Jim's 5.5 gal LED Nano

[beelezebubba]

please forgive my poor photography skills, tank looks much better in person i swear lol. i'm still figuring out how to best use my camera with the leds, so hopefully the pics will improve with time.

it's a standard 5.5 gal with a 10 gal sump/fuge on reverse photocycle. lit by a dimmable aquastyle diy kit, 15 3w leds, 8 rb, 7 4500k w. i plan on adding two more rbs when i finish the canopy for the light.

the only inhabitants so far are a stonogobiops nematodes goby and a white porcelain crab. i don't really plan on adding anything else, possibly a barnacle blenny if i think it'll work out. any thoughts on that are appreciated.

here it is 2 months ago when i first set it up

i try to take a lot of pics just to track growth and whatnot, so i plan on updating this thread at least monthly.

questions/comments/criticism welcome

 

[WoodRiverTroutBum]

Looks AWESOME!

 

[MPevine11]

looks amazing!!

 

[danzig]

good job it looks great, it almost looks like a much bigger tank to me

 

[beelezebubba]

thanks guys. i still have some space i'm saving for more sps down the road, but i think i'm gonna let things coast for a bit and see how everything does.

should be nice in 6 months or so lol

 

[beelezebubba]

july update, all these pics were taken on the 26th

Large Image Link (193 kB)

Large Image Link (171 kB)

Large Image Link (159 kB)

 

[beelezebubba]

and a couple growth shots, about a month between each

Large Image Link (159 kB)

Large Image Link (174 kB)

Large Image Link (178 kB)

Large Image Link (177 kB)

most sps are doing well and coloring up, albeit a bit slowly. that brown acro on the right has since been moved to my frag tank where it's getting better flow and higher intensity, full spectrum lighting, so hopefully it will rebound.

the tank suffered a little during that heat wave we had, and i just got an ro/di about 3 weeks ago. i imagine high phosphates in my tap water had a negative impact on calcification rates and color, though i haven't had any algae problems. i'm also still ramping up my lights, trying not to shock anything. currently at ~80%. so hopefully things will continue to improve.

thanks for lookin, please click links

 

[frank180reef]

wow looks great

what is the red coral in the last post? sps I think

 

[MrX]

Looks great man!

I need to get some lessons from you on placement/attachement to the rocks. Firstly to get things growing on the rocks/etc. Secondly, so my halloween urchin can't pick them up and carry stuff all over the place. ;o)

 

[STiTCH87]

Sweet! I like the mini overflow lol.

I have a 5g pico cube myself. Love the thing. I'm actually thinking about keeping it up and running even when I have the 40g set up, no joke.

FWIW on my 5g I have a mini fan placed above the tank pointed down attached to a RKL along with an iceprobe chiller attached to the RKL with the fan set to turn on at 77.9 and the iceprobe set to turn on at 80.1 and the iceprobe turns on only a few times a week tops even if my A/C is off in my bedroom. Even with the heat wave. Both work great and I highly recommend it. $150 investment and I have never seen my tank above 80.8 and that was on a day that was 95 degrees outside and I turned off my A/C and all my house fans as a test to see what my tank could endure during a bad heatwave running just what was attached to the tank itself. I even have a camping fan that runs on D batteries that I use during power outtages that runs constantly for 2 days on the batteries along with a battery operated airtube pump that turns on during power outtages and runs for a few days as well.

 

[beelezebubba]

wow looks great

what is the red coral in the last post? sps I think

thanks frank. it's a monti setosa, pretty nice orange in real life.

Looks great man!

I need to get some lessons from you on placement/attachement to the rocks. Firstly to get things growing on the rocks/etc. Secondly, so my halloween urchin can't pick them up and carry stuff all over the place. ;o)

thanks

i use jb water weld and superglue gel. dry the base of the coral, put a dab of superglue on it, cover with epoxy, another dab of glue on top of the epoxy, and just press firmly to the live rock for 30 seconds or so. the glue holds the coral to the epoxy and the epoxy to the rock, and after an hour or so the epoxy is pretty firmly set, but not so much that you can't pry it off later. works pretty well imo

Sweet! I like the mini overflow lol.

I have a 5g pico cube myself. Love the thing. I'm actually thinking about keeping it up and running even when I have the 40g set up, no joke.

FWIW on my 5g I have a mini fan placed above the tank pointed down attached to a RKL along with an iceprobe chiller attached to the RKL with the fan set to turn on at 77.9 and the iceprobe set to turn on at 80.1 and the iceprobe turns on only a few times a week tops even if my A/C is off in my bedroom. Even with the heat wave. Both work great and I highly recommend it. $150 investment and I have never seen my tank above 80.8 and that was on a day that was 95 degrees outside and I turned off my A/C and all my house fans as a test to see what my tank could endure during a bad heatwave running just what was attached to the tank itself. I even have a camping fan that runs on D batteries that I use during power outtages that runs constantly for 2 days on the batteries along with a battery operated airtube pump that turns on during power outtages and runs for a few days as well.

mini-overflow lol. yeah i originally planned on not doing too much with the tank, so i recycled a lot of equipment from my old 20 gallon, including the overflow. painted it black and it didn't look too bad, and i decided it was prolly less risky than drilling such thin glass. then i looked into leds after being out of the hobby for about 4 years, and realized i could have a ton of cool, efficient light for pretty cheap. so the whole thing snowballed, as tends to happen, haha.


i may end up doing something like that if the temps get too bad. it never got crazy hot, but the temp swung 3-4 degrees every day for over a week.

 

[JonsReef]

looks incredible! that's quite a bit of light. my 14g BC DIY LED set-up only has 12 LEDs (6W/6B).

 

[beelezebubba]

thanks

yeah i figured i'd rather have the light and not need it than need it and not have it.

glad you bumped this, gives me an excuse to post some pics without feeling like an attention whore lol

was screwing around with some different angles last night

you can see my little frag tank reflected on the front glass, and here's the 'full spectrum' led i made for it. there's 2 4.5k whites, 3 royal blues, and one each of true violet, cool blue, turquoise, and deep red. i had everything but the project box and led bulbs already, so i figured why not. not the prettiest job in the world, but it works well and isn't overheating as far as i can tell by touching the heat sink.

it'll be interesting to see how the difference in spectrum affects growth and coloration, if any.