[Yo-han]

I bought a new house a few weeks ago and leaving my rental appartment on the 4th floor in a month, so finally time for a bigger tank! Couldn't find a minimum requirement for posting in the 'Large aquariums and Ponds' section, but I guess this one passes. If not, mods can move it to 'journals'...

The tank:

Unfortunately no 1000+ gallon, but liter. Still, well over 250 gallon, so not a small tank. Here is the thread from my previous (100G) tank: http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/journals/84716-yo-hans-100g-planted.html

A few things I wanted to do different than my previous tank. First of all, I no longer wanted an open tank. I love the look, but I didn't liked the fact that I lost a few fish and am limited in the species of fish I could pick. Another thing why I want my new tank to be closed is that with such a large tank, I get too much evaporation. And third, I wanted it opti-white!

I don't like a standard hood either so the cabinet will go all the way up to the ceiling. Something like these aquaria from Oliver Knott, but no see-through:

Mine will be in a corner in front of an 195 cm (77 inch) wall. So will be 195 cm long. The depth is still an ongoing battle with the misses. I want at least 80 cm (32 inch), but she wants it to be 60 cm (24 inch) as max. The height can be as much as I want, but for easy maintenance I want a max of 65 cm (26 inch). I'm no small guy, but my arms can only reach so far So it probably will be 195 x 80 x 65 cm (77 x 32 x 26 inch). It will be viewable from the front and left side.

I tried making some Google Sketchup renderings, which wasn't easy, but here they are:
The two door version:

Three door version:

Filtration:

I want a sump. I want the flexibility and want to play more with filter media (if Niko ain't replying on this one someone call an ambulance) And I would love to have the sump in the room behind the wall. This will make maintenance easier and also make the tank more silent. But off course, this means drilling some rather large holes in the wall. So maybe it will be placed in the cabinet, not sure yet.

The pump I picked as a Jebao DC 12000. I picked this one because I know people who used it for their reef tanks and it is very silent. It does 12000 L/h (> 3000GPH) and is electronically adjustable. After taking the head pressure into account, it will leave me with a nice 10x flow.
The overflow will be a bean animal style overflow with the entire depth of the tank as an overflow, see rendering:

Sump in the room behind the aquarium:

Lighting:

The lighting I'll be using will be the same from my 100G. This is a dimmable 6x54W T5HO. But this is only 120 cm (48 inch) so I'll probably supplement it on the sides. Not sure how, but I was thinking about the LED floodlights. A 20W 6500K on either side will probable look good, but perhaps someone with experience with these lights can chip in:wink:

Rest of the equipment:

UV and CO2 off course. Probably in a closed loop on the sump with my Aqua Medic reactor. 3-4 heaters in the sump, to prevent overheating if one breaks and to prevent under cooling if one breaks. Since working in an lfs I've seen so many tanks being destroyed by overheating or undercooling (more of a problem with reef tanks), when only one heater was used. Perhaps I setup my dosing pump again, not sure yet.

Inside the tank:

Lots of wood with ferns and mosses. Stems on the back and low plants in the front. Sand in front and aquasoil in the back. Separated by stones and plants. Working in an lfs, I certainly will be visiting the wholesale where we get our hardscape from!:-D The fish will be the same as I have now, perhaps some bigger schools (now around 20-25 per species), and I'll add a small school (of about 12-15 fish) of one bit larger fish. Always loved denisonii's, but I've seen them grow to 15-18cm (6-7 inch) which I find a bit large for my tank, but not sure yet. Another beautifull fish would be Dawkinsia rohani, but these will be hard to find:

We have some beautiful altums in one of our showtanks at work as well
Anyway, you get the picture, if someone thinks he knows a better fish, please do tell.

Not sure when the tank will be setup, but as fast as possible

 

[Zapins]

That is a really nice looking tank. I'm a little confused - is that your tank or someone who you'd like to emulate? How long till you get your new setup? You should post photos of your new place as well! Moving is always a rewarding experience (well, difficult if nothing else!).

What is Google Sketchup?? Is that something everyone can use?

 

[Yo-han]

That is a really nice looking tank. I'm a little confused - is that your tank or someone who you'd like to emulate? How long till you get your new setup? You should post photos of your new place as well! Moving is always a rewarding experience (well, difficult if nothing else!).

