Nuvo 14 build.

[Reef.]

New stand is here...

 

[CrazyEyes]

Tank looks really great! I cannot recommend the RFGs enough, I don't want to thread jack but I saw you mention there wasn't too many 14g peninsula builds so just wanted to share a quick photo of mine.

 

[Reef.]

Tank looks really great! I cannot recommend the RFGs enough, I don't want to thread jack but I saw you mention there wasn't too many 14g peninsula builds so just wanted to share a quick photo of mine.

Yeah not many of us out there, more the merrier!

Wow you like your flow haha

 

[CrazyEyes]

Yeah not many of us out there, more the merrier!

Wow you like your flow haha

The acros love it! There's roughly 1,565 gallons of flow inside the tank.

 

[Reef.]

Little update.

tank is finally feeling like it’s nearly done cycling, start around 7 weeks ago, I guess it was cycled near enough straight away as I used Fritz bacteria but my nitrites were high, only over the last couple of days they have started to drop, today they are 2.5! I’m thinking by tomorrow they will be 0!

Going to buy a very small cuc next week, get some life in there! I’ll have to feed them as the tank is still clean, I’ve not been running the lights.

sad to say but I’ve given up on the Sicce return, I bought a 2nd one to see if it was any quieter but it wasn’t, I’m thinking the small chamber it’s in is not helping, going to try a IM mighty jet DC when I can get hold of one. Anyone tried this pump in a small aio! Are they quiet?

The money I’m spending on return pumps has been slightly off set with my ato reservoir, cost me all of £6, about $7.80

 

[Tahoe61]

I am very curious to see how the IM mighty jet works for you. I need more flow in my IM 14.
Congrats on getting through the cycle.
Now the fun starts.

 

[Bigbaby]

Digging the diy reservoir. It might be a hassle since itll bottom out even with good water volume in the reservoir, but I'm sure you'll manage. How loud was the noise? I went through quite a few return pumps too, but settled with the sicce as it was the quietest of the bunch, not necessarily quite. Lol hopefully the mighty jet works for you. Have you fiddled around with the electric cable? Sometimes when the pump gets loud, I used to tug slightly on the cable and it would get quieter.

 

[Reef.]

Digging the diy reservoir. It might be a hassle since itll bottom out even with good water volume in the reservoir, but I'm sure you'll manage. How loud was the noise? I went through quite a few return pumps too, but settled with the sicce as it was the quietest of the bunch, not necessarily quite. Lol hopefully the mighty jet works for you. Have you fiddled around with the electric cable? Sometimes when the pump gets loud, I used to tug slightly on the cable and it would get quieter.

Do you mean by bottoming out it could be bigger? It holds 9l, evaporation from the tank is around half a litre a day, I get a good 2 weeks out of it.

You’re good, you managed to suggest the one thing I’ve not tried...wiggling the cable lol...nope that didn’t work!
The noise is not overly loud by any means, it’s just slightly annoying, knowing others claim they have silent returns in the same tank as mine.

 

[Bigbaby]

2 weeks is way more than enough. I have a tall reservoir so it uses up most of the water before the alarm on the ato goes off whereas I would imagine a wide reservoir will have a bit more water volume leftover when the ato decides to warn you. It's no matter. 2 weeks is great. Loool yeah I wiggled away quite a few times but I dont do that anymore with the sicce. I think in my case the skimmer is louder than the return so its virtually silent to me lol.

 

[Bigbaby]

It most definitely wont be silent, but once the pump breaks in, you wouldn't be able to hear it unless you get real close to the tank.

 

[Reef.]

2 weeks is way more than enough. I have a tall reservoir so it uses up most of the water before the alarm on the ato goes off whereas I would imagine a wide reservoir will have a bit more water volume leftover when the ato decides to warn you. It's no matter. 2 weeks is great. Loool yeah I wiggled away quite a few times but I dont do that anymore with the sicce. I think in my case the skimmer is louder than the return so its virtually silent to me lol.

Not sure the Tunze has an audible warning, think it just stops pumping when empty? I’ll have to check that, the pump water inlet is under the base so there isn’t much water that goes unused, it does make my return seem quiet, it’s very loud when it goes off, only goes off a couple of times a day so not an issue really.

