Setting up a new tank, some questions

[Ben1]

The new tank is just going to be a little nano for my bedroom. I am thinking of doing acans on the bottom and SPS up top or maybe all SPS.

The tank is 18 x 18 x 18 frameless cube.

I have a 1/10 hp chiller, heater, already.

I ordered a Warner Marine H1 HOT skimmer. I am thinking of running a carbon reactor, I have a deltec one in storage, inline with the chiller with either GAC/GFO or NP biopellets in it.

I am using a ceramic rock I bought from the alternative reef that will fill the tank and look nice, I have some live sand in a small AIO tank I am breaking down I am going to move over to help cycle the tank a bit.

As far as lighting goes I am a bit unsure, I looked into a Prebuilt LED fixture from http://www.reefledlights.com/

I also bought a JBJ ATO unit, and plan to have it pull from a 5 gal tank that will be RO/DI, kalk.

Heatsink Size: 16" X 8.46
Number of Heatsinks: 1
Total Number of LED's for Build : 24
Number of CREE XR-E Q5 Cool White 3W LED's: 12
Number of CREE XR-E Royal Blue 3W LED's: 12
Number of CREE XP-G R5 Cool White 3W :
Optics: 60º
Driver: Non-Dimable
Driver Enclosure: Yes
Cooling: 2 fan with power supply

Came out to $291.40 I am asking how much more to make it dimmable.

I was also considering a 12" 1x90W AquaIllumination Modular LED Light System w/ Controller

That cost $629.00 from Premium Aquatics. I love the fact that those are completely controllable as far as independently controlling the power to the blue and white LED's, ramp up for sunrise and sunset, and do an automatic 29 day moon light cycle. The cost difference I don't love, especially since this is for such a small tank that was really being set up just for a fun little system.

The cost difference between those lighting options is pretty big. Any other ideas on lighting this tank, it's a pretty small tank. I thought about ledios but read the heat sink might not be good enough to make them last long term.

As far as water movement is concerned I am in between a Tunze 6055 and 7091 single controller and a vortech mp10es. Since this tank is going to be in my bedroom, and I like it silent at night I am going to need the least noisy option. I have a bunch of vortechs on my big tank, and know they are not as silent running as tunzes so am leaning towards the tunze but the new controllers with the ES make the vortech tempting. Anyone running a MP10 know is they are as loud as the MP40's?

Also since the tank will have no sump, the heater, skimmer input/output, and chiller feed pump will sit in the tank. To me this is ugly, I asked Matt what they use for back drops in the aquarium displays and he told me Kydex 0.125". I would like to do something like a kydex sheet to hide the equipment and allow me to easily pull the backdrop out and wash it down. I would also stick the vortech/tunze behind the backdrop and make a cut out for the nozzle. The tank is going to be on my desk in the corner so the kydex would cover the back and right sides with hopefully not losing much space in the display area. Anyone know where I can buy a cheap 32" x 18" sheet of kydex? Or another suitable material?

Thanks
Ben

 

[Ben1]

FWIW I got my ceramic rock in today from the alternative reef. It looks awesome, I post some pictures when my battery charges.

I also ordered the Aqua Illumination 12" fixture. Its the new version with LED'd that supposidly last up to 10 yrs, I am a bit doubtful of that but w/e. It is B/O'd though for 4 weeks so I will be waiting on it.

The Warner Marine H1 is B/O'd untill June also so I have to wait for that as well.

In the mean time I am looking for a used 6055 and 7091 Tunze.

I still havent been able to source a small piece of Kydex either.

 

[Anonymous]

FWIW I got my ceramic rock in today from the alternative reef. It looks awesome, I post some pictures when my battery charges.

I'd be interested in seeing the pics when you get'em up. Dry rock seems to have come a ways from the last time I had a reef going.

 

[Ben1]

Here's the pics of the rock. It is completely hollow but very strong. It isn't too heavy either and the texture is real nice. It has swim troughs and nice spots for coral all over. Its much nicer then the pics show and I think will look fantastic in the tank. I was thinking of putting it in my big tank for a few weeks to get the coralline growing but then remembered my aiptasia and majanos lol.

 

[Anonymous]

That's a beautifully shaped rock. But am I right in thinking that man-made rock doesn't have the same biofiltering capabilities that live rock does?

 

[Ben1]

That's a beautifully shaped rock. But am I right in thinking that man-made rock doesn't have the same biofiltering capabilities that live rock does?

I think it will be just as good, it is very porous. I do expect it to take around 6 months to really get the coralline growth going where LR might be coated much faster. Being ceramic its much lighter then the solid cement man made rocks I have had in the past.

I also picked up 500ml of warner marines new EcoBak and plan to utilize it on this tank. They are selling it direct with no label right now until they get it to retailers. I noticed vertex also came out with a version of these solid vodka method pellets, they seem to be catching on.

 

[Anonymous]

That's a beautifully shaped rock. But am I right in thinking that man-made rock doesn't have the same biofiltering capabilities that live rock does?

As far as anyone can reasonably tell, they do. At least they do enough to get the job done; it's hard to quantify how much live rock is actually needed in a tank for biofiltering, but we all pretty much know it's much, much less than the standard 1.5 lbs per gallon rule of thumb that's always thrown around.

