Oasisreefling Posted December 27, 2019 Share Posted December 27, 2019 (edited) After a 6 year hiatus from reefing, I'm jumping back into it. I've been waiting for the day my tiny house is "done" and I could setup a 20gal but at this point I just need a tank I can pick up and move around. So after being gifted a fluval spec V from my pops this Thanksgiving I decided its time. I've still got all my equipment from the 75g display days so I'm using an aquacontroller jr to control heat and an ice probe chiller. My house can fluctuate from 60-90 degrees in extreme weather so I'm overkilling the temp control. The bottom of the stand is cutout for air flow and will sit up an inch. I used a thin piece of rock to give myself some hiding space for those items, the ice probe is drilled into the bottom of the tank. A chaeto fuge will fill in the rest of the back corner. Im big on refugiums. I once went 6 months without feeding my fish in my 75g my pod production was so good. I did culture and feed phytoplankton. Anyhow, my goal for this tank is to have an easy to maintain, stable, compact, aesthetically pleasing package for zoas and sps that I can transport across the country, as-is in 2 years. Edited December 27, 2019 by Oasisreefling 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
albertareef Posted December 27, 2019 Share Posted December 27, 2019 Good luck with the mini-build! Good planning can certainly help avoid a lot of pain down the road - sounds like you have it well thought out. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gumby Posted December 29, 2019 Share Posted December 29, 2019 Welcome back! You must have had a huge pod population! I will sign you for the new membership drawing. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oasisreefling Posted December 30, 2019 Author Share Posted December 30, 2019 On 12/28/2019 at 9:10 PM, Gumby said: Welcome back! You must have had a huge pod population! I will sign you for the new membership drawing. Membership draw? Sounds good, what is it? Lol I had a 40 gallon chaeto fuge and a 20 gallon green spotted puffer tank (which i did feed live guppies and mysis) in that system and a lightly stocked tank. You could net pods out of the fuge after shaking the chaeto. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oasisreefling Posted March 2, 2020 Author Share Posted March 2, 2020 (edited) Slow progress this month. Built this little fuge that snugs in behind my rock work. I'm currently flow testing with fresh water and really liking the circulation in the fuge. Not pictured is the hole where the sump pump outlet feeds into it. I installed a drain. Modified a 1/4 turn stop to accept a spigot handle. Added a quick connect at the end. Drilled the bottom. I might use the feed function on my controller for water changes or use a stand pipe to keep the heaters wet. We'll see how it shakes out. The dual 50w heaters are set in stages. I have a powerhead under the fuge and I need to find something that soft starts because my controller is so old it doesn't have that feature. I am using 1 minute oscillations and would like to use two pumps. I am hesitant to buy the Jebao RW4 due to a lot of premature failure reviews but I've been looking at it as an alternative to hidden power heads. I'm going to glue down a layer of sand methinks so i don't have to worry about that in respect to waterflow. Might even glue a rock to the back wall. Why not use all the real estate i can? I think I'm going to silicone off about half the overflow slots and make a filter sock bracket and use a HOB filter as the sock. 80gpm is just a silly little trickle across 4 inches of slots. Went to buy an Aquamaxx prism CC light and they're out of stock! Bummer! Hope it won't be long. Otherwise I'm open to suggestions, i have room left on the controller for multichannel lights, I just liked the ramp on/off feature of the aquamaxx. I thought about reworking my old T8 LED tubes but idk... I guess if I build a housing. Could hollow out some 5/4 mahogany. Edited March 2, 2020 by Oasisreefling 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oasisreefling Posted March 7, 2020 Author Share Posted March 7, 2020 In the spirit of using my miscellaneous random materials stash 🙃, I decided to bend some acrylic to make a hood for some dissected 12 year old LED tubes. Its just mocked up for now, needs work. 18w of 12kK and 18w of 16kK. No actinic. Just need some 18-3SJOW and a powerhead and its time to fill er up and start frag shopping! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oasisreefling Posted March 9, 2020 Author Share Posted March 9, 2020 (edited) That was a satisfying project. The smoked acrylic looks really cool with the lights on! Heat testing, might need vent holes. Sand is siliconed down with a bunch of loose on top. Anybody else keeping fish in a tank this small? Im thinking about it more than I should honestly. I wanna check my PAR first and see what kind of coral I reasonably could keep, I know if i try SPS then I won't have bio-room for fish. I'm worried that 36 watts is way too much though and don't wanna fry my first coral. Edited March 9, 2020 by Oasisreefling Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oasisreefling Posted March 13, 2020 Author Share Posted March 13, 2020 I think I need more head room. What do you guys think? I could run the rock through my tile saw and get another inch and a half off the bottom. Should I? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
techymechy Posted August 22, 2020 Share Posted August 22, 2020 That refugium is an excellent idea. How is it progressing? How is the chiller working for cooling your tank? Pleas take some pictures to show what your tank looks like now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oasisreefling Posted August 22, 2020 Author Share Posted August 22, 2020 14 hours ago, techymechy said: That refugium is an excellent idea. How is it progressing? How is the chiller working for cooling your tank? Pleas take some pictures to show what your tank looks like now. Well the fuge worked okay after the diatom uglies subsided. But the tank developed a leak (it was a used handme down) so i rebuilt it out of acrylic scraps i had lying around and turned it into a sump for an 8 gallon bow front. It still serves the function of being reasonably portable. Here's some pix. The sump is smoked bronze acrylic so when the light is on its not too bright at night. (Alternate photoperiod). The iceprobe works great! I've got two heaters (50 and 150) set in stages for the cold nights. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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