# Supernova - from eBay to NA



## squid102 (7 Sep 2013)

I've just had the phone call from Natural Aquario in Portugal to say that my tank is on its way! I can't promise that this will be a pretty tank or that it will be problem free. I'm sure that at some point someone will say 'the problem is your lights/flow/co2/substrate/plants/fish/water/fertilisers' (delete those not applicable) At some point it will need the use of a sledgehammer. I'm looking forward to that bit.

It's called Supernova for want of a better name because I think that's what 108w of LEDs is going to look like in my sitting room. 'From eBay' because it's going to replace our £15 ebay tank that has become really tatty. Ok, it was tatty when I bought it. But what a bargain!

Tank: NA 90cm x 45cm x 50cm
Lighting: NA SUN LED 6 x 18w led strips
Filtration: 2 x Eheim 2217 (aka Classic 600)
Heater: Hyder external 300w
Fertilisation: EI
Co2: Easy Carbo and FE/pub bottle pressurised to 3 tanks
BOC 8500 regulator
Glassware from ebay and co2art

Plants: I'll mostly be using ones I already have so crypts, anubias sp., staurogyne repens, pogostomon helferi, HC, micranthemum sp. Monte Carlo. 

Some of them are growing emersed but not too well. I think I cooked them at some point and the greenfly aren't helping.


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## Gary Nelson (7 Sep 2013)

A great name and I will be looking forward to seeing more - you have some great kit arriving


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## squid102 (7 Sep 2013)

Up to now I've done everything on the cheap and diy but not been satisfied with the results. For me, diy co2 = algae! But rather than keep patching up a scratched tank with rusting hinges, inadequate filter, no co2 I decided to take the plunge. Going from 3 non-co2 tanks to 3 high tech tanks is going to be quite an adventure!


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## Ben Hooper (7 Sep 2013)

Seems like more then enough filtration there!


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## squid102 (7 Sep 2013)

The 120l tank it is replacing has a Fluval 204 filter. The Fluval 204 and I have a love hate relationship without the love bit.


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## Ben Hooper (7 Sep 2013)

Seems many people have that issue, I got an Eheim so haven't had that love hate issue


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## Lindy (7 Sep 2013)

We will look out our sunglasses for all the watts of lighting


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## Nice (8 Sep 2013)

squid102 said:


> It's called Supernova for want of a better name because I think that's what 108w of LEDs is going to look like in my sitting room. 'From eBay' because it's going to replace our £15 ebay tank that has become really tatty. Ok, it was tatty when I bought it. But what a bargain!


 

Looking forward to see this setup.

But let me tell you that i've seen this light unit live, and it is amazing. It is so powerful that can't look straight to it for a long time.

Just comparing ELOS e-lite3 has got 54,60W. NA just doubles it.

ELOS led efficiency is 83Lm/w while NA is 105 lm/W, not only NA has more power it also has more lumen (it emits more light).

Comparing with ADA AQUASKY602 witch is the most powerfull ADA has, it have 5700 lumen total, well has got NA has got 11340 lumen total.

In the end what i really wanna say it that i wish i have 1 and you made a good choice.




squid102 said:


> Filtration: 2 x Eheim 2217 (aka Classic 600)


 

Well 1 will be more than enought, there is no need of using 2 what so ever



squid102 said:


> Co2: Easy Carbo


 
There is no need to use, if your CO2 bottle system is good.

cheers wish you luck.
.


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## squid102 (8 Sep 2013)

The tank is 182l. A single Eheim 2217 has a flow of 1000lph so to get 10x flow I would need to supplement with a powerhead at least. Then I spotted another 2217 on Gumtree for £25 and I thought "That will do!" But I can't decide on lily pipes or spray bar. I'm leaning towards a spray bar. It should be easier to make.


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## squid102 (12 Sep 2013)

It's arrived! We're really impressed with the quality and we still can't tell if the veneer is real oak or not. I can't set it up until we have moved the other tank and its inhabitants out of the way. It will have to wait for the weekend as it involves moving 5 pieces of furniture, 3 tanks and a 3' dolls house. If the cabinet looks a bit shorter than normal that's because it is. I'm too short for their normal height cabinet so they kindly offered to make me a smaller one. At the normal height the top of the tank would have been level with my nose!




