Nano tank setup?

[drillsar]

IM thinking of going with either a 10 or 20 gallon nano tank.

Now I want to place my rock now that I have in there, will it go through a cycle? can I cook the LR, so I can start off fresh?

Heres my plan:

Heater 100w I guess if a 20 gallon, and a 50w if a 10 gal

1lb of rock per gal

1.5lbs of sand per gallon, more if I want a DSB, not sure what I want to do here

Light? t-5's? not sure the wattage, etc

Powerheads not sure what to get here either

Sump or not?

Skimmer I told was a no

Anything else im missing here?

[Ziggy953]

If the rock that you have now is coming from an established system you shouldn't see much of cycle. When I set up my 10g nano I used water from my 72 system to fill the tank and put the rock from my 72 sump in the 10. I didn't have a cycle at all.

Having an established system makes it a lot easier to start a nano IMO. My 10 has a power filter on it with no media in it. It is just there for some flow. I also have a maxi 404 in the tank for additional flow. The LR and LS do all the filtering. Keeping the tank at a constant temp is the challenge when doing a small tank. I would use more then one heater so that if one fails you have a backup.

[capncapo]

You might want to do a little reading on DSBs. There is a lot more involved in having one than you might think.

To start with, a 10 or 20 gallon tank won't have enough area for a functioning DSB so it would pretty much be a waste of time, money and space.

[kindafun]

I've got a 50W heater in my 10 (has 13 gal of water total). That's marginal for me with a closed hood when I've got a fan running circulating air between the water and splash guard. 75 would do it for sure.

[drillsar]

Ok, so how much sand you suggest 1 to 2"? is it worth to get a detivore kit?

[drillsar]

Im thinking of going with a smaller tank because of money. I read flow should be 7-10 so im guessing in a 10gal here do you do 2 powerheads 50gph each or 1 powerhead?

[capncapo]

Sand depth is a matter of personal preference if it's not a DSB.

I'm a firm believer in detritivore kits but you need to understand that your tank is small enough that you will most likely not be able to have a sustainable population of them so you will need to add another kit at least once a year.

[kindafun]

In my 10 gal I've got 300 gph or 30 times volume/hour. It's mixing around in there but certainly not too much. My 75 has about 4400 gph or nearly 30 times/hour. That's a bit of an issue in places to keep sand from flying and critters that like moderate flow to have that moderate flow, placement and direction of the powerheads made it work. 100 gal/hour in a 10 wouldn't be much.

I use loc-line in the nano with a Y in it to direct the flow two different directions, just one powerhead that comes from the sump in the back.

[afish70]

i have a 20 gal with a Aqua C Remora skimmer, a Korilea 1 for flow and a 100 watt heater. i had a Emperor 200 HOB filter on it and very quickly got rid of it. so a skimmer is great.