kribbz
Community Member
Hey guys! New to the site, but not new to the hobby. I took a 15 year break from reefing due to losing my last tank during a power outage in the dead of winter in Illinois. I lost everything along with my appetite to start over. 15 years later, I moved to Texas and had 2 little girls that wanted to start something up during Covid after seeing some pictures of my old setup. After doing some research and wanting to keep the hobby from taking over my home and finances we settled in on an IM 30L Fusion AIO tank. I was not planning to do a build thread but I have the time so I figured, why not.
The tank was purchased in the middle of May from Marine Depot . I built my own stand for it so I could get everything on it that I wanted and had water in the tank by the first of June. Sadly I have not taken many pictures during the process. But I have been keeping a journal of things I have added, water changes, equipment changes etc....
Equipment list started as follows:
IM 30L Fusion
1 AI 16 Prime
Aqamai KPS Wifi Controllable Wavemaker Pump
CaribSea Life Rock - 30 lbs
CaribSea Arag-Alive Special Grade Reef Sand 20 lb
Eheim Jager TruTemp 75 Watt
chemi pure bag
2 bags of GFO (came with the tank)
Technical Pro PS9U Rack Mount Power Supply
Tunze Osmolator 3152 ATO
I have since added:
a Tunze 9004 skimmer because I was having some elevated nitrates as well as an IN Tank refugium with Calerpa and an Acke grow light off of amazon.
I used the FritzZyme Turbo Start to cycle the tank and once all readings hit zero I added a clean up crew and some GSP to keep the load light.
Inhabitants In the tank are as follows:
Clean up crew
10 blue leg hermits
2 nassarius snails
1 speckled Nassarius snail
3 bumble bee snails
6 astria snails
2 standard perc clowns (added late June)
1 yellow watchman goby (Added late July)
1 Royal Gramma (Added Sept 15)
Cleaner shrimp (added Sept 15th)
Corals:
Green Star Polyps frag
superman acan frag
orange ric. mushroom
5 different varieties of zoas frags
candy cane coral frag
some sort of favia frag my buddy gave me
Green flower pot frag
Kenya tree
Feeding:
2 times a week. Mysis with a TINY bit of reef roids on Tuesday and then full spectrum pellets on Fridays. I'd like to feed a little more but before I hooked up my skimmer I was having slightly elevated nitrates even feeding sparingly.
Dosing:
Right now I only does kalk in the top off water. I use 2.5 teaspoons for 5 gallons
Water changes:
twice a month (just like my paycheck 15th and last day of the month) That just makes it easy to remember.
I know long term I would like to do some easy sps so I had an opportunity to buy a radion xr30 from a local reefer so I swapped out the AI 16 for the radion. There is more light there for sure but I miss the ease of the AI. Also in the 2 days I have been running the Radion, my auto top off is going nuts.
My wish list:
equipment wise:
1. I think the only thing I really want to do is get an RO/DI unit so I don't have to depend on a trip to the lfs for water.
2. eventually want to INVEST in hannah test kits. But those things aren't cheap!
Livestock:
I don't think I want to add anymore fish. 4 small fish seem like a good number in a "nano"
pistol shrimp for the goby
Red BT anemone
Hammer coral
torch coral
red Monti
any kind of bright acans
The tank was purchased in the middle of May from Marine Depot . I built my own stand for it so I could get everything on it that I wanted and had water in the tank by the first of June. Sadly I have not taken many pictures during the process. But I have been keeping a journal of things I have added, water changes, equipment changes etc....
Equipment list started as follows:
IM 30L Fusion
1 AI 16 Prime
Aqamai KPS Wifi Controllable Wavemaker Pump
CaribSea Life Rock - 30 lbs
CaribSea Arag-Alive Special Grade Reef Sand 20 lb
Eheim Jager TruTemp 75 Watt
chemi pure bag
2 bags of GFO (came with the tank)
Technical Pro PS9U Rack Mount Power Supply
Tunze Osmolator 3152 ATO
I have since added:
a Tunze 9004 skimmer because I was having some elevated nitrates as well as an IN Tank refugium with Calerpa and an Acke grow light off of amazon.
I used the FritzZyme Turbo Start to cycle the tank and once all readings hit zero I added a clean up crew and some GSP to keep the load light.
Inhabitants In the tank are as follows:
Clean up crew
10 blue leg hermits
2 nassarius snails
1 speckled Nassarius snail
3 bumble bee snails
6 astria snails
2 standard perc clowns (added late June)
1 yellow watchman goby (Added late July)
1 Royal Gramma (Added Sept 15)
Cleaner shrimp (added Sept 15th)
Corals:
Green Star Polyps frag
superman acan frag
orange ric. mushroom
5 different varieties of zoas frags
candy cane coral frag
some sort of favia frag my buddy gave me
Green flower pot frag
Kenya tree
Feeding:
2 times a week. Mysis with a TINY bit of reef roids on Tuesday and then full spectrum pellets on Fridays. I'd like to feed a little more but before I hooked up my skimmer I was having slightly elevated nitrates even feeding sparingly.
Dosing:
Right now I only does kalk in the top off water. I use 2.5 teaspoons for 5 gallons
Water changes:
twice a month (just like my paycheck 15th and last day of the month) That just makes it easy to remember.
I know long term I would like to do some easy sps so I had an opportunity to buy a radion xr30 from a local reefer so I swapped out the AI 16 for the radion. There is more light there for sure but I miss the ease of the AI. Also in the 2 days I have been running the Radion, my auto top off is going nuts.
My wish list:
equipment wise:
1. I think the only thing I really want to do is get an RO/DI unit so I don't have to depend on a trip to the lfs for water.
2. eventually want to INVEST in hannah test kits. But those things aren't cheap!
Livestock:
I don't think I want to add anymore fish. 4 small fish seem like a good number in a "nano"
pistol shrimp for the goby
Red BT anemone
Hammer coral
torch coral
red Monti
any kind of bright acans