 

I'm a little confused about the lights though. The website says "You can set all the light individually with a timer." I took this to mean that there would be an individual plug or control over each of the 6 led strips. But there are 2 plugs. One with 3 thin black wires going into it and one with 2 black and one yellow and green wire. I guess I won't know until I plug them in. I'll post more pictures when it is set up.


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## Nice (12 Sep 2013)

Hello

Great, you got to show us more photos please.

Yes, it kind of confuses the idea when they say it is individually controlled. But it does not make much send to control lamp by lamp. What can you grow with 1 lamp only? nothing . But i going to tell them about this misguiding statement on the website.

So it seams you can make 0 lights, 50% light, and 100% light, that is what you can control.


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## squid102 (14 Sep 2013)

It is now confirmed - you can have 3 led bulbs/strips or all 6. And yes, it does look like a supernova! This is with 3 bulbs:



 

With 6 bulbs:



 

None:



 

But sometimes I hate my house. We moved the tank after this photo and thought we'd got it level but filling it up to test for leaks proved otherwise.


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## Ben Hooper (15 Sep 2013)

Looks great, need to change the bulbs in those wall units over to white


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## squid102 (22 Sep 2013)

Getting closer to setting up. I now have my rocks! I didn't want to spend silly money on them so went down my local landscaper's and bought some big chunks of green granite for 30p/kg. So for just over a tenner I have:



 

Sledgehammer time!


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## Alastair (22 Sep 2013)

Plastic shims off ebay will level that tank out. Or snap off wedges 
http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=360697327414

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk 2


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## squid102 (22 Sep 2013)

Alastair said:


> Plastic shims off ebay will level that tank out. Or snap off wedges
> http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&id=360697327414



We put a strip of 5mm thick board under one in the end that seems to have levelled it. We're now looking at how to modify the light to reduce the light spill onto my chair. I put the propagator in there with some of the emersed plants but within the first hour it had given me a light induced migraine, even at half strength. We think we might be able to tilt the light backwards so the tank will still get as much light but my eyeballs won't.

When I called it Supernova it was because my husband would always shield his eyes when I had the hood up on the old tank and I thought he might moan about this one. I didn't expect that I would be the one to have a problem with it!


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## George Farmer (22 Sep 2013)

Hi Lydia,

Lovely looking set-up. 

I'm thinking about going for the 65cm with the same lighting.

Can you do me a favour and put something red in the tank so we can see the colour rendition, please? 

Have you tried running the light unit with LED tubes missing to reduce the overall output?

You can always raise it further from the tank but then light spill increases. :/

Cheers,
George


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## squid102 (22 Sep 2013)

Ooh look! My staurogyne repens is fruiting!



 



 

The stuffed doorstop is naturally faded. We don't seem to have many red things.


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## George Farmer (22 Sep 2013)

Excellent! Thank you.


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## squid102 (22 Sep 2013)

These photos are with half the bulbs being used. I'm not sure I'll ever need to use all of them. I haven't tried removing bulbs but it wouldn't alter the spill of the light anyway. It's like someone shining a torch in your eyes. It doesn't matter whether it's three torches or one, it's still uncomfortable. I think I just need to angle the light back a bit.

The colour rendition is a very crisp white. It's 8500k but seems to show most colours well, as you can see in the photos. I won't be able to tell further until I plant it up, and I have to make the pipe work first.


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## squid102 (3 Oct 2013)

I finally got my solenoid attached to the regulator yesterday thanks to a very helpful man in Reading. 

It has been a long and boring saga to get to this point and I eventually ended up at the BOC retail place in Reading. They didn't have an easy method of attaching the solenoid but directed me to Reading Pneumatics instead. I went down there, saw a small sign that included the words pneumatics and regulators and went into this small warehouse. I put my pile of bits on the counter and 10 minutes and 99p later had it all put together! He even sealed all the joints for me!

It was only when I left the building that I noticed it wasn't Reading Pnuematics, they were 2 units further along! So a big thank-you to SB Services (pneumatics) Ltd and if I ever need a manufacturer of pneumatically operated float valves, I know where to find them!

