720 liter Green Phantom species tank

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 07 Sep 2007, 18:35

I wish!! Tha tanks hasn´t arrived yet. Don´t know why. Waiting for a phonecall on that matter.

Meanwhile I have made some major changes in the setup plans. On the left side I will use my Eheim 2280 external canister filter. On the right side I will use An Eheim compact 3000 powerhead and also a smaller one. All the water to the powerhead will pass through a 30x20cm rectangular wall of 10cm thick blue mat. This contraption will be partially hidden behind a rocky outcrop from the left side.

The smaller powerhead will run continuasly so that the filter bacteria gets nutrition and oksygen. The large one will run on a timer to shut of at feeding time.

I will try to make a small scetch to illustrate.

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 14 Sep 2007, 20:52

The tanks were supposed to arrive several days ago. A bit bummed out about the waiting. It really doesn´t matter though because I am far from finished. I should be finished by now, but I made some changes to my plans that will increase the amount of work considerably.

I promised to make a scetch, but I don´t have the tools to do it digitally, so I will continue to make photographs along the way.

This is the filtermodule on the left side wall of the tank... It is constructed from scraps of glass, and dressed in rocks to conseal it from the front. The whole thing will be spot glued to the left side of the tank. It can be dislodget with a blade if ever needed in the future. The powerhead is an Eheim compact 3000 powerhead. It pumps 3000lph. I will use one more of these on the right side.

Picture from behind the module:

Side wiew:
[img:782:1000]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide004.jpg[/img]

Front wiew:
[img:721:1000]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide011.jpg[/img]

Front wiew with rocks consealing the pump. The rocks are just an illustration. I will eventually use a larger one for the job.
[img:690:1000]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide013.jpg[/img]

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 14 Sep 2007, 21:06

The whole module is angled backwards and downwards:

[img:805:1000]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide017.jpg[/img]

Kostas · Post by **Kostas** » 16 Sep 2007, 13:34

Looks great Haavard,well done!!!

Very good idea...

About the sketch,you can do it on a piece of paper and then take a photo of it

Thats what i do cause althougth i have the tools to do it digitally,its always faster if you draw it on paper...

Wish your tanks arrive soon!!!

DAWN · Post by **DAWN** » 16 Sep 2007, 13:53

Hi Haavard. Rocks look great! Have you tried contacting the firm, they should have told you there was going to be a delay in its arrival of the tank!

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 16 Sep 2007, 16:11

I telephoned the cargo company on Friday afternoon. This time they told me Monday.

DAWN · Post by **DAWN** » 16 Sep 2007, 16:27

I'll keep my fingers crossed for ya this time

chanettt · Post by **chanettt** » 16 Sep 2007, 21:01

today is monday, can't wait to see some more photos. hoping that the tank finally arrive.

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 18 Sep 2007, 21:11

The tanks will arrive tomorrow between 10.00 and 14.00
This time I think it is for real

Anyway... I really don´t need the tanks for some time. The last couple of days I have worked on the left side of the planned setup. All the water to the external canister filter (Eheim 2280) shall pass through a bluefilter sponge in the corner. It will be almost completely hidden behind some rocky outcrops. This is to protect fry from entering the canister filter. If I manage to breed them I wish to keep young and adults in the same tank. The sponges also makes it possible to keep shrimps in the tank.

[img:1000:867]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide025.jpg[/img]

[img:1000:863]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide026.jpg[/img]

[img:1000:825]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide027.jpg[/img]

[img:1000:907]http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa23 ... ide028.jpg[/img]

Kostas · Post by **Kostas** » 19 Sep 2007, 07:39

Its looking great Haavard,as always...

Good thought about having a prefilter for the canister,i can only see one possible problem:the prefilter will need to be cleaned at some point and then the place for it and the space beneath it will be reachable by fish/frys/shrimps and so you may have problem with getting some trapped behind it or damaged by the sponge if you dont have good visibility to that place...
Looking forward to seeing the complete setup altogether,its gonna be great!!!

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 19 Sep 2007, 12:39

Huzza

Bas Pels · Post by **Bas Pels** » 19 Sep 2007, 14:05

congratulations, you finally got them

looking foreward to seeing the next steps

Kostas · Post by **Kostas** » 19 Sep 2007, 14:06

I am very happy to see your tanks arrived

I bet you will take all afternoon unpacking and starring at them...

At least that what i would do!!!

Looking forward to seeing your 2 meter tank with rocks in place!

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 19 Sep 2007, 17:37

Kostas wrote:I am very happy to see your tanks arrived I bet you will take all afternoon unpacking and starring at them... At least that what i would do!!!

