My waterbox 10

[Jem45472]

Haven't been here in a while. After having a few failed attempts at a reef in the past, I decided to really try to make things hard on myself with the smallest tank yet. I started with a biocube a bunch of years ago, moved up to a 125, then back to a 25 gallon drop off tank. Failed pretty miserably in all these attempts, except for excellent algae growth.

Fast forward a bunch of years and I thought I'd give this one more try. I've learned to be a bit more patient, and to be diligent with my husbandry.

I no longer have much room left, and decided on another nano, the waterbox 10. (Very nice little aquarium)

I started this back in January and don't know why I didn't start a build thread, so here it is- a little late.

 

[Jem45472]

Parts delivery.
Nf-1 skimmer
Aquamai kps wavemaker
Prime 16hd
Jbj nano ato

 

[Jem45472]

Had an apex in the past, and sold it. This is going to be a simpler, more hands on approach. A simple on/off solution for equipment.

 

[Jem45472]

Aquascaping with 2 little fishes "stax" base rock.

 

[Staghorn]

Looking good so far. Do your water changes and you will have success. Looking forward to updates.

 

[Staghorn]

Btw. If you can get your hands on a nice chunk of live rock you should put it in there for your initial cycle. You could always take it out later down the road. But it will help allot with getting that tank up and running sooner.

 

[Jem45472]

Rock and water in.

 

[Jem45472]

Btw. If you can get your hands on a nice chunk of live rock you should put it in there for your initial cycle. You could always take it out later down the road. But it will help allot with getting that tank up and running sooner.

I'm a bit further along, as I'm starting this thread late. Started cycling this tank in January. Gotta cut the grass, then I should have this thread up to date a little later.

 

[Jem45472]

Tank running for about 4 days and I decided to try something different than my last attempts.

Added biospira at 3 times recommended dosage and added fish.

Wow, was this easy! Measured the slightest bit of ammonia for 1 day, then non existent after that.

 

[Jem45472]

Testing the aquamai.


At the time, the nero3 was unavailable, but the little kps is more than up to the task.

 

[Sarcazian]

Very pretty tank and I hope this one goes better for you. I just picked up a used 28.2 that I am getting cleaned up and re-caulked today.

One comment, I was curious your need for the skimmer on a 10G? I run my Evo 13.5 without a skimmer and it has been up since just before the new year. I feed pretty heavy and I only have glass and sand algae and no skimmer.

I do weekly WC's though as an export mechanism.

 

[Jem45472]

Disaster hits. This is going about as well as the last attempts. The wavemaker exposed a silicone flaw after tanks been running fine. Now I have a leaky, cycling tank with a fish in it.

Waterbox was great to deal with. Sent them a picture, and they sent me out a new aquarium.

 

[Jem45472]

Very pretty tank and I hope this one goes better for you. I just picked up a used 28.2 that I am getting cleaned up and re-caulked today.

One comment, I was curious your need for the skimmer on a 10G? I run my Evo 13.5 without a skimmer and it has been up since just before the new year. I feed pretty heavy and I only have glass and sand algae and no skimmer.

I do weekly WC's though as an export mechanism.

Was actually thinking of going skimmer less but decided if I can find one that fits, it wouldn't hurt.

The nf-1 just fits, is silent, and does an excellent job.

 

[Jem45472]

Added a DD jump guard pro.

Also moved some furniture around to move the tank away from the window. Having it in the window was the best area for us, but was an invitation for heat, and algae problems.

 

[Jem45472]

Middle of winter and I let the tank mature for several months. Running lights off, and I dose a capful of microbacter7, and microbacter clean with each weekly water change.

Nothing to do now but wait, so I kept myself busy with another project. Built myself a race, and flight simulator for when I get bored. This things a trip, and incredibly realistic while in virtual reality.

And the daughter giving it a test go.
I found out sim racing is definitely no cheaper than reefing.

 

[Jem45472]

This brings us pretty much up do date now. Tanks been running for 6 months. Decided to try my hand at a mixed reef, mainly lps/sps dominant. If I'm going to go out, it might as well be with a bang.

Ordered a kamoer x1 pro doser, and going to dose tropic marin's "all for reef"

I knew before hand the doser was finicky with WiFi setup. I'm using a couple routers for my vr setup, one is 5g only, the other is 2.4g only. I had zero issues getting the doser setup, and was done within minutes.

 

[Jem45472]

Time to give it a go!
Added corals about a week ago!
Full tank shots are a pain.

 

[Jem45472]

That brings us to now. Things appear to be going well so far. Not knowing better, I have been using reef crystals, and while I've been researching dosing, decided I want to switch to a salt that mixes to the parameters I want to maintain. I've been monitoring alk usage for a few days now and am dropping at about .3dkh per day. I'm on day 2 of dosing all for reef at a rate of 1.7ml per day. My alk today was at 7.9, which I'm hoping to hold at because I just switched to brightwell neomarine salt which mixes to 7.8 dkh. My first water change with the new salt will be on Tuesday. Hoping I have the dosing in the ballpark and can avoid too many swings. This is all new to me, but so far, so good.

Won't have too much more to post as it's time to get my parameters dialled in, and wait for things to grow- hopefully without killing anything.

 

[Jem45472]

And here is my light setting. It's currently still in acclimation mode at 70% for another 28 days.

 

[Jem45472]

Catastrophe today.
Came home from work to a flooded floor. It was dark and all I could see was water running all down the tank and onto all the power cords. I quickly pulled the plug from the outlet.

I've had a few issues with the optical ato I'm using where it would quit filling the tank, and shut itself off into a safe mode. (To keep from flooding) I was ready to scrap it a while back, then decided to remove the snail gaurd from it. It has run flawless ever since.

Needless to say I was very upset today, and knew that piece of **** just destroyed my whole tank, and possibly shorted out all my equipment.

Well after drying things out I plugged the return pump back in and to my surprise the tank water level wasn't high. So now I'm confused. After closer inspection it appears my skimmer moved jus a bit, and it's outlet was dumping water on the top of my fish jump gaurd, then running off the side of the tank- forcing the ato to keep filling. Everything is dried out, and running ok. I appeared to come home just in time to save things. Another hour later, and everything would have been toast. My purple torch hasn't been doing well, so I adjusted lighting and flow to try and save it, but I'm sure it won't recover now after this. It appears that it will be my only loss though, and I consider myself lucky. My temps dropped 3°, and salinity went from 1.026 to 1.023. If I was any later returning home, nothing would have survived. We'll see how things go over the next couple days.


This is where my skimmer was dumping water on my cover, then running down the side.

I have now clipped on an empty pen to use as a spacer to keep the skimmer back, so this can't happen again.