Ideal Water Parameters

[ian_m]

How to inject CO2 with two filters and two spray bars.

 

[Edvet]

spray bars

In general best configuration is having them blowing acros the surface ( just below) from back to front, with force ( lots of post on the forum about this), so you get circular flow, down the front, low from front to back, up the back.

 

[Zeus.]

One issue with hard water is it's pH can be above 7.0pH even with a 1.0pH CO2 drop. Fe EDTA which is the Fe in most ferts needs to be below 7.0pH for it to stay in solution, so you may need to use Fe DTPA or Fe EDDHA for your plants Fe like I do (journal in sig- mobile making links hard!)

 

[Ryouku2015]

Heres the picture of the tank, also ignore the murkiness I'd been moving bits and pieces

 

[Edvet]

I would start with only 2 T5''s for now till you have everything dialed in btw.

 

[Ryouku2015]

That's no problem, as it has two plugs so you can unplug one which will turn two of the four off

 

[Simon Cole]

@Ryouku2015 It looks pretty good now without any carpeting plants. I would select lots of attractive pebbles, botanicals, and leaves for my ground cover. I would continue to patch in with smaller specimen plants: eriocaulons, cryptocoryne hobbit, anubias bonsai, bucephalandra mini catherinae, bucephalandra mini needle leaves etc. Carpeting plants use uniformity to create detail, whereas you tank has the potential to be very detailed but in a far more honest way.

 

[Ryouku2015]

@Simon Cole thank you for the advice and apologies for taking so long to get back. I will have a play around with some of the bits you said as the tanks starting to fill out nicely with plants growth and can see your point. I think I just got swept along with the "carpet plants are the only way to go" trend that a lot of planted tanks have