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Sorry, never saw this post Ryan. I kept it, yes! Unfortunately the tank got overrun with BBA a few months back, so I nuked all the plants and left the wood out of water to try and get rid. Anyway the reason why I came back to this thread is because somehow the fissidens survived!

Looks like cabomba and some others are to be banned across the EU: http://www.hortweek.com/water-hyacinth-banned-august/plant-health/article/1403759

No internet access in my LFS so I bought Manado on their recommendation without checking the reviews online. (Also slightly frustrating to find it's basically tesco value kitty litter at 10x the price but hey ho!) Followed the pack instructions, but now I'm finding it is so light that I have to...

I think any leak could cause it . I had an APS 2000 which had this same occasional 'burping' issue, I checked all the pipes etc and could not find anything wrong. Then one night I had a power cut and without the pump running it started leaking from the main seal around the head and drained the...

Okay so I finished my macros and made some up last week using boiled and partially cooled RO water. Unfortunately I've still got the bubbles appearing! I still have hardly any bubbles appearing in the micros, so I guess I need to replace the pump head again. btw Does anybody know of a really...

I'm still working through the current batch of macros, so it'll be a couple of weeks before I can try it. I will update the thread when I do though! :)

I'll double check the lids, but I think they are all unscrewed. I had the bubble problem before adding the check valves, at the time I thought the issue was due to backflow. I'm 99 % certain they cannot leak at the connections due to how physically hard it was to put the lines on them and the...

Gah! Thought I'd cracked it with the zip ties, but low and behold, a cheeky bubble appeared in the line for the micros this morning. Think there might be a few tiddlers in the macros too. :mad: Wondering now about removing the little plastic connectors and replacing them with checkvalves with...

Hi, still waiting for zip ties to turn up, I'll update the thread effect they're in and have been running for a few days. Cheers Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk

Thanks both, I'll add some zip ties then.

It's a Jebao DP4. So wasn't expecting the finest quality but was hoping for it to work! The seller kindly sent a replacement head which I have fitted, but this hasn't solved the issue. Nor has adding more check valves. I just don't understand what is happening. I can run it on manual for as...

Ikea wasn't a great example as their stuff is pretty good actually. It's cheap but generally designed well and in fact I don't think I've ever had a single product fail from there (and my complete kitchen, incl. utilities, plus my front room (besta&billy units, settee) etc are all from there)...

Yes, it seems to happen over the course of a few days. Lines are indeed above the surface tank end, and at the bottom of the liquid in the macro dosing pot thingy. I've just heard back from the seller, he's going to send me a new pump head so I'll try that and update the thread if it makes a...

My dosing pump keeps getting air in the lines. Line 1 is by far the worst: I've taken the pump head off, can't see anything wrong (pinched or split lines), and this never happens when I run the pump manually (I ran it for a good 2 or 3 minutes with no air appearing). Anyone know what's...

I have one of those Tetratec ones (APS150). It's powerful but not quiet, there is a deep hum which seems to resonate very deeply through the cabinet. I made foam feet for it to stand on (using filter floss I think) which helped greatly. Now you cannot hear it in the same room, but strangely you...

Welcome, and what a lovely area to live in. :thumbup:

They look male to me based on the dorsal fins and head shape. Tough to tell nowadays though as they don't always have all the characteristics of a particular sex.

So I wonder then, would running activated carbon help by adsorbing the DOC? (I assume this is what is meant by organics).

Blimey, I don't want to patronise you, but please be careful if your setup is the same as that OP! Even without the risk of dropping the unit in the water or splashes/condensation, some of those cheap LEDs from eBay are really really unsafe. As in live components at mains voltage exposed and...

Ludwigia repens. I have tonnes of the stuff, and it all came from a single Tropica plant from Pets at Home a few years back. Even in my low tech/low light tank I am throwing some away every week.

Yes, fantastic post! Thank you very much. Going to need to read that a few times over to take it all in. [emoji3] Andy.

Thanks ceg4048, that is a lovely looking tank but I'm not meaning to imply that high calcium is causing a problem with my plants. Perhaps I'm asking the wrong question, so please let me try again! :) I understand that there are a large but finite number of exchange sites available in the...

Thanks, I'm definitely reconsidering soil then. But regarding the original CEC/lots-of-calcium-in-my-water :) question, is the answer then that I may as well stick with an inert substrate?