Anyway, this is my assembled collection of shiny stuff:


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## sa80mark (3 Oct 2013)

Regulator porn


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## squid102 (9 Oct 2013)

I've managed to reduce the glare from the light by modifying it slightly. I used the spare wire tail to hook up the back corners to tilt the light backwards. The main beam still goes into the tank but no longer into my eyes where I sit.



 

The rocks have now been reduced in size in a very amusing "Go on, just whack it!" session. Here they are for scale it the cardboard mock tank. My tips for anyone else considering their own "Go on, just whack!" session are
1) wear protective eye glasses
2) the bigger the rock, the harder it is to break
3) know when to stop



 

To be honest, I'm struggling a little to come up with a scape I like. I know roughly what I want - a fairly steep slope, sand at the front and path up to the back, some wood in it somewhere. Here is the wood I have. It is all seasoned oak. I'll finish stripping the bark when I know which bits I want. They are too big at the moment but I can't decide where to cut.



 

This is how far I've got. There are another 3 big rocks not used. I think we may need another "Go on, just whack it!" session.



 

I don't think the big rock on the left will leave enough scope for planting in front of it and I'm not sure about the upright bit on the wood. The polystyrene won't be used in the final scape because I'll use smaller supports. I don't want to put the big rocks straight onto the cat litter because it will end up as powder!


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## Aquamaniac Fishtanks (9 Oct 2013)

How today I just read about NA portugal. I never heard of them.
And I am portuguese.
Your light unit looks great.
That regulator too? But wanting to do the same to be able to plug all my tanks to one system.
And the rocks look like could turn into a good scape with a bit more work.
Will check how this goes. 

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk now Free


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## clone (10 Oct 2013)

Nice tank so far what are the woods you plan to use. Is that cherry and Vine?


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## clone (10 Oct 2013)

And yeah thats Reg porn baby......


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## squid102 (10 Oct 2013)

clone said:


> Nice tank so far what are the woods you plan to use. Is that cherry and Vine?


They are all seasoned oak. It takes ages to strip the bark.


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## Nice (11 Oct 2013)

Now i am quite curious how tall you are. I don't get the light on my eyes at all, and i am 1,75cm tall.

i like the wood you choose.


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## squid102 (11 Oct 2013)

Nice said:


> Now i am quite curious how tall you are. I don't get the light on my eyes at all, and i am 1,75cm tall.



I am 20cm/8 inches shorter than you. I get the light in my eyes when I am sat in my chair in the evening, not standing. This is also why NA made me a smaller cabinet.

The big curved bit of wood was originally my inspiration but now that I have made a cardboard practice tank and put the rocks in, it's just not working how I had imagined. I started getting different ideas through the fog at about 5am this morning and am going to work on it today.


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## squid102 (11 Oct 2013)

Work in progress.


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## krazypara3165 (11 Oct 2013)

I think that's a vast improvement! I wasn't a big fan of the wood. my only criticism is the 4 rocks at the very front just don't look right......... however I am terribly useless at aquascaping!


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## squid102 (11 Oct 2013)

You shouldn't see too much of those 4 rocks once they have plants and moss around them. There will be sand Infront of them. All the rocks along the front will be raised off the bottom slightly because I have 2 stiphodons and it won't matter how much I tell them not to, they WILL burrow under them!


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## squid102 (11 Oct 2013)

I think this is about as far as I want to progress outside of the tank now that I have the basic framework and know which bits of wood to de-bark.


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## squid102 (14 Oct 2013)

Over the past couple of days I've been making the acrylic inflow pipes and spray bar. My aim was to be as minimalist as possible. Which meant no suckers, a single full length spray bar to serve both filters and no flexible tubing outside of the cabinet. In the end I did use two small pieces of tubing so that the angle of the spray bar can be adjusted and it can be removed for cleaning. 

Equipment used:
13/10 acrylic pipe (spray bar and outlet)
16/12 acrylic pipe (inflow)
10mm silicone rod
12mm silicone rod
Olive oil
142g tin of Sainsburys tomato purée
Paint stripping gun (hot air)
Gloves

The silicone rod was fantastic. I used it inside the tube so that the tube could be bent without flattening. The olive oil was to lubricate the silicone. it also acted as an indicator to show when the right temperature was getting closer as it went from smooth to broken up into smaller drops. It was also useful when I bent it in the wrong place and had to reheat it. As the acrylic got soft again, the silicone natural tried to softly straighten.