What is Google Sketchup?? Is that something everyone can use?

Yes, sketchup is a free program from Google in which you can design stuff. At first quite hard to use, but with only two 8 min tutorials you can build almost anything!

The first two photos aren't mine. Those are tanks Oliver Knott made, but I like the tank design.

The rendering are from my tank. Not sure how long till I get it. I prefer yesterday, but I get the keys of the house next month, will be moving and painting for 3 weeks, than go on a vacation to Malaysia, and than start working in the tank

 

[Michael]

I love vicarious tank set-ups, especially from someone as skilled as you are!

 

[saddletramp]

That will be fantastic.

It will sure allow for your imagination to run wild with wood, rocks or almost anything else.

Will it be a "theme" tank?

Bill

 

[Yo-han]

I love vicarious tank set-ups, especially from someone as skilled as you are!

Thanks! I hope I can live up to your expectations!

That will be fantastic.

It will sure allow for your imagination to run wild with wood, rocks or almost anything else.

Will it be a "theme" tank?

Bill

Not sure what you mean by 'theme'. No little mermaids or anything inside, and the outside won't be painted in a Hawaiian theme either

Guess the theme will be very much like my old tank, mostly nature style, and alway influenced by biotopes. I would love to do a biotope, but it limits me in my options/creativity and I like it to be a bit more 'designed'. So wood with ferns and Anubias, Cryptocorynes and other small plants in front and stems in the back. Most important is I like it, but really keep my fish in consideration as well. They need to like it as well.

I'm setting up new scapes at least once a month on my work or at clients houses. So I ground my creativity that way So I want this to be low maintenance (read: slow growing) and it won't be changed every few months anymore.

 

[Yo-han]

Are there any better alternatives for heating my tank?

And would the extra 2x20W LED floodlight be enough or too much/little?

 

[Zapins]

Too little light. Heating maybe you could do an inline heater?

 

[Tugg]

I like the 3-4 heaters in the sump option. Its seems the safest. You could set then to an upper threshold and put them on a control so they wear evenly. If the controller sticks, then their internal thermostats will shutoff at the high mark.

Edit: I agree the LEDs will be too weak. There's a 125 that tried those and ended up outing T5s on it.

 

[Yo-han]

It's supplementing lighting. The 324W T5HO will be in the middle and will light the bottom all the way to the corners, but the upper half of the sides will be dark otherwise. And off course the lower halfs will be darker than the center as well. How many watt do I need per unit you guess?

 

[AaronT]

I love large built-in tanks too. I'm coming back around from loving rimless tanks as well. While I love the look, I also don't like the fact that fish constantly take what I have dubbed the "fatal leap of faith."

Have you ever kept Rasboroides vaterifloris? They are simply stunning and really good schoolers.

 

[Yo-han]

I love large built-in tanks too. I'm coming back around from loving rimless tanks as well. While I love the look, I also don't like the fact that fish constantly take what I have dubbed the "fatal leap of faith."

Have you ever kept Rasboroides vaterifloris? They are simply stunning and really good schoolers.

I agree, rimless tanks are still the most beautiful, but perhaps not the most practical.

About the Rasboroides, I've never seen them before in the Netherlands. Beautiful fish indeed!

 

[Zapins]

Rummy nose fish are really tight schoolers, though they are pretty expensive.

What fish leap out the tank Aaron? I think I've only had that happen once or twice ever.

I also prefer rimless, but those tanks are so much more expensive than normal tanks. Rimless and starfire glass hmmm..... yummy.

 

[PhilipS]

Impressive. The big tanks look even bigger when small fish are added.

The schools actually have room to harmonize (term?).

Doesn't LED penetrate deeper than Fluorescent lighting because it's concentrated in the downward?

With LED light strips you could have the whole tank surface exposed in view under the upper cabinets. Just use black pipes.

 

[niko]

Hm, a sump.

Why would you want a sump? Does this tank of yours also have one?
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...nt-club/92490-dutch-yo-face-5.html#post695394

What is it that you have seen with canister and other filters that you don't like?

To me if anyone will be doing a big tank like that they would be making a mistake to not go with a sump. Such size tanks need to be both clear of any equipment AND setup to the best of our knowledge/experience so algae are never a problem. We can play with small tanks all we want but algae in a big tank are a true nightmare.

