new idea....10 gallon nano...

[Paul_MTS]

So it seems i had to put the idea of my last tank down due to cost so now i have a spare 10gallon 24x12x12 i was thinking of giving a nano tank a go.

so few questions to get started...

could i just use T5's on it?
what would my choice of fish be?
if i used a powerhead to pump water throguh some UGJ's what other filtration would I need? maybe just a small HOB, i can only get Ehiem ones.
if I can find a place to drill it or a find a drill bit I might drill the tank and wack a sump underneath- i understand this would help greatly.
oh and how much live rock?

my local supplied charges £14.95 a KG and says it's Grade A...don't know origin.

I'ved read alot of the pinned topics I'll scan over them again to extract of the infomation goodness!!

any help much apriciated.

 

[sammydee]

Ok, I'll try and answer some of your questions:

could i just use T5's on it?

Yup, T5s are an excellent choice. Depending on what (if any) corals you want, your lighting requirements would change. You would need maybe 30 watts for FOWLR, 70 watts for softies and perhaps 120 watts for hard corals, maybe a little less.

what would my choice of fish be?

Your choice of fish is restricted, but there is still a wide choice. You could get gobies or blennies in there, clownfish or maybe a six line wrasse. I would stay away from damsels as they are pretty vicious.

if i used a powerhead to pump water throguh some UGJ's what other filtration would I need?

UGJ isn't really necessary. What you need is 100-200 GPH of flow from powerheads and 20lbs (10kg) or more of live rock. Live rock acts as your filter. £14.95 is very expensive, try and see if you can get uncured. It should be more like £10 a kilo.

if I can find a place to drill it or a find a drill bit I might drill the tank and wack a sump underneath- i understand this would help greatly.

Yes that would help a lot by increasing water volume and giving you a bigger saftely margin if anything goes wrong. Also it gives you a place to hide heaters, skimmers (if you have one), macro algae, DSB or whatever.

Do a search on google for any of those things like live rock, goby or whatever and you will get thousands of results. Or do a search on reefcentral or here and have a look.

 

[Paul_MTS]

cheers sammy,

so I'm aiming for 70w to grow a couple of corals.

my main interest would be to have a fire goby/fish? and a percula clown, after that anyone else that can join the party is great.

Ok, so If I get a pump rated for 1000lph to power the sump that should do it fine. I thought it sounded alot, I know there's another place that does marine so I'll give them a bell, does anyone know if Sea pets sell live rock....or if i should even trust there stuff?

seeing as it's only a small tank i don't mind playing around with it either, so I can break it a few times!!

 

[Ed4567]

If the pump is being used to run the sump make sure you tanke account of the head pressure when calculating its flow rate.

 

[parker313]

Hey, a firefish and a perc for a nano is a *great* idea B)

 

[Paul_MTS]

yep have done, 200gph converts as about 950.

so a pump rated at 1000lph will probable be a bit under that and shouldn't slow it down to much on the return so i should get about 850lph return after all that which is 185GPH.

Hey, a firefish and a perc for a nano is a *great* idea

is that sarcasm or is that fine??

and if it is fine is there any one else I could add?

 

[parker313]

No, it is fine, I was just saying it like that b/c that's what I've got in my nano

You *could* add another very small fish, like a goby but you'd have to keep a close eye on water parameters. I added my green clown goby by accident (long story) but so far everything is fine. My perc is still very small and the goby only gets to 1.5" so the bioload in my tank is still pretty low. I've got a skimmer on my tank even though it's not necessary for a 10g, *just in case*.

 

[Paul_MTS]

ah ha, couldn't be sure when you put the great in ****!!

having the larger volume withy a sump should beable to enable me to add another goby like yours safely right?

I reakon I'll add mineral mud then there is no need for a skimmer even if it was a bigger system...i think i'ved read this right else where?

oh and what would water change duties on there be like? if it's not too much too often I could probable scrounge some RO water from a guy at work

 

[parker313]

Navarre's the expert on mud systems, so I'll defer to him on that one

Yes, with a sump, a goby should be just fine, a clown goby of any color, neon goby or there are a couple others that stay 2" or less. Gobies and clowns are good nano fish b/c they aren't big swimmers. They pretty much just pick one part of the tank and hang out there.

In my 10g, I change out 20% once every 2wks. I get pre-mixed SW from the lfs b/c it's such a small amount. I also get RO from them for topoffs, and go through about a gallon in between water changes. So, 3 gallons total for 2wks isn't bad.

 

[Paul_MTS]

sounds all good!!

3 gallons is nothing! how long can you store salty ro water for?

once I'ved paid for everything on my new tank I'll have to get going on this!!

oh just been told it's 12.5UK gals and 15US gals.

 

[parker313]

3 gallons is nothing! how long can you store salty ro water for?

I don't know what the official word is, but I would imagine you could keep it for quite a while, especially if it were capped off (I use gallon milk jugs) to protect from evaporation and contamination....

 

[Navarre]

Mud systems can be ran skimmerless.

The jury is still out whether its bettr to run a skimmer with it.

 

[Paul_MTS]

lol, whats the biggest tank you don't need to run a skimmer on? (usually!)

also would i actually beable to find a skimmer to fit in somewhere!!??

I saw a auction on ebay for a tank that had been drilled and instead of having a weir the water overflowed straight into a pipe that went up from the bulk head, sounds like a good idea to me to reduce space being taken up!!.

also what media apart from mud would i use in the sump? mechanical with some sponges, a few litres of bio logical media??

 

[sammydee]

Nah, you've missed the point about the filtration. Mechanical is fine as long as you rinse it thoroughly with tap water - you don't want it catching dirt and becoming a nitrate factory. But you DON'T need additional biological media. The point is that you use your lie rock as filtration. The live rock has anaerobic bacteria within it that process the nitrates into harmless nitrogen gas.

You do not need a skimmer as long as you do regular water changes IMHO. I did a lot of reading up about skimmers and as long as you have a reasonable amount of live rock and a DSB or Denitrator or similar to convert nitrates into nitrogen gas, you should be ok with weekly or bo-weekly water changes. Another option is to turn your sump into a refugium with plants growing there that will take nitrates and phosphates etc out of the water.

so a pump rated at 1000lph will probable be a bit under that and shouldn't slow it down to much on the return so i should get about 850lph return after all that which is 185GPH.

Yup that should be fine, plenty of circulation with that. I'm using 450 GPH on my twenty gallon.

I saw a auction on ebay for a tank that had been drilled and instead of having a weir the water overflowed straight into a pipe that went up from the bulk head, sounds like a good idea to me to reduce space being taken up!!.

Do you mean an overflow box? I think it is a very good idea to have a sump, maybe with a DSB in it, to boost your water volume and to have a place to hide heaters, skimmers etc.

 

[Paul_MTS]

Yeah I realise LR is the main filtration, but apart from the tank mechanics what else do i stick in there!!

Problem of being a nitrate factory can easily be solved by having a couple of sponges above water level.

Yeah I'ved seen alot of ebay auctions for mangroves to stick in a sum p to grow with a bit of light and there nitrate reducing qualities, sounds like a nice simple idea to fill thre sump out a bit more.

Oh the auction they didn't have a overflow box or wier. The tank was drilled then straight out of the hole was a piece of pipe which the water would of overflowed into, this seems a good idea for smaller tanks.

I'm considering going a 24x15x15 which would be a 25gallon.

oh and DSB???