10 gallon TopFin Glass Aquarium with 1/4 inch glass. This tank was started on March 8th, 2007 in hopes of competing in the NMOceankeepers NANO contest. Although I decided to use a 10 gallon basic tank, I fabricated the in-tank fuge and sump from 1/4 inch acrylic, weldon 33, a acrylic heat strip and a few beers.

       The stand does not exist yet, but will consist of 1x6x8' pre-tailed wood. The canopy, which is almost complete follows the same idea, although the stand will be much higher. The canopy is currently 15 inches tall due to the use of a metal halide lighting system (which can be found below) Unfortunately, due to the heat involved, a higher canopy is required for the fans.

       I entered into the nano contest with the main category of creating a nano reef system with a total WORTH cost of less then $200 over the next six months. Although this is challenging, I believe I will prevail. With that being said, my main water movement device consists of a single mani-jet 1200 powerhead retrofitted onto CPVC and routed through two nozzles to create a dual turbulence zone in the middle of the tank.

       Once the competition is over, I may upgrade to an external pump and adjustable valves but the next six months will tell me the truth.

The water filtration will be provided primarially through weekly water changes. I will be changing out approximatly one gallon per week and I will stirr up the sand and base to remove as many nutrients as possible.

I have also designed an in-line media reactor that will assist in water polishing and contaminate removal.

One of the best outcomes of this project has to be the custom lighting. As a background, VHO and Power Compact are strong lights, but they  do not compair to lighting such as metal halide. MH lighting is as close to true SUN spectrum as we can currently achieve using artificial items.

I looked high and low and I was finally led to an information site by a friend that has directions on how to create a MH system for under $50. Typically MH lighting on for a nano would run about $200.

Up for the challenge, I purchased the necessary parts, with a total bill coming out to $62. The parts included a ballastwise 70W Electronic HQI ballast, a husky 500w halogen lamp and a 70w de hqi bulb.

Actinic supplimation will be provided by numerous 420-430nm wavelength LED's as well as a few 4500k led's for the fuge depending on the heat put out by the MH lamp.