Mavric’s 13.5g Nano Project

[Mavric]

Hey guys,

After having my tank setup and mature for a few weeks and doing various upgrades I thought I’d start a build thread. Nothing too crazy as I am still new to all this, but I felt having a journal would be a great motivator to keep going. This is a budget setup, as I have a baby coming in September and am using little bits of monies here and there to eventually get it to where I want.

Day one:

Fluval Evo 13.5 AIO. All stock. Just poured the sand in, placed the live rock randomly, and began the cycle.

Day two:

Did some aquascaping. Noticed there was some air trapped into the sand so I later combed it out. Still all stock.

(Fast forward 2 weeks)

Day 15:

Removed stock hood and light. Added a Wave Point 10k super blue LED ($70 from LFS) and a 240gph nano powerhead to help flow. I had my first fish, an ocellaris clownfish, that had died a few days after I put him in due to an infection after week one. I let the tank sit with just 2 turbos in it for a week. This weekend I’ve added 5 more turbos and a coral banded shrimp. He has been in since yesterday and is doing great. The live rock and sand is going through some different algae phases, adding some interesting color. The glass is riddled with GHA and copepods. Magnetic cleaner and refractometer should be here today, so will post a clean shot later. Also doing water change today but nitrates are still well under control.

Within the next week I am expecting an intank media basket with some filter floss, chemi pure blue and some purigen. Can’t wait to see how that does compared to the sponge filter I’m using now that came with the tank.

Future updates will be posted as separate threads! Thanks for looking!

 

[Dsnakes]

Nice looking nano Those turbos will likely be very hungry soon. I keep just 2 in my 20g. Im looking forward to following your build.

 

[SPR1968]

Great start so far as nice looking tank!

And welcome to R2R!

 

[Dennis McGrath]

Looks great. I think you'll be very happy with it. I've got the same tank but with a stock hood, and a Hydor 240 powerhead. I still have the sponge media in mine with the ceramic media that came with it, but instead of GAC, I'm using Purigen .

 

[Mavric]

6 days later update:

Took banded coral shrimp back to LFS and got credit towards whatever. Used it to grab a snowflake clown. Reason I did this is because the shrimp really wasn’t doing anything, and I know they can be aggressive towards other fish which is what I’m trying to avoid.

InTank media basket came after the holiday and I finally got to drop it in this morning. Filter floss in first chamber, two bags of chemi pure blue and the bag of fluval bio-max in the 2nd, and bio balls in the third with a final bag of purigen placed over the flow grate. Think I’m going to setup a refugium in the 2nd sump chamber but need to find a good grow light first. May just use light that came with the tank and tape it to the side or something.

Still having some GHA and some kind of white stringy stuff growing out of one of my live rocks. Going to watch it over weekend and see if the new filtration has any effect on this.

Oh! Also added a frag of frogspawn and what looks to be some type of zoa? Not sure on 2nd one, was a $10 frag at the LFS and looked cool enough. Both have been thriving really well!

 

[Mavric]

July 15th update:

Finally got a new light that I like. Adjustable channels and violets with a fan! Now I can actually do some fine tuning and get things where I need to be for better coral growth. This has made me a lot happier in general with the hobby which is much needed after a frustrating algae outbreak.

Moved the live rocks around and added a torch and armor of god coral. Everything currently seems very happy. Also adjusted the powerhead to oppose the return pump.

 

[Mavric]

Hey all!

Tank is two months old now, and is looking great! I've upgraded the lighting, filtration, and made lots of changes with the live rock. Got an outbreak of aiptasia so I introduced a peppermint shrimp and he's been doing his thing. Also decided that my single clownfish was getting kinda bored so I put in a yellow tail damselfish. They're about the same size and they have been doing just fine after about a week.

Next major upgrade will be an ATO. Not sure if I will build a DIY system or buy something outright. And once I accomplish that it's time to upgrade the return pump.

Did a water change yesterday and took some to get it tested. Turns out my refractometer I bought from Amazon was off about two ticks, causing my salinity to drop to about 1.022. No big deal. Brought it back up to where it should and my corals are looking happier again.

Not a huge update, but one worth sharing!