Need tips : need to reduce height of my tank

A

AqEnthusiast

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Dec 19, 2011
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Hi

My tank is 3 feet (36 inch / 85 cm) tall. .

This is creating lot of difficulties of light penetration and the bottom gets dark..

I want to reduce this tank by 1 feet from top. .

Can this be done ? Will I need to remove all my fishes and plants ?

Please suggest how should I do that. .


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Cutting a foot off the top is just not feasible. You will need to invest in some better than stock lighting. Any tank over 18" tall can benefit by better lighting. Reducing water level will only compound the problem by creating more reflection loss. Using power compact or similar higher wattage lighting might help as well as possibly using metal halides. (I think the PC's are on their way out of fashion).
 
Or just use the inverse square law to calculate how much light you need to penetrate down to the bottom.

Florescent or LED can give a better color spectrum than metal halide.

A 3' tall tank will need 2X the light levels of a 2' tall tank and 4X the light levels of an 18" tall tank over the same sq in of substrate.

For my 125 I have one 23w of every 7". If this tank was 3' deap I'd need two lights in the same space to make the same light levels at the bottom of the tank.
 
Waterproof your light fixture, submerge it, and disguise it as a log/root system. Ftw :thm:
 
Many thanks everyone for your help and support. .

Today I gathered the courage and cut the tank by 15 inches from top !!!

Now the tank dimensions are (in the unit you measure) :

L × W × Depth

Feet : 4 × 2 × 1.75

Inches : 48 × 24 × 21

Cm : 120 x 60 x 54

Ltr : ~388

Us galon : 100

Now I need to know what type of plants and subtrate I put in this. .

Will have a separate thread. .




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Yes, that will be interesting to see. I'm assuming perhaps the tank is not glass...?

Some suggestions for your plants. I would not attempt any high-light plants but stay with low to moderate light requiring plants. This will allow you to lessen the light intensity a bit, which will be much better for the fish, and be less likely to create algae issues. Floating plants are still advisable for both reasons too.

These taller tanks are ideal for more authentic tropical biotope aquascapes, where wood and dry leaves are more prevalent over the substrate than plants. Low light plants like Java Fern and mosses can be used on the wood to add some green. The floating plants provide the plant benefits for water quality.

Remember too that the more light, the more it costs to operate. And nutrient fertilization has to balance.

Byron.
 
ROYWS3 said:
How the heck did you cut it!!?? Give us details!!
Click to expand...

Sure. Nothing special as such but below is what I did :

Need to empty the complete tank (fish, ornaments, water, plants and substrate and whatever is in there, and I think in that order as well )

I took some water out of the existing tank and put that in a different container so that when I put my fish in that container they have the same cycled water ( i just put my filter outlet of existing tank to that container and that's it - my cycled water in that container ).

Then I put my filter system in that container as my fish would be there and I was sure it would be there for quite some time so I ensured good airstone as well...

I maintained the plants in the tank till i took fish out because I knew If I detach my plants first the gravel coming out from below plants would make the water too much dusty that I can't see my fish to bring them out. . So I removed fish first, put them in the container mentioned above which had filter and airstone running..

Then took the plants out (I am going to plant new plants so I discarded these existing ones but they will be preserved in a different container of same water if need to replant the same plants - but in my particular case I was aware I am going to new plants and new gravel)

Then took all the water and substrate out. .Now empty tank was on the stand. .

Took the tank from its stand on the floor.. (tank this size is too heavy - so few friends and all family there : ).. I loosened silicone from one side ( I actually heated it a little with hair drier (duh) and put a paper cutter in - it worked)..

And then rest is regular glass cutting exercise really. . I called one of my friend who is in glass cutting and he warned me first - "mate I will help you in cutting this glass - but it can go wrong and cut / break the whole of glass" - I said okay ! ( did I have a choice when this was necessary for me to do : )

And there it is, my height reduced tank ( ofcourse required support system glass reapplied on top as seen held with tapes )

uploadfromtaptalk1396775871423.jpg

Boy I am so happy because it was necessary for me to reduce its height (my mistake when I made it at 3feet - too high for planted tank ) was pending since long to do and now is done - will be great for my plants as now quantum of water will reduce ( =less nutrients floating in water probably reducing / now more hopefully stopping algae ) and much more light will penetrate til the bottom..


Will set that up pretty soon now. .




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uploadfromtaptalk1396775871423.jpg
 
Last edited:
so, wait a holdit. was this a home-made tank to begin with? not that it matters one way or the other really. this was a ballsy move and very well executed.
 
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