Yeah! I am very happy. All the tanks arrived intact.
A bit bummed out because 15 lengths of the porsa racks for the 200 liter tanks are missing. Half of the cover glasses for one of the 720 liter tanks are missing also. I have to phone the cargo handlers and maybe the supplier tomorrow.

Kostas wrote:Looking forward to seeing your 2 meter tank with rocks in place!

The 720 liter tanks are 160x75x60

Kostas · Post by **Kostas** » 19 Sep 2007, 17:59

Thats good

They were in quite a bit of danger during their travel...
Missing things is never good...I hope they are just in another pallet that delayed a bit more...

Didnt knew that your 720lt tanks were 160cm...I assumed they were 2meter ones as i think you dont mention their dimensions anywhere

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 19 Sep 2007, 18:42

All pallets where intact, and the number of pallets was correct, so I assume someone at Aqualine have made a mistake. I just have to phone them tomorrow and ask for some kind of express solution with the porsa lengths.

Meanwhile I can focus on the larger tanks

sidguppy · Post by **sidguppy** » 19 Sep 2007, 19:42

I had a laugh when I saw the last pic....and especially when I checked your location

Berserkers are cool and all, but you might want to be careful around all that glass!

Seedy · Post by **Seedy** » 19 Sep 2007, 21:43

Now THAT is happy fishkeeper!

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 20 Sep 2007, 00:03

Hope I didn´t scare you

I actually do get berserk, but more in a spiritual way. I rarely break stuff on purpose or when exited.

About breaking.. Sometimes I see fault lines in the rocks I am using. To avoid the rocks falling apart i split them along the fault lines, remove all loose material, rub silicone into the surfaces and glue them back together. When gluing porous rocks it is very important to rub the silicone deep into the rocks. Silicone in itself is strong, but the surface needs to be relatively solid. Otherwise the top layer of the rocks will peal off.

Seedy · Post by **Seedy** » 20 Sep 2007, 00:23

Haavard Stoere wrote:Hope I didn´t scare you

...probably not any more disturbing than the decorations in my fishroom

Hope your missing glass shows up soon...

Kostas · Post by **Kostas** » 21 Sep 2007, 08:23

I hope they do that for you Haavard

How it goes with the big tank?Have you started working on them?If yes,then we need photos

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 23 Sep 2007, 23:15

Today I ordered 4 juvenile L25 Scarlett Plecos for the tank. They are only 8-11 cm long, so I don´t think they will bother the Hemiancistrus much.

[Mod edit: Update to use persistant CLOG link. --Mats]

taksan · Post by **taksan** » 09 Oct 2007, 07:48

Haavard Stoere wrote:Today I ordered 4 juvenile L25 Scarlett pl*cos
Pseudacanthicus sp(l025)
for the tank. They are only 8-11 cm long, so I don´t think they will bother the Hemiancistrus much.

When they grow up .... they will kill them.

When one grows up faster ...it will kill the other L25's

Very ...very VERY ! aggressive fish

[Mod edit: Use persistant CLOG link -- Mats]

DAWN · Post by **DAWN** » 09 Oct 2007, 12:04

Hi There, Haavard. Very pleased to hear that they finally delivered the tank! Hope things work out the way you hoped it will, and I also like the plecs that you're having in it. Please keep us posted on how things turn out.

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 09 Oct 2007, 22:35

taksan wrote:When they grow up .... they will kill them.

When one grows up faster ...it will kill the other L25's

Very ...very VERY ! aggressive fish

Thank you for the advice

I didn´t know they were that aggressive. Luckily the fish I ordered were not in stock at the moment. I won´t order them again.

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 09 Oct 2007, 22:42

DAWN wrote:Hi There, Haavard. Very pleased to hear that they finally delivered the tank! Hope things work out the way you hoped it will, and I also like the plecs that you're having in it. Please keep us posted on how things turn out.

The tank is in place, and I´m installing all the rocks and filter systems. I have to install the lighting before I can make any decent photographs of the progress. It may take more than a week before I can install the 8x18watts lights.

DAWN · Post by **DAWN** » 09 Oct 2007, 23:07

Hi, hope things go swimmingly

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 10 Oct 2007, 02:01

Yeah

I`m looking forward to finish this project. It took a really long time.

chanettt · Post by **chanettt** » 17 Oct 2007, 03:05

looking forward to see your new tank. can't imagine how nice it will be.
take care.

Haavard Stoere · Post by **Haavard Stoere** » 17 Oct 2007, 22:27

All the modules are in place and I have started sycling the tank with mud from another tanks filter. I now plan to install 12x18 watts lights tomorrow or Friday. The water will probably clear up by that time.