Part IV- Let there be light!

Maybe the most important thing for plants, and life in general, is light. Together with carbon (in the form of injected CO2) they create our little piece of nature.

There are many issues with lighting, its luminosity spectrum and shape influence the look and growth of the plants.
There are many kinds of lights but the dimensions limited my options to 15W T8 fluorescents or 24/36W PL lights. Metal Halides were ruled out as being too bright and expensive (although I might change sometime in the future).
I liked the variety of T8 bulbs available and people seem to like the ones that are special for growing plants. So far I have two 4500K and two 6000K lights and I'm going to get two Growlux or 935's in addition. I don't want to put more than 6 bulbs so if the luminosity won't be enough I'll over drive some of them.

I've started installing the lights yesterday, the pictures show the test runs. Once I get all the wiring correct I'll tidy it up so they stay invisible and make a cover for the top.

Things are moving

Just a few pictures of the progress made last night…

Started wiring the electricity and working on the lighting

I wired it so I have one set of outlets connected all the time (for the filter, heater, etc…) and a second on a timer (lighting, co2, reactor, etc…).
Lighting will be 6X15W T8 fluorescent light bulbs (the ballasts can be seen in the picture)
I also got the filter, Atman EF1, it's a very simple cheap canister type filter.

It has two sections, one with biological media the other with some kind of sponge.

The filter will be mostly for keeping the water clear (i.e. mechanical filtering) so I will see how it works then decide if different filtering media is needed.

It comes with lots of parts and connections as can be seen in the picture. The build quality is reasonable, it's not robust but if one isn't abusive it should hold well. It is also very simple and has a moderate motor, for this aquarium it should be good since a slow current is more favorable. I think for its price and considering that most people are satisfied with it, it is a good buy but I'll know for sure only after using it for some time…

Substrate also arrived, I hope by next week I'll be ready to set it up :-)

Change of plans OR Step III - The air we breathe

Well, I thought I had it all planed out… low-tech tank, simple, low maintenance… Not any more it isn't:



That’s right, I'm going high tech. got my hands on this Red Sea CO2 pro system with a 5kg cylinder. As new just not in the original packaging, such a nice opportunity, I couldn't just let it go…
There's a duel gauge regulator, a needle valve, bubble counter, the Red Sea 500 reactor, tubing and a CO2 level indicator set. The stuff looks very good.
I did a search on the internet to get an idea of what this system is like, looks fairly promising. It is self contained and it suits a wide range of tanks. Unlike with a packaged set I got this one without the manual, not a big problem, though, I just downloaded it from the Red Sea site. The manual is fairly straight forward but even without one the system is simple enough so setup is no big deal.

I like the design of the needle valve and bubble counter, putting them together on the side of the aquarium is sensible. I also like the fact that they attach with suction pads so that I can remove them easily.

My preference is to have an inline reactor so as to keep it out of site and have less tubes running in the tank. Nevertheless, I would like to try out this Red Sea CO2 reactor 500. It has a nice design and I'd like to see how it works. I read on the net that some people found it problematic at high flow rates so I would like to give this little baby a test drive and see how far it can go.

My only problem so far is with the regulators connection to the cylinder. The way the sealing is done you can't close it without a wrench or spanner. I think this issue is handled in a better way on other regulators I've seen, where ones hand is enough for securing the thread. This isn’t a significant issue, though, since you only do this once every few month.
My first impression is therefore very good but before I can put it to use I have some rethinking to do with regards to the lighting, substrate and a few other things in light of my change to a high-tech tank.

The glass is here

Also building the aquarium looks like lots of fun I chickened out of doing it myself. Afraid of the possibility of a leak and a hundred liters of water seeping into the wooden floor I looked for someone else to do it for me. I got recommendations for a great aquarium builder and gave him a call. We discussed what I wanted (simple rimless tank, 8mm clear glass…) and he was very attentive and helpful but also insisted the glass should be 10mm thick, trusting his judgment I agreed to that and hoped it wont look too cumbersome. Once the cabinet was finished I had the dimensions ready for him, I asked for it to be 52cm by 51.8cm and 42cm high. The tank was ready within a few days but I had to wait for ten days for the silicon to cure.

The tank was built to the exact size and fits perfectly on the cabinet but there were a few things I didn't like. The biggest one is the issue of the green tint, although the glass doesn't look too thick the green coloring is very noticeable. I looked at many tanks since and I think I could have insisted on 8mm glass which would have been a little better. On the other hand the seams are very elegant and the amount of silicon is really minimal (as you can see in the pictures) thanks to the thickness of the glass.

On the outside the work isn't as clean and there is some access silicon that has to be removed, when I got the tank there was tape going all around it and when I removed it there was silicone underneath that has to be removed.

The builder also added supports at the bottom of the tank which I did not want.


He said it is the only proper way to prevent leaks.


I disagree but it is too late now, I will just have to wait and see what it looks like after I fill it in with substrate (in a regular tank the bottom is covered by skirting so one doesn't see the supports but I want to leave it bare)
I'm very pleased with this tank I tested it for leaks (no problems as expected) and now I can hardly wait till I get the rest of the things ready…