Buddy Wants 10G Setup

[CSUPUEBLOTIM]

Okay guys,
I have a buddy of mine on staff with me at school here who is interested in setting up a saltwater tank. He was thinking of doing just LR for now with just some fish and purchasing coral later on. He already has a 10 gallon tank. Do you guys recommend just running a filtration and a power head, creating maybe a mini refugium, or hiding it all creating like chambers in the back? I was thinking for the power head like a maxi jet 800 (or equivalent) or one of the ones that goes back and forth to give a wave motion. I am still lost on lighting. May have to order a DIY kit online for some PC lighting since I can't think of anywhere locally to get the stuff. If you know of somewhere let me know. Maybe Home Depot or something. Any input or suggestions please let me know. Thanks in advance! I am off to bed I shouldn't be trying to type and think this late........

 

[thejrc]

There's mod's out there for the aquaclear filters (not really a mod persay, just removal of the media and bang instant fuge) as well as the hang on back aquafuges. I use a hang on back aquafuge on my 10 gallon experimental (currently set up as a macro tank) and it works wonders. I recently added an aquaclear 30 to help out with filtration (like I said experiment tank, odd stuff ends up in there) and between the two I get decent flow and the water looks great!

A 2.5 gallon aqiafuge on a 10 gallon tank helps, and since it's so small and slick looking I dont need to worry about hiding it, it simply looks good. The flow out of the thing isnt exactly wonderful or directed so I'd add a powerhead if your going to do corals in there but it's definately a nice solution. Unfortunately it's not large enough to hide any of the heaters I have in there but they do make heaters small enough. Pretty simple design using a maxijet in the main display to pump the water in and an overflow pipe in the fuge to dump water back into the tank so it's not going to break siphon or overflow easily like a different setup would. Just make sure the overflow exit doesnt get clogged.