 

[Reef.]

Not much happening here but did get a new return, the noise on the Sicce was too much.

There are very few that fit the Nuvo, I wanted to try the IM mighty jet but it’s out of stock here, I couldn’t wait so picked up a Jecod Dc 1200, first day it had a loudish high pinched whine to it, so I tried it with a rubber mat under it and amazingly that has reduced the whine to next to nothing, it’s still not silent but near enough, the only noise now is a quiet powerhead type noise, much much less than the Sicce. That is on the lowest setting tho so not great but It’ll work for me, as I don’t need a big turnover as I have a mp10 in the tank.

So looks like the way to go at least for me is a DC pump (I can’t explain how some get the Sicce to be silent in the Nuvo tho, I could feel a lot of vibration from the Sicce), will still give the IM mighty jet a go when it’s back in stock, see if I can get rid of that last bit of noise.

 

[Reef.]

It’s even quieter, I can now hear the MP 10 rev up and down over the return, Fixed one issue now wondering why I paid £350 for a quiet drive powerhead that I can hear lol Good problem to have tho.

 

[Reef.]

Finally got some life in the tank, a pair of clowns and a cleaner shrimp, think I’m going to get another cleaner I think they really add to the tank.

Sorry about the bad picture, how you guys take such good pictures beats me, I promise tho I’ll try to get better at it.

 

[Reef.]

I can’t help myself I keep feeding the fish and cleaner, luckily the fish don’t seem to like the Vitalis pellets or flakes, well the pellets are hit and miss, sometimes they take the pellets other times they just look at them, the flakes they totally ignore, so I only feed frozen now, so hopefully that will keep the nutrients down with how much I feed.

nitrates around 15 and phos hard to tell with my salifert test kit but there is hardly a colour change so I’ll guess at .03, might try Elos phos test to see if it’s easier to read. A lot more expensive tho.

I have a Royal gramma on order, hopefully adding that in the next week, also ordered a Pom Pom crab and a couple of Nassarius snails, oh and I forgot I also have 2 trochus snails already in which are great, they are very active, weird as you never see them move but one minute they are there the next the other side of the tank!

water changes I have been doing 2 litres daily and 5 litres weekly, the weekly change is so I can vacuum the sand bed, took me a while to get the hang of it, with the tank being small, I had to make sure the water flow was real slow or I couldn’t finish the tank within the 5 litre change.

Really looking forward to getting my first coral, most probably will be a zoa, any recommendations for a small bright head zoa would be good.

 

[Tahoe61]

Looking very good.

For Zoanthids and Palys depends on your budget but some easily had Zoanthids that are not too expensive.

Rasta
Sunny D, caution they can take off
Bam Bam
Armor of God
Candy Apple Reds

 

[Reef.]

I am very curious to see how the IM mighty jet works for you. I need more flow in my IM 14.
Congrats on getting through the cycle.
Now the fun starts.

my LFS tells me there is a hold up with importing IM stock (it’s not because of Brixit lol) so another option is the Aqua Medic Dc runner 1.2, it’s listed as 12.5 length but I contacted Aqua Medic and they told me with the filter inlet cover removed it’s only 9.5cm, the space I have available is 10.5 so it should work.

 

[Reef.]

Looking very good.

For Zoanthids and Palys depends on your budget but some easily had Zoanthids that are not too expensive.

Rasta
Sunny D, caution they can take off
Bam Bam
Armor of God
Candy Apple Reds

the first 2 on your list I have seen and love so will look out for those in the shop, I’ll look up the others, I have also came across Mandarin orange which look good and what seems like an old classic the fruit loops!

budget wise I’m not too fussed as it’s a small tank so I don’t mind spending on higher end corals, so go crazy with the suggestions lol

 

[Tahoe61]

Oh I would definitely pick up some Mandarins. BoomCorals has them.

So many zoanthids to choose from. Zoanthids and Palys grow so fast.

 

[PR_nano]

Nice choice on first inhabitants, tank looks good. There are a ton of zoas options to add color to the reef. Like mentioned above there are some that grow faster than others.