Cheers RM. That's what I was thinking originally, but 1) I have fish that dig, and 2) I tend to uproot plants fairly regularly, so I had ruled out using any kind of soil. TBH Even root tabs get on my nerves, often see them little blue and yellow balls popping up out of the substrate and...

My water is hard and has lots of calcium in it. Is it therefore pointless trying to use kitty litter or flourite etc to try and retain iron, magnesium and so on for the roots to access? My understanding of the chemistry is poor at this point, but if I have understood correctly, then calcium...

Darrel, thanks for the detailed answers regarding surface plants/iron. :clap:

I used to use frogbit for this, but it keeps getting holes in it. I think it's from condensation dripping from the lid. Do you happen to know if either salvinia or pistia would be more resistant to the burn? Thanks.

Welcome, those are really nice tanks.

Is it okay to make up the trace mix with tap even with hard/relatively high pH water? I recall there is some issue there but can't for the life of me remember the details.

Yep, chronically slow here too in sunny Essex.

Morning & welcome. Guess I can't blame our delightful hard Essex water for my failure to grow frogbit any more then? ;)

I like that tank set up a lot. Nice and simple. :clap:

Hello! I've been meaning to set up a fancy goldfish tank for a while for my folks. Do you have any pictures of your setup?

Welcome! On the subject of peppering, I was told it can be resolved by using brighter lights. Not sure if it's true as I don't keep them myself, but it might be a useful keyword in your searches. And get a journal up when you start setting the tank up! :)

Thanks guys. I gradually tapered the liquid co2 down to nothing, I've also cut the dosing down. So far so good, no signs of distress from the plants other than some GSA and some pale new growth. Think i've probably cut the fert dosing down too much, so I'll increase that a little bit. Loving...

Tried to make an automatic water changer, hose came out of the clamp and rapidly dumped 10L of water on the (wooden) floor :clap: Wife came in, shook her head and gave me that look that says "I'm not angry, just disappointed".

I have an established aquarium with fish and plants in which is (/was) using very low light, 1/4 EI & gas co2 injection. I've been meaning to make it a low tech for a while due to time constraints, but failure of various bits of co2 equipment has forced my hand this morning. So what I want to...

Hi, did adding the extra potassium sort the problem out? I think I have the same issue starting to occur. Thanks.

Looks like a nice little setup you have there. Is it okay to have the filter pipes like that permanently? I'm sure mine had words to the effect of the the hoses must be pretty much straight up from the filter to the tank. Anyway looking forward to seeing how the scape turns out on this one.

I use Viakal, seems to work on the lamps etc, though sadly not on my tank glass which seems to have been permanently etched with limescale marks by the previous owner. Anyway, as Ian_M says, do it away from the tank though and dry off any residue afterwards and you'll be reet. :)

Sorry for the OT, but it's 0.5ppm according to Walstad. -not trying to be a smart Alec, just thought some on this board might find it interesting as 3ppm is so commonly mentioned as the equilibrium level. Actually that's what you see when the co2 from respiration etc is taken into account.

Nice, what are the plants?

Sounds like it works in the same way as the SenEye but with better quality sensors, colour changing test discs and also RFID tags to reference the calibration data taken at the factory. There are more details on the kickstarter page itself...

Hi mate, unfortunately I don't have any of that to give you. But I did see you can get it for £3.50 ish inc. delivery from this seller on fleabay: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/RARE-ORDINARY-Live-Aquarium-Plants-Stem-Plants-Midground-Background-/171259722316?var=&hash=item27dfdffa4c Says in the...

Great, now I have the remix of that stuck in my head. :banghead: Site seems to be working again anway :cool:

Really nice. Quite surprising to see how much surface rippling they have. Really nice. Quite surprising as well to see how much surface rippling they have.

I had to switch off ad blocking (uBlock Origin) to get it to work. Looking at the uB log, their site theming lives in a directory named '/nielsen/', and that is matching one of the default filters.

Saw this the other day when I was looking for shrimp. http://www.freshwatershrimp.co.uk/product.php?id_product=518

How fine is it? If it's really fine like play sand it'll make vaccing up detritus a bit of a pain as it gets sucked up so easily. Also would be a shame to lose that nice rich colour from what you have at the moment.

I use an Ikea Samla plastic storage box for a quarantine tank. Would probably work quite nicely for this and is < £5. I've kept fish in it for a few weeks with no problems. Obviously ensure the heater is not directly touching the box..! The ideal thing would be to find an equivalent product...