 

[Anonymous]

The closest they have here seems to be concrete based, put in the sea for a while until it gets covered in coralline and various marine life and then brought to the surface again. I'm struggling to see how that would work, though the ceramic rock above does seem possibly effective.

 

[Ben1]

Tom do you guys have a lot of the mame reef company's stuff available? Seems like a real cool Japanese based reef company.

 

[Anonymous]

MMMMM....rice!



Oh yeah nice rock! :wink:

 

[Anonymous]

Tom do you guys have a lot of the mame reef company's stuff available? Seems like a real cool Japanese based reef company.

If it's the same company I'm thinking of, then yes, it's available here. Mostly aimed at nanos I think and pretty pricey. Well, certainly their new LED fixture is - about $1300 for a fixture suitable for a 24" aquarium.

On the other hand, they also do a protein skimmer for nanos which runs only to about $90, but looks fairly rudimentary to me (if beautiful to look at), as it's powered by a wooden airstone venturi by the looks of things.

 

[Ben1]

Yeah that them Tom. They got some neat products, they have a HOT overflow made of hand blown glass that self recovers its siphon if it is lost. I think that skimmer is mostly hand blown glass too. Not that I would use glass overflows or skimmers but they do seem to be an innovative company.

 

[Anonymous]

It's a completely different type of company to that seen outside Japan maybe. Their line of glass overflows etc makes me think they're the saltwater equivalent of ADA - very pretty and very pricey. I'm sure they work pretty well, but I'm not convinced that the price is worth paying. Kind of a bit like ELOS that way too - very pretty, very pricey, but how effective? No-one's who's spent that much on something wants to admit something else half the price works as well!

 

[Anonymous]

It's a completely different type of company to that seen outside Japan maybe. Their line of glass overflows etc makes me think they're the saltwater equivalent of ADA - very pretty and very pricey.

Yeah, that was my first thought as well. ADA seems to be trying to break into saltwater, but only in a very small and piecemeal way. These guys seem to be jumping into the niche headfirst.

I'm sure they work pretty well, but I'm not convinced that the price is worth paying. Kind of a bit like ELOS that way too - very pretty, very pricey, but how effective? No-one's who's spent that much on something wants to admit something else half the price works as well!

Well of course. As an ADA junkie - and someone who plans to buy an elos mini just as soon as the new stuff from interzoo hits the market - I'll be the first to say you'll get no increase in performance with glass lilly pipes over plastic, or stainless steel canister filters over eheims, etc etc. Something else a tenth the price will probably work just as well. But what you're paying for with ADA, with Elos, and presumedly with this other japanese company mentioned here is aesthetics; stuff that looks elegant instead of industrial, that your non aquarium hobby friends won't think is an eyesore that detracts from the attractiveness of your tank itself.

Is it essential? No. Is it more useful? No. Does anyone need it? No. It's strictly for making components that are useful, that are essential, that are needed look damn good while they're at it

 

[Anonymous]

I'd buy it if I could afford it. :wink:

 

[fishrule]

That is really cool looking rock. This is the first I've seen of it. I might look into putting that in my tank. It would be nice to have something different then the traditional live rock.

 

[Ben1]

Thanks! I put it in my new cube over the weekend. I added sand from an established tank I broke down and threw my pair of maroon clowns in there. The female maroon is a full grown large female and she can hide deep inside the rock to the point it looks like no fish are even in the tank. Its weird looking in there and seeing nothing and then having this big fish pop out of no where. I threw an old remora HOT skimmer, and 70 watt HQI MH on the tank I had in the closet as well until my other gear shows up. I also have a koralia 4 in the closet (as well as 4 other koralias lol) I threw on the tank till my tunze gets here. The background is still ugly though with the skimmer pump, soon to be also a chiller pump, heater, cables from the powerhead, and the ATO sensor. If I cant find a piece of kydex I think I might just order some black acrylic and make an internal backdrop to stick it that will allow me to hide the gear, and have the tunze's nozzle sticking through so that the inlet pulls from behind the acylic, and water from the surface overflows through teeth into the backdrop so I dont get a surface slick and my skimmer can dump into the back area so the microbubbles stay out of the display area. I have the router, weldon, and needle applicator to make one and it would be cheaper then the kydex but would be a bigger pain to take out to clean.

 

[Ben1]

I gave up on the kydex background since I couldn't find the right size cheap enough. I bought a sheet of black acrylic and made a background from that with a little internal box to hide the pumps and stuff. I also got 2 tunze 6055's and put them in there. I got a sand storm though from the tunzes pulling sand under the backdrop and shooting it back out. I am going to seal the backdrop in with silicon but thats gonna cause me a bit of grief draining the tank again to seal it. I also am waiting on the skimmer and light still and the skimmer I am currently using dumps a ton of micro-bubbles back in the tank so I cant wait to get rid of it. The tunzes are also run on two separate 7091 single controllers, and I might sell the two single controllers and buy a multicontroller. The JBJ ATO has been

Once I get the new skimmer and light, all the gear will be hidden and the tank will look seamless, have nice random flow, good lighting, plenlty of skimming. What more could you ask for. The tanks looking like its going to be strictly SPS.