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The Shed Tank

greenink

Member
Joined
2 May 2011
Messages
944
Location
London
So it's been a while...

I’ve had a couple of journals before. Here’s the ‘transparent tank’ showing the journey from the moment I knew nothing at all, found ukaps and managed to make something half-decent. Here’s the ‘bookcase tank’, a 259 litre effort from when I’d learned a bit more. And here’s a sort of aborted 'matchstick brink' one in a tiny tank that looked lovely to start with and never got enough attention (or even any water!)

The advice I’ve got on this forum has been incredible, and it seems somehow amazing that the two proper 'bookcase' and 'transparent' journals have been looked at 50,000 times, and that both are in the top 15 threads across all of ukaps. I’ve learned a lot more than I expected too: about aesthetics, chemistry, biology, botany, DIY techniques, a jumble of other random things, and the odd titbit about fish too.

So this is the big, final, do-it-properly journal.

The one that starts with architectural drawings, planning permission applications and getting the builders in. (I kid you not). The one that tries to think things through properly, so life down the line is a lot easier. The one with some nifty gizmos and ways of doing things.

I hope this journal will be as useful to people as I can make it. It’s going to digress a lot, but hopefully take the time to explain things in a clear way.

It’s worth saying at the outset that this whole approach was inspired a lot by Tony Swinney’s set-up. It’s taken a lot longer to do than I’d thought… which is why I haven’t posted anything on here for about a year.

The first few posts are going to fast forward over the period of about a year. And then it’s going to settle down into a normal journal. So here we go...
 
Good to see you back :) Looking forward to this
 
Subscribed!! Good luck.
 
So: here are the drawings I gave the builders.

11502948963_921b6665bc_z.jpg

The basic idea was to have a tank mounted flush with the wall, with a large flap that lifts up on the inside for feeding and access, and then basically an insulated ‘shed’ built onto the outside of the house that contains all the fishtank related paraphenalia and wotsits.

The custom-built optiwhite tank is the best dimensions I could think of: 55cm high, 58cm deep, 140cm wide. A grand total of 440 litres when filled. Enough depth from front to back to get proper perspective. Enough height to bank soil right up and still grow meaningful stems. Small enough to be able to reach in everywhere comfortable. Small enough to clean easily. Two sliding glass panel lids to stop condensation and fish jumping. It’s not an open-top kind of deal...

The shed is the clever bit. Insulated walls, doors and roof, with a built-in drain, dedicated electrical sockets for lights, and a thermostatic tap set permanently to 23 degrees to make water changes as quick and painless as possible. (I’ve been fine with London tap water heated by the boiler so far, and don’t see a need to change...) High enough to not need to bend over, and suspend lights well above the surface if I need to.

Here are the foundations going in. Every fish tank should have it’s own foundations...

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And here’s a bit more building work.

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More soon...
 
This looks promising...


From Alex - Internet names may vary. Comment not fit for human consumption. Contains small parts.
 
That's dedication Mike...Which came first the tank or the extension?

Some things are best left unspoken.

I'll tell my girlfriend this "fact".

Rather you than me... Maybe stress the advantages of no water in the house, no buckets, that kind of thing first?
 
I saw in another forum, someone who had an "aquarium shed", he had mains water but didn't have a drain connected to the sewer. So he fitted a large butt to collect waste water from the tanks and fitted sink, and a pump that pumped waste water to a "large spray bar" (ie very long pipe with holes in) mounted on his garden fence. Thus waste water watered the garden. Also had another butt for prepping and heating RO water, again waste watering the garden.
 
So here’s the final bits of building work coming together, and the tank in place.

15635200778_cf54304377_b.jpg

15820620655_31c74e8d3c_b.jpg
Learned a lot from my previous ‘in the wall tank’ that you need a much bigger ‘flip top lid’ than you’d expect, and that it needs to be properly weighted with cupboard supports so it stays open. So some ikea kitchen cupboard hinges are in there...
 
#Hardware
The hardware is all recycled from my old tanks, and basically a collection of what I’ve found works best for me and accumulated over the years. Heres a shot of the inside of the cupboard.

15202274714_e8b717d007_b.jpg

So what’s that stuff?

CO2 diffuser - AM1000 reactor, set up inline after the filter, filled with customised trifle-layers of filter sponge and filter media. The best diffusion I’ve been able to manage. Results in crystal clear water and never clogs, so you get a constant CO2 rate for months. And with this filling, it’s completely silent. I’ve tried pretty much every other option, and keep coming back to this.

15635837940_235b04b690_b.jpgIMG_4404 by greenink@ukaps, on Flickr

CO2 supply - 3.5kg bottles of CO2 from London Beer Gas. Cheapest suppliers I can find, delivered to your doorstep the next day. One bottle on the canister, one spare so I never run out unexpectedly.

CO2 guage and solenoid - cheap and cheerful stuff from ebay. Never had a problem.

Heater - Hydor 1000. Lovely, set to 23 degrees. It doesn’t need to work too hard because of the insulation and the thermostatic tap.

Fertiliser - to start with, osmocote granuales under molar clay. On an ongoing basis, a DIY estimative index mix, made up in big 3.5l supermarket milk cartons, and then pumped in once a day using a cheap chinese automated dosing pump. Perfect fert dosage, requires about 15 minutes work every few months to make a new batch of fertiliser.

