Is This Setup Ok ?

[psycho-killer]

i there all, i plunged into the art of nano tanks and its great fun,heres my setup pls tell me if i need to do anything.

i have a 65 Liter tank (18 us gallon) i have 6kg of crushed coral in there and 5kg of live rock (getting more this weekend) i have a 200 watt heater in and also a 900L/H canister filter with the normal filter media inside (spunge like,should i take it out ) will that provide enough flow ? should i also run it on with the bubbles or off ? my salanity and temp is fine.i have a white 15watt light and 1 blue 15 watt light how should i run them ? depending on readings i might add some cleaners this weekend...

also i havnt had any algae outbreaks...

 

[psycho-killer]

ok, i have done water tests quickly and here it is, any help will be appreciated...

SG 1020
Temp 29 C
PH 8.5
Amonia 2.0
Nitrite 2.0-2.5
nitrate 50

my tank is 2 days old..

 

[xxBarneyxx]

SG is a little low, other then that looks like it is cycling pretty much as expected. Nitrate seem a little high maybe for 2 days but haven't cycled a SW tank yet so this is probably normal.

Algae wont kicked in until the 2nd or 3rd week. You might want to consider either using a chemical filter media to remove nitrate or doing water changes to keep it down (this should reduce any algae outbreaks while it cycles).

 

[SkiFletch]

Sounds like significant dieoff there. Be prepared to do a 100% water change once the ammonia goes away to get the nitrates back down

 

[Musho3210]

i there all, i plunged into the art of nano tanks and its great fun,heres my setup pls tell me if i need to do anything.

i have a 65 Liter tank (18 us gallon) i have 6kg of crushed coral in there and 5kg of live rock (getting more this weekend) i have a 200 watt heater in and also a 900L/H canister filter with the normal filter media inside (spunge like,should i take it out ) will that provide enough flow ? should i also run it on with the bubbles or off ? my salanity and temp is fine.i have a white 15watt light and 1 blue 15 watt light how should i run them ? depending on readings i might add some cleaners this weekend...

also i havnt had any algae outbreaks...

Are you using tap water? That high nitrate could be coming from tap water. Sponge in the canister and crushed coral may contribute to nitrate but thats more in the long term not short term. With media in that canister filter it wont run 900lph, my rena XP3 says 350 gph without media and 187 with media. So i guess half yours (450lph) and add a bit (500lph) So to say it on the safe side you have about 500lph coming out of your canister. You can always check it with a flow rate meter. Bubbles may hurt some organisms in the tank so i wouldnt run bubbles. What do you mean by cleaners? You may want to take out the sponge in the canister and take out the crushed coral in your tank. Put some purigen and/or chemi-pure and/or activated carbon and/or rowaphos or phosban or similar phosphate removal products in your canister. You could also put some live rock rubble but i wouldnt, seems like a waste IMO. Is your canister filter clear?

Heres a nice light schedule:

Actinic bulb (blue light) on for an hour
white and actinic light on for 8 hours
actinic light on for one more hour
moonlights or no lights

So 10 hours of actinic and 8 hours of white. It will give you a nice dawn dusk effect. You wont be able to keep much corals in there though although mushrooms or zoas or other softies may work, maybe an lps, heck ive seen some people put sps corals in 9 watt tanks (dont know if it suceeded). But dont expect to put much corals at the bottom of the tank.

 

[psycho-killer]

hi,so if i understand correctly when the ammonia is 0 i need to do a 100% water change?

 

[Musho3210]

when both ammonia AND nitrite are at 0

 

[psycho-killer]

ok, skifletch said complete die off ? will my live rock be ok ?

im bought a hang on filter with chemical biological filtration that im gona use and then take out the filter medium in my canister filter. Hopefully this can speedup the process.

i wanted to put in a cleanup crew at the weekend seems that is not gona happen.. just one thing i want to mention, after i did the diy lighting there was electricity that was conducted in my water it gave me a little shock and i fixed the problem,im just worried that my live rock is now dead rock ?

thanks for the help,im so eager to get past the cycling...

 

[psycho-killer]

ok,i have ditched the hang on thing it sucks,bought a 1200L double canister and used the one canister with the normal sponge in it then the other i modified with wool and activated charcoal... the flow rate is 1200 litres an hour that should be suffiecient ?

 

[Musho3210]

i really doubt you killed your live rock.... so dont worry about that. I wouldnt really recommend wool or sponges or bio media in reef tanks. They can become nitrate factories (they dont complete the whole nitrogen cycle, they stop at nitrates and dont move on to nitrogen gas).