 

[Yo-han]

What fish leap out the tank Aaron? I think I've only had that happen once or twice ever.

I've lost half my pencils jumping out, the remaining don't seem to be jump happy. All killifish are a no go. Dwarf rainbowfish can take a jump now and than. And when CO2 gets a little too high, you'll find 40 amano shrimps on the floor all over the house!

Hm, a sump.

Why would you want a sump? Does this tank of yours also have one?
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...nt-club/92490-dutch-yo-face-5.html#post695394

What is it that you have seen with canister and other filters that you don't like?

To me if anyone will be doing a big tank like that they would be making a mistake to not go with a sump. Such size tanks need to be both clear of any equipment AND setup to the best of our knowledge/experience so algae are never a problem. We can play with small tanks all we want but algae in a big tank are a true nightmare.

You mentioned it already. I want the main tank to be clear of equipment and I need a boatload of canister filters to get the filter volume I would like to have. 10 Canisters doesn't seem like easy maintenance either

The tank in questions doesn't have a sump unfortunately. It has only two large canister filters And flow is way too low, so I added a streamer, but all this means extra equipment in the tank and still no extra filter volume. esides that, Amano says a sump is the best, so definitely go for the sump

 

[niko]

What about a sand filter meant for pools as mechanical filtration? You can get a small one for about $250 off ebay and it will be enough for a tank way bigger than yours. These things are a mechanical filter that can make water crystal clear AND allows you to flush the filter as often as you want by just opening a valve.

The only thing that I think will be a problem is the motor. I am not sure if an Eheim Compact pump can run such a filter. The sand, when dirtied up, may have too much resistance. The pumps that are normally used with these filters are too big and noisy. But they are meant for huge volumes too - 10,000 gallons for example.

If you like to think that gurus mean what they are saying (like Amano and his comment about sumps) then you must have seen more than one huge tank on which Oliver Knot has uses two very big pool sand filters. Granted - these are tanks on which everything is overdone because they need to cover all bases since they are being serviced by someone that has to physically go there. But the setups make sense anyway.

Here's one that Knott made. There is another picture with two sand filters under a big tank. They are bigger than these orange ones - about 1 meter tall.

 

[AaronT]

Rummy nose fish are really tight schoolers, though they are pretty expensive.

What fish leap out the tank Aaron? I think I've only had that happen once or twice ever.

I also prefer rimless, but those tanks are so much more expensive than normal tanks. Rimless and starfire glass hmmm..... yummy.

Everything jumps out. I had 30 bloodfin tetras a few months ago. I now have 2. I don't keep schooling fish anymore because they just don't last.

 

[Yo-han]

I've seen the sand filters on his tanks. I asked Oliver about it but never had a reply.

Does anybody know what is in Amano's private sump? Or about the filtration from the large tanks in the Sumida tower?

 

[niko]

Eh, you expect useful details from these people? You are a very, very nice guy. Bottom line is - most of Knotts tanks have serious filtration - especially mechanical. But not all. I believe that it is all in how everything is maintained, not in what piece of equipment is used or what fertilizer is being added or not added.

For years ADG in Houston, Texas (http://www.aquariumdesigngroup.com) ran planted tanks for very generous clients in a very straighforward way - their own mix of rich substrate capped with inert gravel, CO2, and always the same type of lights. Zero water column fertilization. Pretty puny canister filters and very bad flow rate and flow pattern. Zero testing of parameters. Their tanks stayed clean - with extremely high paying clients you got to be the best and ADG were and will always be. Houston is a huge town and you can not afford to visit every tank every other day. How did they keep all these tanks clean I do not know but it is all in how it is done, not about equipment, parameters, and ferts. After they paired up with Amano they started using his system but often it was obvious they also did whatever is practical. These days they are about to come up with their own line of everything planted tank and we will all see the same thing - whatever is popular in the internet as a way to run a planted tank is not what they do and advise. Including some of ADA's approaches/products.

Amano has a single published diagram of the sump at his house. It is full of bioballs from all things. I do not recall seeing mechanical filtration. But keep in mind - this entire "big tank surrounded by a pond I designed outside" is part of the marketing. Naturally there is a lot of interest how the big tank works. Naturally we will not know the whole story. A nice, simple, clean Japanese diagram is what we get.