choosing and setting up nano help

[bprewit]

My future mother-in-law isnt all that old, but is disabled do to degenerative bone disease. She sits in front of my tank for hours when she visits and I have been thinking of buying her a small tank and setting it up. I was thinking of a 12g nano with sump/fuge but then realized that I was going to spend way more money and complicate things more than I want. So I am looking at this tank:
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=10677&N=2004+62759

I am not sure if it is the best way to go or not, but sounds like a pretty decent little tank to start with. Plan is a pair of percula's, maybe a skunk cleaner or two, a small anenome, and maybe some shrooms and zoo's. I kinda figure 10lbs of sand would be plenty, and probably 8-10lbs of rock that I will scavange out of my tank and sump. Here are my questions:
Is there a better tank for around the same price to use with same volume?
Will the 24W pc lighing that comes with the tank be sufficient for a anenome such as a bubble tip? How about zoo's? Or will I only be able to keep easier softies and shrooms?
Any advice or warnings would be greatly appreciated. I want to get it right so that its a good expierence for her instead of having lots of problems.

[mathias]

my question is can she keep up with it.... because I hear that nano tanks are a lot more difficult to keep... than big salt tanks... maybe get her a small planted goldfish tank.... ?

[Chip]

I can't view .com websites at work :scold: but if it is the JBJ nano you are looking at, I am wanting to purchase one as well. I tried to start a thread on this but got no response so I will be checking on this one as well. From what I understand about this nano is that the 24W pc is not nearly enough light. I saw this same tank at Aqua Tek a while back with a 96W Quad on it with SPS frags in it!!! It looked awesome! I can't remember how else they modded it though. I will call them on my lunch break and ask them some more questions about it.

[Chip]

mathias has a point, I've heard nanos are a lot harder to keep up because the smallest changes are huge to a smaller tank. Not quite sure if I made a lot of sense there but I tried. You have to be ritualistic with nanos. I have a 10g planted FW tank that will be replaced by this nano if I get it. It is so easy to take care of and I purchased it all for less than $100 including the little CO2 canister for it.

[cvonseggern]

My nanocube (bought it established) is amazingly stable, even if I neglect it. But then again, someone (me or Deb) is always here to keep an eye on everything. I don't know if I'd go nano for a tank that will be in someone else's house. I'd be thinking more in the 30-gal range. It's still small, but there's a lot more margin for error or not making it over there when you planned.

Chris

[bprewit]

From what I read nano tanks are much harder to keep up! Such a small volume of water things happen very quickly and goes bad in a hurry. The reason I even considered this is:
She lives in a very very small house and being disabled she is home 24/7 and has more than enough time to spend taking care of it. Not wanting sps or even lps corals for the tank, figure there are enough colors of shrooms and zoo's to keep her content.
The more I think about it I will probably add a 10g sump/fuge below the nano in a small stand and that will add atleast a bit more volume of water making it just a bit more stable and some macro, sand, and rock in there should help with water quality tremendously plus give me a place for a small Lee's airlift skimmer. Also there is a deluxe model of that nano that has two 24W pc bulbs. It is $80 more but that may be worth it compared with building a new hood for more lighting. I have a mag drive 2.5 pump that I use when mixing water that should work perfect for a return pump and wouldnt take much to add overflow to the 12g tank. A freshwater planted aquarium is definatly a possibility. I would much rather go the sw route, with most of the rock and softies coming from my tank as established rock and frags.
I forgot to mention that she lives in a old mobil home. Anything larger than a 20g tank I would be afraid to put in there, as particle board floors dont do well with weight on them and over time seem to warp and bend. I am afraid that would cause a larger tank to become unlevel and be a flood hazard.

[Ram_Puppy]

Sounds to me like you have it figured out. I would go with the deluxe model (personal preference). Have you given any thought as to location in the house? Reason I ask is, you could consider hooking up an inexpensive RO unit and float valve to handle auto top off in the sump, and you have just limited the MAJOR instability issue with a nano cube. It doesn't even have to be the best RO system out there, something small and simple likw AquaFX's stingray (2 stage 50 GPD) (better than tap any how). Your only constraint would be running the line, though, with a mobile home, if she's not opposed, you could go right under neath it and drill a hole.

Throw some zoo's and shrooms in, a couple tiny fish for movement, and I bet she would love it.

[tony]

i looked into the jbj systems as well

check here for the upgraded systems: http://www.nanocustoms.com/catalog/

i have no clue about their services and am not affiliated with them in any way i just stumbled across the site one day on nano-reef.com

[matt]

Sounds like a neat idea; kudos for treating your future mother in law so well! Here's my 2 cents:

1. Forget about the anemone, at least for a good long time. Small tank, new tank, new reefkeeper, difficult animal to keep, etc....some liverock, mushrooms, maybe an LPS or two depending on light, a shrimp, and one or two small fish (maybe a clown and small goby?) is about what I'd go for.

2. I think 2 10 gallon tanks plumbed together makes a great nano set up, and it's dirt cheap for the tanks. You can even find someone to drill one of them; I had a nano set up like this and it worked great. You can use a mag 3 or even a maxijet as a return, but if you use the maxijet, be prepared to clean it every week. There are lots of P.C. retrofit set ups for ten gallon light strips; try ahsupply.com as a first start. Then you can set up a small skimmer, but I'd consider the Lees hang on essentially useless; I had a prizm on mine and it worked fine. You can hang it on the sump/refugium tank.

3. Top off is easy; just set up a five gallon (or even 1 gallon) glass jug next to the tank, higher than the sump, and use a two-holed stopper/glass pipe/flexible tube siphon arrangement to keep the sump level steady. There are lots of pictures of this set up on the web; I described it in detail on a way earlier post on MAAST. It works great for kalk dosing, too. If you use a five gallon jug, you'll probably be able to let it sit for a week or more before refilling.

Maybe I'm jaded, but I'm almost always disappointed in "ready made" systems for the aquarium hobby, although lots of people seem to like the jbj nanos. Isn't it more fun to build your own? It looks almost certain that my next tank will be a homemade nano; the price of apartment living.

[JimD]

I agree, the pre-fab stuff is ok for a beginer I guess, but if you really wanna get your hands "wet", use your imagination and a little advise from those who've been there done that. Definately no anemone, clown/goby sounds good to me, maybe some zoos.

[GaryP]

Next time you are down this way you might want to stop into Fin-Addict. Felipe makes some pretty cool retro nanos. He takes an Eclipse top and adds a cooling fan, light kit, and a small air driven skimmer. Its pretty darn slick.

Gary

[mharris7]

Nano cubes are nice. Because of the hood design there's not that much evaporation. They sell 28watt light upgrade kits on ebay for them. There are mods where you can add a skimmer in one of the filter chambers. They're also glass, not plastic, and the "cube" shape is great for aquascaping. Check out nano-reefs.com especially their diy forum. Also check out www.nanocustoms.com - it's a site that sells customized nano-cubes.