Off the Wagon - New Nano
 

So to prevent further withdrawals I setup a little nano, thought I'd post some pics for some feedback.

It's a modified Fluval Edge with a small sump and Cree LED lighting. The vase next to the tank serves as the top off container which is gravity fed into the sump.

Just starting out so not too much livestock yet.

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6423.jpg


http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6425.jpg


http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6426.jpg


http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6429.jpg

That's a great clean looking nano! How many watts are the Cree's and any idea on stocking yet?

That would make for one heck of a zoa garden, great top down view on it.

awesome nano. i'm totally loving the ato! did you diy the LEDs?

You really do have your own way man. I can't pin it down but I really like whatever it is you do. Can't wait to see how this develops. What are your real plans for the next tank?

i want to see the sump set-up:mrgreen:

Thanks. The leds are 3W a piece, there are 6 of them all together, 3 white, 3 blue.
Yeah some zoas would be sweet! You got any for me :wink:

Yes, its a kit from rapidled mounted on a chunk of aluminium flat bar with an acrylic shield.

Thanks man, I try. :mrgreen:
When we buy a house I'll setup my 100 gallon again and probably stick with the same type of livestock as before. We also want a larger fish only but that'll depend on the house. Right now we're just renting a condo so this little nano is hopefully going to hold me over for a few more months.

Well I'm running out of room in the zoa tank so a frag snipping will be coming up shortly, I will certainly shoot you a PM when there done up.

Very eloquent! I like it. I agree, some zoas would look killer in there.

LOVE seeing the Edge done like this! It's a great little tank, and it looks amazing as a saltie!! Nicely done

Nothing special so don't get your hopes up, the combination of all my tools being in storage and blowing most of the budget on the stand made me have to improvise on some details.

The sump consists of a fluval 304 which holds the various media and is drilled in the base and plumbed into a recycling bin which holds some more rock, heater, return pump and float valve.
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6433.jpg

Also I just want to say thanks to Jay for his help on a couple things that made putting this together a lot easier and cheaper. Cheers!

Please do!

very nice set up if the misses seen that tank she would love it she loves the edge and wanted to start one too.i was just on rapidled's site earlier and i want to order one of their led kits was it hard to set up and customize??

I was wondering when we'd see a tank thread from you! :p

Looks great Steve! :cool:

I thought at first it was dangerously full but then I realized these edge tanks have tops. :lol: How easy is it to keep the glass clean?

Pretty easy, I just use the small magfloat, works nicely, even on the top. However If at some point I have to get in there with my hand and scrap some edges or hard spots it'll probably suck the big one but at least it's small.

well, i am impressed! looks amazing. can you explain the canister filter...i mean why not just overflow into the bin and return pump back out? i have never used a canister filter so not sure how they work. how is the tank itself plumbed? did you drill and put in bulkheads?

The canister filter has three trays inside stacked on top of each other. I feed the water from the overflow directly down into these trays which hold my filter floss, carbon and some bio-media. This was easier for me than trying to build such trays or chambers into a sump. It also keeps the majority of water noise and humidity to a minimum as it’s all contained within the seal canister filter. I drilled a hole and installed a bulkhead in the base of the canister to convert it into a wet-dry system which typically wouldn’t be ideal for saltwater but in nanos I believe it can be good. A bulkhead is also installed in the lower side of the sump to connect to the canister drain. This drain puts less back pressure on the overflow compared to trying to feed the output out of the top of the canister and into the sump. The sump is now free of micro bubbles and most of the clutter so it holds the return pump, heater and float valve easily. I’ve also placed some live rock in the sump for added bio-media in the more conventional saltwater way.

I did have to make some changes to the canister filter to make this work for me, besides installing a bulkhead in the base I also opened up the water entrance (which is actually the stock water output) by removing the impeller assembly and drilling out any major obstructions, this way a clog is less likely and it handles the gravity feed flow much better. I also made a simple baffle to keep bubbles in the canister and out of the sump.

Looks great... I built an edge with an over flow, 6gal sump and led's, but just some plug and play led's using the edge fixture, mine are not as bright as those cree's though...The nicest thing about the sump is you never get any bubbles trapped under the glass :biggrin:

Got any pics of the lights?

Yeah not getting those annoying bubbles is key to this tank, although I still get a few from time to time but they are easily removed with regular cleaning. However I think the best feature gained by adding the sump and overflow is that the tank doesn't overflow when you put your hand in it, the stock tank is pretty freaking stupid for this reason.

I'll post a pic of the light fixture tonight.

Nice tank! Great corals. ;-) Is that a bit of blue cloves you got from me? Looks like it, the cloves are ok but it has that weedy caulerpa on it too. I would pull that out immediately and toss it in the trash. You do not want that particular weed in this small tank. Only a foxface or something big will mow that weed down and it will fill your tank up. Unless of course it runs out of food or iron perhaps? To be safe I would pull it.

I should be able to give you a bit of cloves sans weeds if you like.

Yeah I was thinking about doing that, if you have some more that would be great. Let me know.
Thanks

I went and looked in the display and I am sure I can get you a clean hunk of cloves. Later in the week or on the weekend I will be around.

