Tony's Nuvo 30G Long AIO

[Tony R.]

This is my first reef tank! She just turned 5 months old. A lot of members were asking for some pictures in the greeting forum so I obviously had to oblige! I truly appreciate the warm greetings and interest in the build!

I'm currently running a NUVO 30 gallon long All In One system with matching stand from Innovative Marine. The light is an Aqamai LRM. I'm currently running a HYDOR ATO with the Innovative Marine hydrofill pump and matching ATO return bracket. I immediately upgraded to the IM Mighty Jet for the added GPH and feeding pause mode benefit. For extra flow I also added two IM spin nozzles and an Aqamai KPM powerhead. For heating I'm running two 100W Cobalt Neotherm submersible heaters set at 74 and 78 degrees in the event of one falling. In terms of filtration I have removed the stock filter socks in favor of two custom caddy baskets. One running intank filter floss, ferric oxide, and chemipure blue. The other caddy is running filter floss and has chaeto refuge with its own IM Chaeto Algae light. All controlled by a Neptune Apex controller.

Out of all the inhabitants the fighting conch has got to be one of my favs. However, I love how the goby always looks like it just remembers it left the stove on at home.

I'm unsure of the best way to secure my two new (like yesterday new) corals to the rockwork so I'd love to hear advice on that and placement.

 

[ReeferReefer]

Can you tell me about your experience with the fuge light and running a fuge in the system?

 

[flchamp89]

Great Nuvo. Like the scape you have some interesting rock on the left side. Really clean for 5 months.

 

[samnaz]

Awesome scape. Reminds me a bit of planted scapes.

Following along looking forward to updates, I have a 30L too.

Ps welcome to R2R!

 

[Tony R.]

Can you tell me about your experience with the fuge light and running a fuge in the system?

The fuge light has ran really well and noticeably boost the chaeto growth. I run it on the "off" hours of the light. If you are really careful placing the fuge light (when you cut off the black rubbery backing to place the light) you hardly see it through the front of the tank. Some say the amount of Chaeto you can run in there is too small (about baseball sized) to actually make a big difference since its also stationary and not in a spinning reactor. I beg to differ, I think it increases pods as well as helps stabilize Ph. Though be careful Chaeto grows super quick and may interrupt water flow if not trimmed regularly. I nearly had an overflow due to the density. Post trimming expect some chaeto chunks getting blasted into the display but someone will eat it before its a problem.

I would recommend not going with the IM filter baskets and spending the extra coin for the In Tank ones. I think its well worth it. After installing the IM ones I found the Intank ones and squarely kicked myself in the butt about it. The IM ones are uneven, I have to put a suction cup behind them to press them forward into the overflow.

 

[Tony R.]

Great Nuvo. Like the scape you have some interesting rock on the left side. Really clean for 5 months.

Thank you! I had some serious battles with algae about one month ago all over the rock and sand bed. I had to vacuum out like half the sand. I changed where I was getting my RODI water from and did some aggressive water changes and cleaning schedules for a while along with cutting back the lights. I slowly introduced more lights and clean up crew and found a good balance of enough algae to feed everyone but not be overtly visible. My pistol shrimp really took care of the sand sifting problem if you didn't notice haha.

 

[Tony R.]

Awesome scape. Reminds me a bit of planted scapes.

Following along looking forward to updates, I have a 30L too.

Ps welcome to R2R!

Thanks! I checked out your build thread, I have been kicking myself in the butt for doing AIO. I really should have went for the NUVO EXT or similar.

 

[ReeferReefer]

Thanks! I checked out your build thread, I have been kicking myself in the butt for doing AIO. I really should have went for the NUVO EXT or similar.

An AIO is fine in this size. Obviously a sump gives you a lot more flexibility when it comes to equipment but the Nuvo 30L is still a great tank.

 

[Daniel91]

Great set up - following along.

 

[Whisnantrider]

How do you like the LRM light?

 

[Gusto]

great thread, is that the newer style top where you don't need the clear clips? If so how do you like it? I have to old style one and debating on either the newer style top or having a custom made one from safe top lids.. Thanks

 

[Whisnantrider]

great thread, is that the newer style top where you don't need the clear clips? If so how do you like it? I have to old style one and debating on either the newer style top or having a custom made one from safe top lids.. Thanks

I have the same top. It is great, no complaints at all.

 

[Gusto]

Thank you, I know IM has a DIY kit maybe I will consider that..

 

[Gusto]

I have the same top. It is great, no complaints at all.

Also went to your build thread.. beautiful tank..

 

[Tony R.]

great thread, is that the newer style top where you don't need the clear clips? If so how do you like it? I have to old style one and debating on either the newer style top or having a custom made one from safe top lids.. Thanks

This is the newer top that comes with the recent NUVO 30s no clips it just has notches that overhang and snag onto the frame. Very low profile.

 

[Tony R.]

How do you like the LRM light?

LRM light is pretty great. Looks gorgeous and seems to be strong enough for most softies and even my Tridacna clam. The fans took some time to stop making this nightmarish white noise haha. Its a good choice for the tank due to the weird 36inch footprint it has. I still wouldn't put light loving corals on the far edges of the tank but probably some lower light stuff. The interface is easy to connect (assuming you don't have the new Galaxy S10). The UI on the interface is sluggish and outdated but gets the job down and is great to set and forget.

It sure beats the price of buying something like TWO kessils ahha

 

[Gusto]

This is the newer top that comes with the recent NUVO 30s no clips it just has notches that overhang and snag onto the frame. Very low profile.

. Thank you, I might give the DIY version they sell a try instead of going the custom route.. I went custom with my 20 and I like it and I have feeding door on it but always seem to lift the whole screen up anyway due to trying to feed my clowns that are sometimes in the back.

