The tank you would die for!!!

[Shiftaltumlock]

Well, I guess it would only be limited to the amount of maintenance I was prepared to perform.


I would build a tank into my livingroom wall. There would be a service room on the back side of the tank. All lighting for tank would be above tank on service room side. The tank would be 96Lx36Wx36D. The tank would be drilled on both sides with overflows built in on both sides. It would be lit with four 400 watt MH pendants with remote ballast. In the service room, there would be 2 registers with large vents coming from the Central air conditioner (The MH’s Will be HOT!!!) The color temp of the bulbs would be 6400K. I would start the tank off with substrate heating coils. Top those off with Red Florite on the right, blending to the left with onyx sand. There would be lots of driftwood pieces with maybe a few pieces of red granite. The filter would be a high output Pond filter (3000gph)with XtraLarge canister for biomedia . The Co2 system would consist of a 20lb bottle with dual gauge regulator and needle valve. I would inject Co2 directly in the canister for 100% absorption into the water column. This system would have a pH controller linked to a solenoid which would turn on and off flow of Co2 as needed. I figure I wont need a heater other than the MH’s and substrate heaters. BTW: The lights and pH controller would be hooked up via USB or serial to my computer. (That would be the best) I wont go into much detail about the plants that will be in the tank, I will tell you that there would be lots of ground cover with rich dense growth filled with vibrant colors. The fish would be a single school of 300 Rummey Nose Tetra’s. The algae eating army would be 50 ammano shrimp and 20 True SAE’e. Oh! Surface dwellers would be 15 Longfin Zebra’s I guess.

BTW: 50% water change per week would be a snap with the builtin water changing system. While I am thinking of it, lets add a nutrient dosing system for the plants. Let that be controlled by the computer also.

BTW2: Can you put MH’s on a dimmer? That would be nice to simulate the sunrise and sunset.


I got to stop this!!! I am actually think about doing this know. Geez! I got no life.

 

[slipknottin]

use 250s instead of 400s. less heat, less money.

i have heard that you could dim MH bulbs, but i know of no ballasts that support this.

 

[Richer]

only problem with such a deep tank would be planting your plants.... be prepared to factor in snokling equipement

-Richer

 

[Shiftaltumlock]

Originally posted by slipknottin
use 250s instead of 400s. less heat, less money.

i have heard that you could dim MH bulbs, but i know of no ballasts that support this.

I would need almost 7 250's to equal 4 400's. I need the 3wpg ya know... Oh Wait!!! The tank is 3' deep. The throws a wrench in thw works. I will have to go to atleast 5 wpg to get the job done.

 

[Shiftaltumlock]

Originally posted by Richer
only problem with such a deep tank would be planting your plants.... be prepared to factor in snokling equipement

-Richer

I thought abot that but I figured a 8' long 2' deep tank would look out of balance. If I am on a high platform in the back area, It should make it do-able. Ya gotta figure that there are going to be some inconveniences with a monster this size. Anyway this is suposed to be a thread of what everyone would build if the had the resources. I just kinda spit this out and its not really polished. I think it is a good start though.

 

[slipknottin]

you cant go by watts per gallon

MH lighting is point source and will be much more intense and penetrate better than a much higher wattage of fluorescents.


BTW, you cant add lights to increase the depth the light penetrates. If you have 1 VHO bulb and it penetrates 24" deep, adding another bulb will not increase the lighting depth. It will stay at 24" regardless of the amount of bulbs above.

a 250 watt MH is fine for any plants, even at 3 feet deep.

 

[Red]

If we're just dreaming then id go the biggest tank possible, with a big mangrove aerial root in it, and a few large nice shaped rocks covering a whole back corner so at the top it shallows slowly to create a different type of habitat in the tank that is densly planted and has a fair bit of wood structure. A natural dark brown sand/gravel, a plain black background to show off the light colours of the light coloured wood, the moss, algae and tough plants like anubis growing from the rock work and the big root. Its occupants would consist of either a number of large cichlids; P.polleni (or bleekeri), texas, festae and maybe a cuban with a couple of gibbiceps to clean my glass for me, and maybe a few S.lima catfish. Then i would get feeder type guppies to stick in the shallow densely planted area for a break in the scenery and to occaissionally feed my cichlids. Or i would get a couple of red Asian Arowanas with the gibbiceps again (if they wouldnt get eaten)