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6435.jpg

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a1...e/DSC_6436.jpg

1/2" x 8" x 4" aluminium flat bar
6 LEDS, no optics
Aluminum screen frame used to hold 1/8" acrylic shield

LEDs are a little beat up as I ran them without the shield for few days. Runs a little warn so I'll probably add some fins when I get a chance.

So you figure this tank is too small for a ghost ribbon eel? Good or bad idea?
I had one before, pretty sure they're blind and wouldn't really notice, just swam around in circles before anyway or just hung out in the overflow box :wink:

welcome to the fluval nano nation, that tank is gorgeous, u did the light mod amazing dude, and chance you could post or pm me detailed info on how you did your plumbing and ATO, i wanna redoo my edge with better plumbing, and did u just order all your lighting from cree.com?

I've attached a quick sketch of the plumbing/overflow. I simply used 1/2" PVC to get the job done. I drilled three holes in the back piece of acrylic just big enough for 1/2" PVC pipe to slide through. For the drains I used a Tee and a cut off piece from an elbow to sandwich outside the acrylic. The return is simply a 90 and a 45 sandwich. The fittings where glued in place and silicone was used to seal around the hole.

The two drain tees simply act as standpipes preventing siphon, they are tee'd together to a single drain line.

Personally I don't think this is the best way to go, if I could have I would have just notched the back acrylic piece and added an external overflow in a more traditional manor. However I went this route purely for the ease of doing it in my current situation.

The LEDs were ordered as a kit from RapidLED
Here's a link

how long did it take to get the leds delivered??

3 Weeks with USPS priority, originally tracking stated an estimated delivery of 3 days but shipping with USPS over the border always gives random results. Sometimes things only take a few days other times a few weeks. They did ship it the day after I placed the order though.

Any thoughts?

I thought you were kidding at first. :p What are the dimensions of the tank? I was under the impression it was really tiny. I have no experience with ribbon eels but I thought it was still true that these guys still have a very high mortality in the hobby. If you've had one before then you know the score with them better than I do.

Myself having tried a different species of eel (golden dwarf in my case) in both a small setup and a larger setup, the one in the smaller tank wasn't quite as comfortable in his surroundings as the one in my cube tank. For an animal which you can tell is functionally blind at the best of times, he's surprisingly spatially aware.

So anyhow I would probably steer myself away from a ribbon eel at the best of times never mind one a nano, but what I know is only based on hearsay, and I do remember that you had one before and was able to train him onto food.

White/ghost ribbon eels aren't traditional ribbon eels like the blue and black ones. They are easy to keep and very hardy. It is a recommended fish for nanos but yeah mine is pretty small at around 16x10x10. They usually tend to like small spaces and the one I previously had seemed to prefer the tiny overflow box over the 50 gallon tank it was in. I personally think it will be just fine but I'm worried about getting harassment from certain people if I later post pics of it in my setup, then again what do I care :twised:

Interesting, I didn't know that about them being a recommended livestock for nanos.

Doing some reading right now - Pseudechidna brummeri? Interesting stuff. Ok so I see they are totally different than the traditional "ribbon" eels - that face is distinctively moray looking for one.

Only thing is that it looks like they get to 40" ? If that's the case it seems that eventually you'll need him a bigger home but seems to me if you could find one small enough that it would probably do OK for at least a little while. As long as you have the escape routes sealed up, I'd be worried about him snaking his way down to the Fluval?

Dumb question maybe but how easy is it to open the tank up for feeding and so on? Not too bad?

I'm not sure I've ever seen one offered up around here. (Not that I've been looking though.)

Yeah they can get long but stay super skinny.

Opening the tank for feeding is easy, top lifts right off and light fixture can be easily moved.

Of course you'll get harassed! ;) We all get harassed for something at some point... :lol:

Very true

My personal thoughts...bad idea. Too much bioload when it gets bigger, and even though they have weird habits, I think a 16" tank is just kinda mean. Personally, I think most fish do better with stimuli...like other fish in the tank. They tend to be more active and eat better. For that reason, I would choose several small fish to put in that tank instead. What about a pair of Griessinger Gobies, and maybe a few Panda Gobies if you think you can get them eating...? Or a trio Threadfin Cardinals instead of the Pandas? Cardinals might eat the Griessinger's.

To be honest at this point I've already talked myself into it :mrgreen:
I'm not worried too much about bio-load, I do have over 10 gallons of volume with enough bio-media for a tank much larger, plus I do weekly changes of close to 40%. If I do find its too cramped for him I can always find him a new home and try something else. I just want something different, gobies just seem too ordinary for me even if they are more rare. The eel is also low maintenance which is key for me.

appreciate the info bro, i went out today and bought a fluval 105, didnt wanna waste the money on a 305, should do the same thing, my tank is already running lol so this might be a little trickier but ill prolly be asking you more lol, you drilled the bottom of the filter? so that drains into a sump/refigium, then what did u do for the return? its the single line in the middle of the acrylic i assume. do you have another pump in the "sump" or did u utalise the filter some how...

i got a question lemmie know what you think, can you not just seperate the 2 sections from eachother (silicone or something) and drill 2 holes in the bottom, so it drains down one straight into the sump, then the side with the impeller sucks water back up from the sump into the tank through the media filter stuff........essentially using the filter as a overflow and pump all in one.......

Nice!
 

I have to say.... one of the nicest nanos I have seen in a long time!

Those Edge tanks have a great look!

Any new update pics?