Foxy Brown
New member
Hi All,
This is mostly for me to keep a log and get advice as I go. I have been planning on a much more complex system, but due to the economic issues of the moment, it's on an indefinite hold. So, I'm trying to shrink those ideas down to size I CAN afford. Not everything will work, but I'll try my best.
Here's my starting point:
and from the side:
(hope those aren't too huge).
I
The tank comes from Petco near my home in Northeast PA. Dimensions are 12x12x24 (I think, haven't measured) = 15 gallons. I bought this because it fits well on my desk while still giving some volume to work with, and becuase I really liked to hood for DIY potential. There's about 3" of fine grade aragonite in the bottom (also from Petco) and about 8lbs of very nice open live rock from my favorite LFS (though still not a great one, but most around here make me feel sorry for the fish). I think I might go back and get more (maybe 15lbs total) if I can find some pieces I like (thinking of a cave and/or overhang).
The filter is a small HOB that came with the tank, and the powerheads you can see are a pair of 12V Koralia nano's. They are currently running from a custom driver instead of the Koralia one that cost me only about $50 (you can see that running in the lower left).
The light is also custom LED. The LEDs are 2x 10W white (6700K but look a lot cooler to my eyes), 1x 10W 445nm, 2x 3W 470nm and 2x3W 670nm all from SatisLED.com. I really like the color so far, but not much more than white sand to look at yet. The driver is currently also from SatisLED, but I'm swapping it out for an ELN-60-48D, which I will dim using the same controller as the the pumps are using now (plus a low pass RC filter to get 1-10V DC from a PWM signal). The heat sink is from RapidLED.com (4.25" x 9"). It gets definitely warm but not crazy hot (with LEDs on at full power)... thinking about adding a fan though anyway. I will try to get some shots of the hood modifications tomorrow. The hood came with a nice diffuser. It actually gives glimmer lines, but the color mixing is great and there's only 1 spot on the rocks where I see any separation between colors at all. They don't add much heat to the water, which runs at about 68F with the heater off (my office is always freezing).
The last bit of equipment I would like to add is an HOB refugium, but it needs to be custom job to fit this tank and I'm terrible at acrylic fab. Dimensions should be 12x4x18 or so. I'm looking to squeeze in a counter-current air driven skimmer going all the way up one side of it (say 4x4x18), with a rock rubble cryptic zone on the bottom of the other side and a reverse cycle cheato zone on top of that. Probably a small area for carbon floss or GFO. Would an 8x4x6 inch mud zone do any good? (guessing no)
Flow rate would be slow - probably from a small pump in the display and overflowing back in so I can breed some 'pods, but air pump for skimmer would be run by SSR so it can be switched off except when needed. Anyone know of a place I could get the acrylic made to spec? Otherwise I'll have to make a ugly mess myself.
Livestock for now is just 5 each of Cerith and Nerite snails. Will likely add some Trochus or Strombus as well as a few Nassarus to this. Other inverts to include a few scarlet reef hermits, a skunk cleaner shrimp and a peppermint shrimp, and maybe one day - a crocea clam! I plan to add a min-n-match from IPSF with small inverts (britsle worms, micro serpent stars, grammarus, mysids, etc.) when I get the 'fuge running. (No real signs of life from the sand after 2 months now). For the nearly inevitable hair algae outbreak, I'm planning on 1 or 2 lettuce nudis. These have worked well for me in the past and are great fun to watch.
Fish I have in mind are a Tanaka's pygmy or Pink-streaked possum wrasse, for control of pyramellids and flatworms, and a yellow watchman / Pistol shrimp pair. I would like to add an upper-level fish like maybe a chromis or maybe a back and white occy... just not decided on that one yet, but would love suggestions. (Seahorses ?!?!?). Might be able to squeeze in a blue neon goby too, but I'm worried about bio-load. Not sure yet on corals... wish I could find a nano-anemone (to go with the clown) but I've never heard of one small enough. I have heard they will sometimes host corals though.
