The koralia nano PH would a for a 6gal tank its small I have one in my sump to keep the water moving in there.

Grounding probe is not needed, get a GFCI plug or GFCI powerbar and you will be fine, the grounding probe will take any stray voltage you have in the tank and give it a path to ground which is great but IMO it hides the fact theres a problem, at least if a GFCI trips you know you have a problem. I just checked my tanks with my meter and one tank had 0.04V showing and the other had 0.02V all used equipment expect my power heads so personally for me with a combine total between my two 40gal tanks of 0.06V im not worried at all.

Live sand from the bag is like uncured rock , in the way that it contains dieoff, so this Alone is enough to start a cycle but nit enough to sustain a "bioload" or be a filter. Alot of people run barebottom tanks (no sand)

koralia nano is fine indeed but I don't like how it's one piece (mine is anyways) makes it hard to clean.

Refractometer over hydrometer , hydrometers are not accurate

To wash simply rinse with ro water,as your gonna have a cycle anyways you only want to remove the filth from it. I used a fine fishnet and buckets rinsed each netful a few times each.

good luck with the small sw system
i recently just set up a 2g fluval spec at work for a contest and its doing really well for such a small tank (even all the sps is doing awsome under the LEDs). Ive even been thinking about buying one for myself and putting a small zebra mantis in it.

that the ones at pisces pets?

@Magma Thanks. Is your Nano PH a specific model? I see the nano is available in a 240 or 425 gph.... guessing 425 would be way too strong for a small tank?
I figured the grounding probe was unneeded since I recently installed GFCI's but I thought I would ask.... thanks for confirming.

@reefwars How dirty is LS from the bag? Could I get away with dumping it in and filling the tank slowly? I imagine its going to make the tank cloudy either way just to different degrees?
Looking at the manual for the nano and under the maintenance heading it says that it can be disassembled as shown in figure 4 ... not sure how exactly but there must be a way.
Wow I didnt realize a refractometer was so expensive! $70 bucks is the cheapest one on Big Al online. I might just go with the hydrometer for now since its only $15

@AHhope same question as Magma... is it at Pisces? I saw the Specs there and they both looked great!

It's def cleaner but you should still rinse, after put your rock in and pour sand around . Pour water in slowly to create as little stir up as possible. I use plasic bags weighed down with plates or cups and once it's full just slowlyremove the weights and pull the bags out slowly:):)

actually... the plan for me was to put in the sand... fill with water and then go around and find some live rock somewhere... Might be a few days before I find chunks that are small enough and in a nice shape. I am still putting the finishing touches to the mods on my overflow and sump so it will be a few days still before I get to setting it up in its final spot.

Dont suppose there are any snails or other CUC that would be ok to put in right after putting in the live rock during the cycling period? Just curious because I would be a bit impatient having an empty tank and I know there might be boxing day sales coming up.

You might want to check the classifieds.
Key_Equine is just down in Bragg Creek and selling a reftractometer for $40.

You can add rock later it's jst most prefer to not havevthe sand under the Rock as alot of fish dig plus trapped ditrius.

Unfortunately no livestock during cycling alot of inverts are more sensitive to amonia than fish. :):)