15823797942_f2ca0f298e_b.jpg

70% water changes, once or twice a week - Turn off the filters. Pop an old eheim filter inlet over the top with a hose out to the shed drain. Leave it to siphon 70% of the water to the bottom of the inlet. Scrape the glass a bit with an old credit card, rub the leaves a bit to get rid of any residue, and waft around inside to disturb sediment. Go and do something else for bit. Then come back, pop in two capfuls of Seachem Prime, turn on the thermostatic tap, and go and have a cup of tea. When it’s full, switch off the tap. Done. No buckets, attaching hoses, sorting temperature or any of that nonsense. No drips inside the house. Hopefully this will mean I do the kind of regular water changes that seem to be the pretty much essential regime for a decent planted tank.

Filters - one Eheim Pro 3e 2078, doing 1850 lph. One Eheim 2073 doing 1050 lph. Both totally reliable, lovely things, with the filter media that comes in the box. No purigen to start with, but I might get tempted at some point, to give that final ‘polish’ to the water. The big one powers the heater and AM1000. The little one gets to do its own thing. Together, these give about 7 * turnover an hour flow.

Powerhead - a standard Hydor Koralia evo one. I’ve tried to do tanks without these in the past, but prepared to accept it for one this size. At some point I’ll probably remove it and see if I can cope without, but for the start, I’ll accept. This adds another 1150 lph turnover an hour.

Overall, with both filters and powerhead, that’s about 9.5 * turnover an hour in terms of flow. Given that most people here say 10 * is about enough, I’ve got room to spare.

Inlets - all DIY acrylic with a pipe bending spring, a paint stripping gun and a saw. Cost almost nothing and I now have loads of them. Really recommend doing this.

15819007841_2d018ff020_b.jpgIMG_4390 by greenink@ukaps, on Flickr

Drop checkers - just cheap ones from ebay.

Lighting - three TMC Tropical Grobeam 1500 tiles, suspended on a rail, with adjustable height. (I had these sent back to sort out the high pitched whine, and now they work great.) One Grobeam 500 strip mounted towards the front of the tank to catch iridiesence from fish and reflect if forwards, and give a more evening kind of feel as the lights dim. Also a four bar, pretty standard, spare luminaire mounted high up and out of the way, towards the back, that can be switched on to provide extra light for proper photos.

Backdrop - one black roller blind, one light blue roller blind, mounted in the ceiling of the shed, about 20cm behind the back of the tank. Takes about 20 seconds to change the backdrop, and it’s far enough behind to reflect light back into the tank from additional photography lighting to give a sense of even more depth.

A plastic crate full of the usual gubbins, tweezers, scissors, flotsam and jetsam.

And a lovely little light wired in under the tank so I can see what’s going on.

Camera. (I think this is pretty much part of the kit!) Canon EOS 600D, with the cheap 50mm Canon prime lens that is just brilliant and shoots at about a stop lighter than anything else. (Also a 15-70mm prime lense for other shots, but I don’t use this that much.) Infra-red remote for taking pictures while also getting fish to shoal by waving something big above the tank. Tripod.
 
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#Hardscape

I’ve long been a fan of fine-grain bonsai molar clay. It’s available in great big bags from bonsai places.

15200928884_ec032c9d50_b.jpgIMG_5269 by greenink@ukaps, on Flickr

Rinse it in the bag and it leaves no sediment in the tank. Pop a bit of slow-release fertiliser underneath, like osmocote, and then pour it in. Gets better with age as it absorbs nutrients and basically stores them for plants, while allowing good circulation. (Think ADA Aqua Soil with DIY nutrients). It’s all to do with it’s cation exchange properties. Plus it’s seriously cheap.

Here is the osmocote going in to the tank.

15635478968_f36b4b3d92_b.jpgIMG_5270 by greenink@ukaps, on Flickr

Have tried various different stones in the past, and decided that I’m just going to be unoriginal and use the lovely Seiryu stone that just always looks great. Haven’t found anything else that has the same fine-grained detail of texture that makes so much difference for a sense of scale.

Took the plunge and bought a few bits here and there over a while. That way it doesn’t seem so expensive. Sort of. How can stones cost that much? Seriously.

Here they are just bunged into the tank, so you can see how much stone there is.

15797228016_430907446f_b.jpgIMG_5272 by greenink@ukaps, on Flickr

Expensive. They are nice though.
 
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#Plants

So here’s the bucket that got dredged from my last tank, and left to fester in a trug in the garden for a good few months.

15636706589_f50e6ee794_b.jpgIMG_5321 by greenink@ukaps, on Flickr

It’s mainly Lilaeopsis brasiliensis, Hemianthus micranthemoides and Marsilea hirsuita. Tiny bit of Stuarogyne repens. One lonely Cryptocoryne (which I think is wendtii). A bit of moss, though not sure whether it’s mostly Fissidens fontanus or mostly Vesicularia dubyana. All a bit mixed together though. Hopeful that mess will give it a nice, lived in, natural look when it’s planted out.

Slightly depressingly, this lot totally loved being left completely alone in a bucket of rainwater for months. Tripled in volume, no algae at all.

Just shows.

So that left me with a good plant mass to start with. Next up... layout.
 
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