Well that's it for now. Comments welcome.
This is mostly for me to keep a log and get advice as I go. I have been planning on a much more complex system, but due to the economic issues of the moment, it's on an indefinite hold. So, I'm trying to shrink those ideas down to size I CAN afford. Not everything will work, but I'll try my best.
Here's my starting point:
and from the side:
(hope those aren't too huge).
I
The tank comes from Petco near my home in Northeast PA. Dimensions are 12x12x24 (I think, haven't measured) = 15 gallons. I bought this because it fits well on my desk while still giving some volume to work with, and becuase I really liked to hood for DIY potential. There's about 3" of fine grade aragonite in the bottom (also from Petco) and about 8lbs of very nice open live rock from my favorite LFS (though still not a great one, but most around here make me feel sorry for the fish). I think I might go back and get more (maybe 15lbs total) if I can find some pieces I like (thinking of a cave and/or overhang).
The filter is a small HOB that came with the tank, and the powerheads you can see are a pair of 12V Koralia nano's. They are currently running from a custom driver instead of the Koralia one that cost me only about $50 (you can see that running in the lower left).
The light is also custom LED. The LEDs are 2x 10W white (6700K but look a lot cooler to my eyes), 1x 10W 445nm, 2x 3W 470nm and 2x3W 670nm all from SatisLED.com. I really like the color so far, but not much more than white sand to look at yet. The driver is currently also from SatisLED, but I'm swapping it out for an ELN-60-48D, which I will dim using the same controller as the the pumps are using now (plus a low pass RC filter to get 1-10V DC from a PWM signal). The heat sink is from RapidLED.com (4.25" x 9"). It gets definitely warm but not crazy hot (with LEDs on at full power)... thinking about adding a fan though anyway. I will try to get some shots of the hood modifications tomorrow. The hood came with a nice diffuser. It actually gives glimmer lines, but the color mixing is great and there's only 1 spot on the rocks where I see any separation between colors at all. They don't add much heat to the water, which runs at about 68F with the heater off (my office is always freezing).
The last bit of equipment I would like to add is an HOB refugium, but it needs to be custom job to fit this tank and I'm terrible at acrylic fab. Dimensions should be 12x4x18 or so. I'm looking to squeeze in a counter-current air driven skimmer going all the way up one side of it (say 4x4x18), with a rock rubble cryptic zone on the bottom of the other side and a reverse cycle cheato zone on top of that. Probably a small area for carbon floss or GFO. Would an 8x4x6 inch mud zone do any good? (guessing no)
Flow rate would be slow - probably from a small pump in the display and overflowing back in so I can breed some 'pods, but air pump for skimmer would be run by SSR so it can be switched off except when needed. Anyone know of a place I could get the acrylic made to spec? Otherwise I'll have to make a ugly mess myself.
Livestock for now is just 5 each of Cerith and Nerite snails. Will likely add some Trochus or Strombus as well as a few Nassarus to this. Other inverts to include a few scarlet reef hermits, a skunk cleaner shrimp and a peppermint shrimp, and maybe one day - a crocea clam! I plan to add a min-n-match from IPSF with small inverts (britsle worms, micro serpent stars, grammarus, mysids, etc.) when I get the 'fuge running. (No real signs of life from the sand after 2 months now). For the nearly inevitable hair algae outbreak, I'm planning on 1 or 2 lettuce nudis. These have worked well for me in the past and are great fun to watch.
Fish I have in mind are a Tanaka's pygmy or Pink-streaked possum wrasse, for control of pyramellids and flatworms, and a yellow watchman / Pistol shrimp pair. I would like to add an upper-level fish like maybe a chromis or maybe a back and white occy... just not decided on that one yet, but would love suggestions. (Seahorses ?!?!?). Might be able to squeeze in a blue neon goby too, but I'm worried about bio-load. Not sure yet on corals... wish I could find a nano-anemone (to go with the clown) but I've never heard of one small enough. I have heard they will sometimes host corals though.
Well that's it for now. Comments welcome.
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