Swiss Nano Project 20g (Red Sea Max)

[chipchipbro]

Hello from switzerland, R2R

First of all: Sorry for my bad london!

After 6 years without reef tank i've decided to give this great hobby a new go!
I am planning to build a more "minimalistic" nano reef tank with not that much rocks and mostly LPS. My plan is to add Euphillya and Acan as main corals...
However, I just bought a used Red Sea Max Nano which is a 20g "dice"

My plans so far is to build it this way:
- 5 kilogram of Aqua Medic finest coral sand
- starting with Microbe Lift Special blend and Nite-Out II
- using only carib sea live rock shapes (there is like no ok quality live-rock these days in switzerland); even a dealer confirmed that
How much kilograms would you guys use? it should look like a pillar with some tables in my thoughts.
- I will add a seperate Tunze 6040 controllable nano stream to have more flow
- I will also try to run this tank with manually dosing "ATI Nano Essentials" - any experience with that from one of you guys?
- Adding the water by using "ATI Absolute Ocean" and RODI water only

What do you guys think and do you maybe have ideas or thoughts you want to share? Maybe I forgot something necessary?

My stock plan is:
- 1 pair of normal clowns
- no idea what else (i want to keep bioload on the low)
IDEAS?

many thanks in advance forsharing your thoughts with me and helping me with ideas.

cheers and lots of love
Steven

 

[Quietman]

Welcome!

As for the Life Rock Shapes - I used them as well as was/am very satisfied.

Here's what I got in my 20lb box (about 9 kg).

I didn't end up using the bottom right piece long term in my RSR170 as it just took up too much room and impacted flow a bit. You can see the set up in my build thread to compare size of rocks in my tank.

Like that you're keeping bioload down. Not sure what to recommend as a pair of clowns will like stake out the entire 20g tank as territory. Maybe a blenny that stays on rocks or a sand based goby (YWG with shrimp is interesting and pretty tough as it didn't take any grief from my clown)

Good Luck!

 

[Sshannon]

- I will also try to run this tank with manually dosing "ATI Nano Essentials" - any experience with that from one of you guys?

I strongly recommend a dosing unit on any aquarium where you grow calciferous coral, both SPS and LPS. You can slowly add supplements over the course of a day, rather than manually adding the dose once a day.

However, I just bought a used Red Sea Max Nano which is a 20g "dice"

At 20 gallons, the possible ratio of evaporation to tank volume is quite high. Will you be filling the evaporated water manually or with an automatic top off unit?

 

[chipchipbro]

I strongly recommend a dosing unit on any aquarium where you grow calciferous coral, both SPS and LPS. You can slowly add supplements over the course of a day, rather than manually adding the dose once a day.


At 20 gallons, the possible ratio of evaporation to tank volume is quite high. Will you be filling the evaporated water manually or with an automatic top off unit?

I see the point of a dosing unit and i would also love to have one. Think I might upgrade to it when I have a chance. Somehow I dunno how this would look since the tank has no sump.

For evaporation the tank has a small automatic refill. I think the refill tank is like 2litres. Should be fine for about 3 days they say.

 

[dragon99]

Welcome back! I've had a Max Nano for a few years now and it's a great little tank.

4-5kg of rock is probably all you will need. I think I used 5 pieces of the life rock and one from an old tank and it feels a bit crowded.

I originally had 2 clarkii clowns and now I've got a pair of ocellaris clowns. I've tried other small fish (blennies, gobies, firefish) a few times but lost them for various reasons.

For dosing I recommend the Tropic Marin All For Reef because it only requires a single dosing pump.