New to Chicago Reefs! Hello!

cju84

cju84

Member
Hey everyone,

I finally pulled the trigger after about a year of wanting a nano reef! I decided to go with the 5.1gallon EcoPico tank from Ecoxotic. Also bought a Hydor 25W heater and Koralia Nano 240 PH.

I live in Lakeview (work downtown) and stumbled upon a LFS within a mile of me that I checked out this past weekend (tankiteasy on Ashland/Waveland). I plan on getting LR/sand/water from them and possibly one small fish. Just waiting on my tank at this point! After the cycle completes, I plan on a few blue hermits/ceriths/snails/nerites for the CUC.

This LFS does sell frags (prices seemed relatively cheap), but would love to meet and purchase from a few of you. Only so many frags for a 5gallon, but I plan on upgrading within a year or two.

Look forward to chatting with you!

Cheers,
Chris
 
Hey Chris, I had an EcoPico reef so I can make some recommendations for sure. I would ditch the stock filter, run it barebottom, and get an Azoo Palm filter to run with some carbon. Also, it is very easy to do a solderless DIY LED retrofit on the stock eco-pico arm. The stock LED won't cut it for anything but the lowest light soft corals, even upgraded with more EcoPico strips (been there, done that). I live downtown and would be happy to put the retrofit together for you and help you out with any other setup stuff on the tank.

Azoo Palm:
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=9821

DIY Solderless:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2387770

My EcoPico running with 5 EcoPico strips on the stock arm:

4BD30DEB-B557-489D-B739-92AC9421343E_zpsvenulack.jpg

6e133339.jpg


Whole EcoPico Build thread for more info:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2104727
 
Thanks for the kind words Matt and Ted!

Ted - that tank looks amazing. I plan on upgrading to 3 strips off the bat (I didn't buy the reef lighting, just the normal one as I thought it was cheaper to do that and add the two strips) and testing some low light corals for a bit as I'm new to the hobby. I'm sure I'll upgrade to five shortly after.

As far as the additional strips - what do you recommend I get if I'm running 3 strips? I believe it comes with the white/blue/white strip. Should I just grab two more of those or go with an all white and all blue? Or a variation of that? Do you think I'll need another power supply if I just purchase the 3-way splitter for the two additional strips, or should the original power supply be sufficient for 3 strips (I think the one power supply should be fine for 3 strips if my math isn't too terrible!).

Will the three strips be sufficient for zoas/polyps/mushrooms or is that still not enough?

Sorry for the questions!

I might have to take you up on your DIY offer when upgrading.
 
cju84 said:
Thanks for the kind words Matt and Ted!

Ted - that tank looks amazing. I plan on upgrading to 3 strips off the bat (I didn't buy the reef lighting, just the normal one as I thought it was cheaper to do that and add the two strips) and testing some low light corals for a bit as I'm new to the hobby. I'm sure I'll upgrade to five shortly after.

As far as the additional strips - what do you recommend I get if I'm running 3 strips? I believe it comes with the white/blue/white strip. Should I just grab two more of those or go with an all white and all blue? Or a variation of that? Do you think I'll need another power supply if I just purchase the 3-way splitter for the two additional strips, or should the original power supply be sufficient for 3 strips (I think the one power supply should be fine for 3 strips if my math isn't too terrible!).

Will the three strips be sufficient for zoas/polyps/mushrooms or is that still not enough?

Sorry for the questions!

I might have to take you up on your DIY offer when upgrading.
Click to expand...

Never apologize for the questions, as long as you are actually interested in the answers no one will ever get mad at you for asking! You can run three strips off the one power supply. I would just get 2 more all blue strips if I were you. The white chips can be very overpowering. With that setup you could try some mushrooms and zoas but it would be a toss up. They might live but might also brown out.

Another piece of advice, if this is your first reef tank, ditch the 5g and go with at least a 20g. Maintaining water chemistry on a 5g is an absolute PITA as any little thing going wrong can bring the whole tank down. If you do stick with the 5g, get a quality auto top off unit. For a small tank like that I would look at the Hydor unit or the smart ATO. Nothing with float switches as they will take up a lot of space and also be prone to failure since all of your livestock is going to be right there with them.
 
Welcome! I would take Teds advice. I considered myself an experienced hobbist until the day my 6 gal spiked. Smaller tanks are very prone to changes and spikes fortunate for me my clowns lived but all my coral died. Ted makes killer LED'S I have one of his and it looks amazing. Can't wait to see your tank pictures.
 
Tested levels for first time.

Hey all - just tested my levels for the first time - wanted to know what I should do (if anything).

ph: 8.0 (it seems)
Ammonia: 0ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrates: 40ppm

Seems nitrates are quite high - does this mean I'm in some sort of cycle? I just added a massive CUC a few days ago. Also, I read my ph should be between 8.2 - 8.4, but saw that 8.0 is 'fine'.

Any thoughts on what I should do if anything?

Note that I bought live aragonite and live rock from an established tank at my LFS. I didn't really think there would be a cycle per se.
 
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