The tomato purée tin was the perfect size to bend the tubing around for all but the tightest bends.

The hardest bit was an identical but mirror image set for the other end. The spray bar has a small pellet of cling film in the middle to stop the flows from the two filters from clashing. The ends of the inflow pipes are open as they will have shrimp guards on them.

This was the result:


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## Alastair (14 Oct 2013)

Very nice squid. They look very professional


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## Wallace (14 Oct 2013)

Very very nice, very professional looking. As they are one pice though, excl. the spraybar, are they not gonna be a bit of a bitch to clean?


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## squid102 (14 Oct 2013)

Wallace said:


> Very very nice, very professional looking. As they are one pice though, excl. the spraybar, are they not gonna be a bit of a bitch to clean?



No problem! The longest piece is about 1m in length and I bought the 1.5m Eheim cleaning brush which goes through easily. I've already had to clean them all to get the olive oil out.


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## Wallace (14 Oct 2013)

squid102 said:


> No problem! The longest piece is about 1m in length and I bought the 1.5m Eheim cleaning brush which goes through easily. I've already had to clean them all to get the olive oil out.



Fair enough. I'd love to have a go at this myself when I start my new 80cm tank over the next few months. Not sure I've got the skills though. 


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## squid102 (14 Oct 2013)

I did have a practice by making some new pipework for my puffer tank first. The trick is patience. Heat slowly but always keep the heat moving. If you stay still and heat an area too quickly, it blisters. Keep heating until it becomes quite flexible because if you try to force it you end up with an uneven curve and/or stress lines.


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## tim (15 Oct 2013)

Acrylic pipe work looks very professional, where did you order the silicone rod from ? Do you have a link pls


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## squid102 (16 Oct 2013)

I ordered the silicone rod from Polymax.

The acrylic tube came from The Plastic Shop.


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## squid102 (20 Oct 2013)

Well, here it is, at its best before flooding. At its best before everything started to go wrong. 




 

So what went wrong I hear you ask. Surprisingly, forgetting to rinse the cat litter didn't cause a problem. I had thought that the wood was quite secure, but no. As soon as the cat litter became saturated the wood just fell over dislodging all the crypts. It's still not secure and I need to work out how to do that. Then there was all the plants that floated out of the cat litter. I replanted those but then when the filters were switched on that dislodged another set. 

The last straw was the leaking pipework in the cabinet.  It would seem that fitting an Eheim 16/12 tube into a 22/16 tube, sealing with silicone and a jubilee clip still does not create a water tight seal. So here it is flooded, complete with crypt floating across the front!





Setting up the co2 will just have to wait until tomorrow. I've had enough frustration for one day.


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## squid102 (30 Oct 2013)

Now 9 days post-flood. I screwed the wood to some pieces of slate to keep them in position but then had to completely rebuild the right hand end of the tank to get them in place. 





The cat litter has been a nightmare and I would not use it again out of choice. It is too light to hold anything in place and I have had plants pulling free all week. I would like to brush the fine dust off some of the leaves but just touching a plant can be enough to dislodge it.

The crypts are all melting but will hopefully recover. I thought I had killed all the giant willow moss so cut most of it away but have just noticed a couple of new green shoots! Everything else seems to be starting to grow well, if they can stay secured. Except maybe the utricularia. I reduced the lighting after about 5 days by putting on the glass cover and adding a couple of sheets of clear polythene. I've also put a small piece of card directly over the utricularia to add extra shade just to that area. 



 

Current plant list:
Fontinalis antipyretica var. gigantea (giant willow moss)
Vesicularia ferriei 'Weeping' 
Staurogyne repens
Eleocharis parviflorus (hairgrass)
Echinodorus tenellus
Echinodorus latifolius
Lemna trisulca (ivy leaved duckweed)
Anubias sp.
Cryptocoryne wendtii
Other crypt sp.
Lobelia cardinalis
Hemianthemum 'Monte Carlo'
Hemianthus calitrichoides 'Cuba'
Glossostigma elatinoides
Micranthemum umbrosum
Pogostemon erectus
Pogostemon helferi
Hygrophila polysperma
Fissidens fontanus 
Riccardia chamedryfolia
Hydrocotyle tripartita
Microsorum pteropus
Microsorum pteropus 'Narrow'
Ludwigia natans

Wow! I didn't realise it was that many!