I'm really glad you're still working on this one. :cool: A question regarding the stand: is the bit highlighted red here (directly next to the main support) used to stop the stand collapsing sideways? If so is there a reason why you didn't put a piece diagonally like so? Thanks

I think they are both right. In my experience get diatoms when the water is polluted with organic waste. If the reason for the organic waste is because your lighting is a little too high (and therefore damaging the plants) then lowering it may help. If that is not the reason, then lowering...

Took three or four days for mine to settle down. Bubbles appeared to be coming out from the rubber seal . I also had to turn the pressure down a little bit. Is a really good diffuser though. Really really fine mist from it. Just wish it was bigger. Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk

Thanks for the info. Good idea trimming fixed feet, hadn't thought of that. Also I was gutted for the OP when reading that 800ltr thread. :( As for being able to find feet which will take the weight, I don't think that's a problem. http://www.rosshandling.co.uk/tilting-feet.asp Does the...

Thinking of making a stand, but my floor (in fact the whole house) is a bit wonky. Current tank is 85 cm across, new one is probably going to be approx 130 - 140, so the wonky water line would be a good deal more visible I think. So would it be a spectacularly bad idea to use something like...

The implication being they are ill treated. He's posted several times about EI and co2 injection being 'abhorrent' due to their effects on fish for example. Now, there may or may not be valid points in there. Certainly interesting discussion in any case, however the way he talks about it is too...

Heh, I knew upon opening this thread what/who it would be about. Apparently, "The Only Way Is Walstad"! Without wishing to indulge myself too much in the drama, it was a shame the original thread over there ended up locked before any proper discussion of the points raised could take place and...

Wow, I'm really pleased about that! :happy: And don't worry zozo, I won't be killing it (at least not intentionally!) Thanks for the help ;)

I cocked up my co2 a while back and caused (I think) BBA in my tank. Fixed the issue and have been using peroxide and Excel to kill off the remaining black stuff. Anyway, I noticed since then that this stuff has been sprouting out the wood (between the tiny anubias and the moss): Is it algae...

I use PVC piping in an upside down 'U' shape connected to a garden hose to do mine. It's the right height that the syphon breaks when it reaches 50% water removed. Then I just bring the end of the hose in from the garden, and attach it to my mixer tap with a Hozelock 2304 to refill the tank...

Hmmm, that is making me nervous on your behalf :wideyed: You've spent a lot of money so far. Maybe it'd be worth your while getting out a building surveyor to advise?

So your 10% water change involves the removal and replacement of three and a half thousand litres?! :eek: Assume you're not on a meter! :lol: Edit: Just checked and it would only be a few quid. Quite surprisingly cheap actually.

What do they use to make the fluorescent colours stand out like that? I was at Southend Sealife Centre at the weekend, and some of their reef tanks had this vibrant 'popping' coral colour and some not. Is it UV?

Silly point but have you checked it's the correct way around (if possible with that model) ? I had mine the wrong way round and it leaked when closed. Not sure how I was supposed to know which way was correct as there were no instructions supplied and no indication on the unit but anyway...

Double check this, but I don't think that matters, as the item was over £100. I don't think you need to put the full amount of the item on the card for it to be protected. https://www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk/en/articles/how-youre-protected-when-you-pay-by-card Anyway hopefully it won't get...

Brackish water?

I had that line of thinking myself, and replaced almost every co2 component trying to sort out my fluctuating BPS. Swapped it for the camozzi and since then it's been rock solid. Can't understand it myself either, my only guess is that there is somehow movement (upper end of allowed tolerances...

I have one, it's the best I've used so far. Prefer it to the 'precision' one they sell.

ardjuna did a good post about this here.

Read this today: http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/content.php?sid=6769 The claim being that adding high levels (>12ppm) of co2 to the water can cause problems for the fish. Anybody know any more about this? I have not had any unexplained deaths in my pressurised tanks, but am not...

I would never use mechanical ones again after I had one get stuck in the 'on' position while I was away for the week. It was driving my lights, so it nuked every plant in the tank, and the glass was entirely green with GSA apart from a few stripes where a nerite had wandered across it. I can...

Same here, use this with my solenoid, one with the main light and another controlling the crappy night light LED bar. Works very nicely.

Does anybody have a pic of how this setup looks in the tank, using a powerhead to drive it?

I just use an airstone for a couple of hours over night. Totally removes the oil film I had. Not sure of the mechanism but it works for me.

