Greg's 16 Nuvo Build

Greg's 6.6 Pico · Oct 23, 2017

Alright so this is my first real thread on here I tried dabbling over in the light thread to no real avail but here I go with a new one for my new tank. Now by no means is this my first tank, I started about 5 years ago with a 65 corner fish only tank and struggled through the experience. About two years ago I decided I'd get back into the hobby and I came back very small with a 6.6 gallon tank, this tank has done good by me but very recently the sand bed and rock have started to leech Phosphates so that brings us to where we are now.

I came across a good deal for a used IM Nuvo 16 that needed a good cleaning, I couldn't resist I've been itching to upgrade tanks for quite some time and at this price, it was a steal. As for a stand, I decided id build a custom bookshelf to hold the tank out of some 2x4s and some oak siding.

So the light is actually a big brand light that no one seems to use anymore. The light is called A1 Angle by (link no longer available) and it is very similar to a Hydra 26 by AI. It has 26 LEDs (all CREE except UV) with five controllable channels it comes in at 95 Watts and a max par around 600 give or take a little.

As for the shelf, it is a normal shelf from Lowes. All I did to modify the shelf is drill a hole to rout the wire through and add extra wall anchors (all that are included are two). the bracket is simple to use and I just added two eye bolts to the edge of the shelf to anchor the light.

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shaggydoo · Oct 24, 2017

Looks really good. I kinda want to start a nano again now

Greg's 6.6 Pico · Oct 24, 2017

shaggydoo said:
Looks really good. I kinda want to start a nano again now

I would never go back to a larger tank, Personally I enjoy the challenges of a smaller tank.

Lunar Mike · Oct 29, 2017

Nice, I got one recently and I'm new to saltwater. My light is a Kessil 150 ocean blue(maybe too blue). Looking forward to your updates, I'll post mine.

Greg's 6.6 Pico · Oct 30, 2017

Lunar Mike said:
Nice, I got one recently and I'm new to saltwater. My light is a Kessil 150 ocean blue(maybe too blue). Looking forward to your updates, I'll post mine.

I actually looked at getting one of these lights but I miss the control of other companies.

Greg's 6.6 Pico · Oct 31, 2017

So today I'm going to go ahead and give a small update, Its actually going to be quite large. The tank is done cycling and I have moved over the majority of my LPS I'm still not ready to start moving acro's yet as the water, in my opinion, is not ready. Now for the tank it's self, I have taken out one of the wavemakers but added a new return Pump, and I also added a skimmer.

I bought a Jebao 2000 which I know has had both good and bad reviews and for the most part, I can say that I like it so far. I'm running the pump between 60 and 70% I'm thinking about taking out my second wave pump the return seems to be so strong.

Now the story of the skimmer, for anyone with an IM tank please let me know what you're using as a skimmer. I searched long and hard to find a skimmer to fit in the rear chamber of this tank with a decent review and it was hard to find anything.

Now, most people with Nanos say oh skimmers are overrated and you don't need one... I beg to differ though I believe that a good skimmer is the best tool that could be used in this hobby. So after my little rant, I ended up with the IM Ghost Skimmer because it mainly fit in the back chamber and didn't need 1000 modifications to function semi-decently. Now by no means do I love this skimmer it has some major issues but they are tolerable, It skims decently but seems to be very wet, It also has to be kept on its lowest setting to function the way I like it too.

Most importantly this week I added my clean up crew which includes-
4 Blue leg hermits (more to come I want around 10)
3 Red/Brown Leg hermits
1 Scarlet hermit
3 Nassarius snails (I want about 5)
2 Margarita snails
1 Fighting Conch

kanders87 · Nov 12, 2017

Nice tank! Any updates or pics?

Zoaeasy · Nov 12, 2017

That was my first tank and loved it.

Greg's 6.6 Pico · Nov 29, 2017

kanders87 said:
Nice tank! Any updates or pics?

Sorry about the wait but it would seem that the holiday season is upon us and I got busy, The tank has had a few changes some major and others not so much.

To start off the two powerheads came out of the tank for a while then back in and then I decided I wanted a little upgrade so I bought an Aqamai Kps. Now there's not a lot of good reviews out there but this one from NanoReef.com is pretty darn good. although it doesn't have as much flow as I was expecting it was pretty darn good. And at $100 for black Friday I can't complain about the price. After about a week of operation, I believe I have got the scheduling down and I will be posting it in a picture soon.

On the other hand, I have had some MAJOR Algae issues my guess is because the rock was completely dry it had another mini cycle that caused a large number of algae. On top of that one of my previous frags had a small amount of byopsis algae growing on it, this small amount soon turned to a large and aggressive amount. I started dosing with hydrogen peroxide which helped slightly but Vibrant has seemed to help a lot, although in all honesty, my SPS have not been happy with the hydrogen peroxide dosing.

In the next few days, Ill be posting updated pictures of the tank and of the wavemaker settings.