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## Nice (30 Oct 2013)

The tank is looking good, i believe it will be a good surprise at the end this tank.

keep posting and keep updating...


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## squid102 (2 Nov 2013)

This is getting tiresome.  Five plants floating today.



 

I'm considering removing the top inch or so of cat litter and capping it with something heavier. It will be a bit of a pain, especially with the disturbance to the glossostigma and the hemianthemum but probably easier now than later. Any suggestions?


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## tim (2 Nov 2013)

Cat litter is very light unfortunately but if you cap it, it has a tendency to end up above the new substrate with moving/ uprooting plants and sometimes gravel cleaning as the roots of the plants develop it becomes easier to clean them, patience is key although very frustrating, on the whole I think your scapes looking good


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## squid102 (2 Nov 2013)

So stick with it then? 

I had another thought after posting. I have lots of little shards of granite from the sledgehammer sessions. They're a bit razor sharp but we have an old kids rock tumbler in the garage that could be used to take the sharp edges off. If I sprinkle those round the bases of the plants then it might be enough to stop them spontaneously uprooting.


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## tim (2 Nov 2013)

squid102 said:


> So stick with it then?
> 
> I had another thought after posting. I have lots of little shards of granite from the sledgehammer sessions. They're a bit razor sharp but we have an old kids rock tumbler in the garage that could be used to take the sharp edges off. If I sprinkle those round the bases of the plants then it might be enough to stop them spontaneously uprooting.


That may work, long as you don't mind picking the bits out once the plants are settled I used these 	  JBL Plantis Plant Anchors | Aquarium Supplies	 when I couldn't get some blyxa to stay planted, that was cat litter too, seems to get heavier and less troublesome over time.


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## squid102 (21 Nov 2013)

A minor disaster! I came home from work today to the news that three of the clips for the glass lid had sheered off when my daughter was putting the lid back on, plunging the sheet of glass into the tank! 

Fortunately, the bits of wood stopped it from hitting the rocks and she managed to grab it before it could smash. Phew!


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## OllieNZ (21 Nov 2013)

squid102 said:


> A minor disaster! I came home from work today to the news that three of the clips for the glass lid had sheered off when my daughter was putting the lid back on, plunging the sheet of glass into the tank!
> 
> Fortunately, the bits of wood stopped it from hitting the rocks and she managed to grab it before it could smash. Phew!


I had the same thing happen to me, except I wasn't so lucky. I ended up making metal ones.


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## squid102 (21 Nov 2013)

OllieNZ said:


> I had the same thing happen to me, except I wasn't so lucky. I ended up making metal ones.


Was that the NA ones too?


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## OllieNZ (21 Nov 2013)

squid102 said:


> Was that the NA ones too?


No just some siliconed on bits of arcylic they held up the plastic lids ok but when I had glass ones made the extra weight was to much I guess. Have you seen the ada brackets? I made something similar and now my cat sleeps on top without falling in.


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## squid102 (21 Nov 2013)

Yes, I remember reading that thread. I shall still feed this failure back to NA though. The tank has only been in operation for 4 weeks so I am a bit disappointed.


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## OllieNZ (21 Nov 2013)

squid102 said:


> Yes, I remember reading that thread. I shall still feed this failure back to NA though. The tank has only been in operation for 4 weeks so I am a bit disappointed.


Definitely do, any decent manufacturer should be interested in product failures as it may indicate a bad batch or that a redesign is required.


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## James D (22 Nov 2013)

Sounds like you're having a bit of bad luck mate, it still looks good though! I used to find one or two stems of Ammania floating round my tank every morning but once they put down some roots they stayed put (that was in amazonia).

I'm not surprised those clips broke, I've got a little device that lets you see the stress points in acrylic and laser cut, sharp internal corners tend to be really weak. I could cut some for you with bigger radius' if you like but metal ones would be far superior.


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