, the ammonia was gone. However nitrites haven't moved much. I did add a pinch of flake food however to keep the bacteria fed and not overload nitrites too fast.

I also got my seneye in the tank and took some par measurements. Everything from the sandbed to the top of the rocks is between 80-150 par at 25% color, 100% intensity. This will be perfect for the corals I intend to stock in this tank.

Lastly out of curiosity, I checked my big 3 and found my alk was 6.5, cal 440 and mag at 1420. I dosed my alk back up to 8.2 last night and checked again today and it's at 7.2. Not sure what's going on. Maybe some of it is binding to the rocks or sand? Anyone have any insight?

 

[btmedic04]

I'm still waiting for BRS to send the right adapter. They sent another 19mm. Turns out they were right next to each other on the rack, so they moved one to another isle to prevent future mix ups.

What really surprised how fast this fritz turbo start has worked. As of right now I'm testing 0 ammonia and .25 nitrites and have been feeding the tank daily.

We also have diatoms starting to pop up in the rock and sand bed. That coupled with an emerald crab in my 40b sump who ate 3 of my 5 trochus snails prompted me to move the remaining trochus and astrea snails over. I've also added algaebarn ecopods to the system to get that population started.

Nothing else to report. Just waiting on my Tanaka's to finish QT before moving it over and getting fish in

 

[btmedic04]

Today I recieved the correct 16mm adaptor and added a single link of loc-line and the rfg. Even with the mightyjet turned to its lowest level, it was creating a dune with the fiji pink sand. I have 10lb of special grade that I took from this system last year when i broke it down that I rinsed and let dry, so I added 2 handfuls to the low spot and it has allowed me to run pulse mode at 2.7. The special grade still shifts a bit but nowhere near as much as the fiji pink. I'm gonna let it run overnight and see how things look tomorrow. If I need to add a 2nd loc-line link to help with reducing dune creation, I will.

Testing today showed 0 ammonia and .25 nitrites and the diatoms are kicking into high gear. Were just about ready for critters!

 

[btmedic04]

24 hours into having the correct adaptor and it's already broken. I was trying to take off the locline to add a second link and a perfect ring came off of the adaptor. I can still attach locline to it, but it's a huge pain.

Disgusted and angry, I threw on my old spinstream and noticed immediately that my sand was no longer being blown into dunes even at max speed. I think I'm going to stick with this for the build as I know it will eventually quiet down. If this tank ever gets rebooted into a bare bottom sps build, the rfg will go back on.

In other news, a local guy who normally travels with the frag swaps posted some really good deals on corals due to all shows currently being cancelled so I stopped by and picked up 4 zoa frags, an octospawn, 2 hammers and some sort of hybrid euphillia that kind of looks like a cristata/frogspawn for less than $300. He even threw in some mtsis shrimp that were living in his system for my fuge on my 40b. All corals are currently residing in my 40 until this tank is ready for them and ill post pics tomorrow when everything opens up

 

[btmedic04]

Heres a quick video of the mysis shrimp being acclimated

 

[btmedic04]

As promised, heres some pictures of this tanks future corals

Octospawn

Hammers

Cristata hybrid?

This cristata (was told it's a torch)

Zoas