 

[intricate_reefer]

Welcome to R2R really great seeing another 30L owner. Tank looks great, love the shrimp and goby pair. What are you plans for other fish and corals?

 

[LionfishMan]

Wow - great looking tank! Love your aqua scraping, and particularly like the clam... looks fantastic! Are they difficult to keep?

 

[Tony R.]

I got a LARGE tank update on my IM 30g long tank my friends. It hasn't all gone peachy I must admit but I'm finally getting back to a stable enough point where I can post here and update! So hold on to your hats okay!

February-April 2020: All was pretty normal I guess then I left to collect field specimens for my research and had my tank in minimal maintenance mode for a month and returned to a complete take over of GHA! The GHA was proliferating and dying so quickly it must have just destroyed the water chemistry and killed dozens of corals and even a fish.

When I came home I was pretty sure I was going to just throw the dang thing out but instead I opted for the scorched earth policy and wait and see what I could manage. Since I had high surface area ceramic bricks in the sump area and wasn't too worried about biological filtration deficits, I went nuclear and removed all of the afflicted rocks. I then did a large water change every other day until I replaced the total volume. From here, I put in clean dry rock I had from other projects and dumped a bottle of Frtiz bacteria start in so the fish and shrimp wouldn't be too freaky. I chiseled what corals I could salvage and placed them on a plastic frag rack just to see if anybody could survive. This was on March 4th. The following photos are what was left!

All in all the purge of rocks went alright and was surprised to see the surviving corals rebounding. Slowly however I could see that sparse GHA and more abundant diatoms/dinos were encroaching onto the new tank real estate. At this point seeing the brown goop overtake the tank I was really ready to just quit. So I had one more last ditch effort and went super crazy and broke down everything and cleaned it ALL. I vacuumed out the old sand bed and replaced with CaribSea coarse sand and replaced all the temporary rocks with CaribSea Liferock. (Both of which I rinsed for hours on end with hose water then subsequently with RODI water prior to adding). I then dumped in some more Fritz bacteria and essentially didn't touch anything for quite a while until maybe April. To my surprise all of the non-coral critters actually did survive (even a few corals) which was amazing and quite a nice surprise.

April-May 2020: Here's what the initial change over was looking like. A lot cleaner still some dinos and "like new" tank syndrome as I refer to it. I really dig the coarser sand and I used my acquired practical reefing knowledge to make a more functional rockscape. In the spirit of slash and burn I cut my GSP in half to get rid of any gunk on it and also took bone sheers to my pipe organ coral to remove and GHA nested in between the grooves. I also chunked a good portion of the monti for the same reason. From my dino paranoia I also eliminated the cluster of chaeto in my mini refugium.

May 2020:

Return Pump
The tank was looking up and I realized running it a little dirty was actually helping to eliminate the dinos. Seeing a cleaner tank inspired me to sink some time and money into further automating and improving the tank. I replaced the crappy IM Mightyjet pump with the Reef Octopus Varios-2 which I dial comically down with the apex VDM module. The plumbing for the Reef Octopus pump was kind of annoying but in general I purchased a Y barb fitting that had 2x 1/2inch outlets and 1x 3/4 inch inlet. I then used the two 1/2 outlets to connect to the bulkhead outputs of the stock IM 30 and connected the 3/4 inch inlet to the stock barbed Reef Octopus output. It was a pain in the butt since the barbed output did actually taper to 3/4 inch but it would make the connection so tall that it was out of the water in the AIO sump region, therefore I had to ream the 3/4 inch tubing using hot water and a ring mandrel to fit properly and maintain a lower profile. Now the tank has phenomenal flow and is very very quiet.

ATO
I replaced my Hydor ATO sensor and IM hydrofill pump combo with the Apex ATKv2 topoff. Working well so far barring some minor inconveniences. For instance I had to remove the float valve fail safe which I wasn't too happy about. Not only did I lose the fail-safe but removing their float valve system made is so the water from the ATO pmup pump would literally shoot to the CEILING. So I removed the designated port and output connections from the ATK bracket and salvaged my old IM hydrofill bracket pictured here, I reamed a 1/2 inch tube to completely engulf the pmup output and connected it to the IM bracket. The bracket has numerous siphon breaks and also eliminates the messy splashing of the refilling. I was still not happy about losing the fail-safe on the ATK bracket so I used the now vacant hole to add an additional optical sensor as an emergency shutoff so now their is three sensors on the bracket (plus one in the ATO reservoir).

Protein Skimmer & UV bulb
As I single handily keep Innovative Marine in business I purchased their NuvoSkim DC protein skimmer which fits into the AIO rear chamber beautifully and is plug and play. At first the NOISE WAS INSANE, like hear it through the walls insane but it broke in and started skimming in a day or two. No complaints yet here. I also have the Innovative marine universal 10W UV bulb and pump going at very slow circulation speed.

Replaced IM Spinstreams
As much as I loved watching snails go for a ride I couldn't handle how often they would get stuck so I replaced it with two RFG nozzles and the necessary locline drop adapter for IM tanks. My new pump can EASILY handle running two of these badboys.

Replaced IM Media Baskets
The media baskets and their wonky tilts were bothering me so I switched for the much tighter fitting InTank media baskets.

June 2020: Photo updates!

Finally the tank is looking like something to be proud of again!

DOS Auto Water Change
The present project (like today) is plumbing a DOS for autowater changes. Since its an AIO and in a corner of a home office on a second floor it is quite the challenge to plumb efficiently. Currently my idea is to drop a line into the garage where I will have my mixing station and my drain will be plumbed directly out the window closest to the tank into a trough which will guide the water to an abused patch of cement/dirt in the backyard where there are some native halotolerant plants.

Thank you for reading all of this if you made it until the end! Please let me know if you have questions!