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120cm new scape

flygja

flygja

Member
Joined
12 Mar 2008
Messages
1,260
Location
Penang, Malaysia
My new project for this year :) I'm designing it as a low-ish maintenance tank for a few pairs of discus and some other dither fish. So no stems for this one :rolleyes:

120 x 50 x 50cm 300L
DIY LED lighting with 10x Cree XML 10W
Eheim 2217 and Fluval 405

Plant list includes:
Cryptocoryne wendtii "green"
Cryptocoryne wendtii "brown"
Cryptocoryne nevillii
Cryptocoryne cordata
Aponogeton crispus
Barclaya longifolia "red"
Anubias barteri var coffeefolia
Anubias barteri var nana
Vallisneria nana
Cyperus helferi
Bolbitis heudelotii "mini"
Microsorum pteropus "mini"
Microsorum pteropus "narrow"
Lilaeopsis braziliensis
Fontinalis antipyretica (Willow moss)

No prizes for where the inspiration came from. Arches and middle open spaces are IN! :D

DSC02739.jpg
 
Nice, I'll be interested to see how you go with this as I've just given up with plants in my discus tank, could never seem to keep it clean enough with a lot of plant mass as they can be quite messy fish
 
I'm loving the scape so far, would love to be able to do something like that in mine.
just need to build up the motivation and get started.
Have you weighed the wood down with rocks? or has it been soaked previously?
 
+1 for the hardscape, looks excellent so far.
Im intrigued too about the wood and how it is held in position. Does it simply stand in the substrate and hold, or is it a complicated construction of soil and rock to get everything to stay put?
Ady.
 
Thanks all for the comments, I'll try to answer all your questions in this post, if I miss any please let me know. The wood is normal Malaysian driftwood which I have collected over the years. I have been planning this tank for a LONG time so everytime I drop by at an LFS, I'd take a look at the driftwood collection to find some interesting pieces that aren't too expensive. There are gems here and there. Most of the wood is quite heavy and doesn't float. I do secure them as best as I can with rocks and subtrate.

About the DIY LEDs, its very similar to the 15x 3W Cree XR-E unit I made a while ago, seen here http://ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f= ... 30#p180248. This one's made up of 10x 10W Cree XM-L LEDs. I'll provide more details about them in another post.

Why two filter outlets? I have two filters running thats why! :) Fluval 405 and Eheim 2217, both using their in-box installation kit.
 
The plants arrived today! All nicely bagged and packaged. I ordered these from Aquashop. Kinda nice to have almost all the plants at one time to plant :D I know you guys in the UK usually so that but this is only my second time ordering plants online. The plants were all healthy, particularly the Cryptocoryne wendtii brown (left-most), cordata (middle) and neviilli (right-most) which were bursting with plantlets outside the actual pot.
DSC02750.jpg


Here it is being filled up slowly. Took almost an hour to fill up 300L without disturbing too much of the substrate.
DSC02752.jpg


And here it is fully filled. I forgot to rinse the filter media before putting them into the filter so when I switched it on, it instantly became sintered glass soup :D
DSC02753.jpg


OK, I'm beat. It's 11.30pm here and I have to get up at 6 to go to work. Comments are most welcome.
 
harper said:
Nice, I'll be interested to see how you go with this as I've just given up with plants in my discus tank, could never seem to keep it clean enough with a lot of plant mass as they can be quite messy fish
Click to expand...

This is really uncharted territory for me. Ever since I started aquascaping, my ultimate goal was to create a discus show tank. And 4 years later, here's the realisation of that dream. Felipe Olivera can do it, and he did it with wild Heckels, so I hope I can too. I won't be going for wild ones though, just too expensive for the limited experience I have.

I had originally planned for a full Lilaeopsis braziliensis carpet but decided to go with white sand and a horde of cories for clean-up instead. Figured that'd be cleaner. And... easier to convert to a full carpet later rather than the other way around :lol:
 
Thanks Harry!

For those who asked about my DIY LEDs, I didn't take any pictures using my usual camera, just with my phone, so please excuse the blurry pictures below. I don't have many either, will answer all questions as best as I can.

LEDs: http://dx.com/xmlawt-1000-lumen-led-emi ... 3-5v-51989
LED drivers: http://dx.com/3-0a-100w-power-constant- ... 306?item=1

The DIY lumimaire consists of 2 lengths of aluminium profile mounted on atop the other. This one's called rectangular open-backed here. It makes a sort of C-shape if its lying on its side. They are joined together using screws and bolts.
IMAG0098.jpg


The reason why I need 2 joined together is so that I can run cooling fans on the top and mount the LEDs on the bottom piece. Here it is with the fan holes cut and fans mounted. They are regular 12V DC fans and will be powered by a separate 9V DC adapter. I run them at 9V to keep the noise level down.
IMAG0145.jpg


Two of these are then joined together with some extra aluminium profiles to form 2 rows of LEDs.
IMAG0146.jpg


Here's the test run after I wired all the LEDs. I could have drilled holes in the bottom piece to hide the wiring, but it was too fiddly for me :lol:
IMAG0149.jpg


The LEDs are wired in series (+ve of one is connected to negative of next one) as the LED driver supports up to 36V. Each LED is ~3.3-3.4V so 10 of them in series makes up 33-34V - just nice. The luminaire gets warm to the touch, but not hot to hurt. I would prefer to run it a little cooler but haven't figured out how.

The LED driver itself has a heatsink underneath but it does run really hot, so I put it in a plastic box with ventilation holes and a small fan mounted on the top.
 
:wideyed: Good lord buddy,...you're like our malaysian version of Handy Manny,... :lol: I would have never been able to come up with such a DIY system. Nice one flygja.
 
Thanks Faizal. I think its still a hack-n-slash job and doesn't look elegant enough at the moment. Haven't found anyone who knows how to work aluminium (cheaply) to make me a luminaire.

The water has cleared up after a waterchange during the weekend. Added Echninodorus cordifolius to the back left corner.
DSC02755.jpg


A closer view of the right side.
DSC02756.jpg


And of the left.
DSC02757.jpg


Here's the piece of folded yoga mat used to hold the aquasoil back. Once the plants grow in more, it should just disappear. I learnt it from one of Amano's videos, the one where he scaped the 180cm x 180cm cube.
DSC02758.jpg
 
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