This is a good idea, I think I will do the same mod next time I have the pipework out of the tank. We had a leak at work when we had a powercut during the weekend. Turned out the canister filter (APS 1000EF+) had a leak in the pump head somewhere. In normal use, no water came out, I guess...

So does that mean that it is pointless using an all-in-one product such as TNC Complete if the pH of the tank is 7.5 or so?

According to TNC, that triple dose is roughly equivalent to EI levels of nutrients. Is that necessary for Excel at their recommended dosage? I presume it also would necessitate a 50% water change each week?

Welcome! ;)

Really nice setup legytt. Hmm, that's a bit concerning. I have a 125L tank on top of my double width Besta, with only a few corner brackets as extra bracing (to stop it turning into a parallelogram!). I did jump up and down on the top of it and it was fine, so hopefully it'll stay together...

Any chance of seeing pics of how you added extra support? Thanks

I've read before that dry media = dead bacteria. That's another myth then is it?

Assume you mean transparent rather than opaque! What LED lighting do you have? My swords used to go transparent when I had bright lighting and not enough carbon. I added liquid co2 (TNC Carbon) first, which helped but didn't completely sort it, then eventually added proper co2. Maybe you could...

I think they will be fine. I forgot to switch my filter back on after maintenance so it was off for a day or so. No problem. I wouldn't drain the filter though, personally.

Welcome! :)

What do you mean by 'correctly'? Maximum efficiency? They've been used in mainstream GPU and CPU heatsinks for a while now. For example: http://www.ebuyer.com/176157-arctic-cooling-freezer-7-pro-rev-2-socket-775-1150-1156-1155-ac-frz-7pr2 Or a passive one...

Have you been watching Interstellar? :lol:

Thanks Paulo, that's interesting. To save other people some time time, [0023] on page 3 is where the explanation of how it works begins.

Actually their plants (at my local PaH stores anyway) aren't too bad. I think they are from Tropica. Mostly easy to grow stuff though.

Excellent idea, LuckyJim. Looking forward to this. How do you filter/circulate such a tank effectively?

Quick update: it works perfectly. Rock solid BPS throughout the lifetime of the generator bottles. That's 3 bar down to 1 bar, at which point I change one of the generator bottles. One problem I had is that the threads on the pushfit adapter and the regulator didn't mate properly so there was a...

Look, that method may work for you & I when starting a new tank, but most people aren't planting tanks anywhere near as heavily or as successfully as members of this site are. And certainly not from the get-go on a new tank. For example, most fishkeeping friends who see my tanks are really...

Brief update. Clarke air regulator and BSP->6mm fittings arrived. Have fitted as follows: (Excuse the excessively long hose and general mess, I'm still working out the best layout!) First thoughts are that it appears to work. :) Initially set the reg at 1 bar & needle at 175 BPS (input...

No big secret, just that I use these on the bottles, and with proper co2 line there are no detectable leaks :) http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121457945543?_trksid=p2059210.m2749.l2649&var=420398448216&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

Good tip, on the marmite thanks , haven't heard that one before. There's absolutely no problem getting enough pressure, the pressure gauge shows 45+ PSI solidly for a few days after mixture change, then 25PSI for a few weeks.I reckon it would actually go higher than 45 PSI but that's the...

Not at all, all replies welcome ;) I do realise it is a bizarre amount of effort to go to for a DIY system. With regards to the cylinder I've been told it absolutely cannot be horizontal, so do be careful if that's what you're doing! All I was thinking is that if a constant PSI can be...

I have a DIY co2 setup as follows: The idea being to (a) control output using a needle valve and solenoid and (b) store an amount of co2 gas therefore keeping the output more constant. Problem is that when adding a fresh mixture, the pressure raises from its normal ~25 PSI to around 40 for...

Okay thanks guys. I was really hoping you'd say it was fish/snail damage as to me it looks as though the plant has been cut rather than 'melted'. Drop checker is yellow at lights on, turnover is 9x tank vol and the spraybar output splashes the front of the tank with some force like ceg's...

Any ideas on who the culprit of this might be? Seems to have started suddenly about two weeks ago and to me looks like it's been chomped. Occupants of the tank (none of whom appear to be malnourished): Many MTS Many Bladders (including one almost 1CM across in size) 1xRed Lizard Whiptail (L10A...

I know it's still early days, but how is the tank settling in Lauris? Do you think the light is bright enough? Really like your scape.

Stunning pics, and very interesting! But why didn't you include the United Kingdom? ;)