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5ft Bookshelf Aquarium - River Scape

doylecolmdoyle

doylecolmdoyle

Member
Joined
26 Jul 2016
Messages
886
Location
Australia
I am in the planing stage of creating a High flow river scape, some details below, still planning, if any one has advice on creating high flow river scape please post, this is new to me, its very interesting to learn about a new aspect of this hobby.

Tank - Fire Aqua 1500 x 210 x 240, 10mm low iron glass. 20G / 75 ltr
Stand - Ikea Kallax bookshelf's as stand, with extra soild wood top.
Filter - Undecided something oversized to assist with flow
Flow - 2000lph powerhead via a "river tank manifold"
Hardscape - Smooth river stones and a few twigs
Substrate - River sand
Plants - Low light plants that do not mind high flow
Light - ?
Fish - ? Flow loving fish

Mainly after advice on creating unidirectional flow, originally I had just thought about using a oversized canister filter and having the inlet and outlet at opposite ends and increasing flow using a wavemaker or powerhead. But after some research discovered "river tank manifolds" I think I can get away with 1 powerhead and modify the design of the manifold to not have a pipe running at the front of the tank, being so shallow I would like to try hide the pipes but not have a huge thick base of sand, planing on using 15mm pvc pipe, this smaller pipe may limit flow.

Basic mockup below showing the design of the manifold.


River-Manifold-Mockup-v2.jpg
 
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I've not done this, but have read it somewhere...
You could drill the tank and run the pipework underneath it, or use flexible hosing outside the tank to connect the inlet to the powerhead in a loop (have powerhead 'upside down').

Also have seen people use maxspect gyre instead of manifold, but they aren't cheap!

K
 
Cheers guys @alto thanks I did stumble across that forum, need to do some reading!
@Kezzab yes that is an idea to drill the tank, perhaps the back panel (can't drill the bottom due to stand and location of tank etc) but I would like to keep the stank stock for future scapes, but drilling would allow for more hardscape and less equiptment, I am considering it, the Grye is out of my budget!
 
The word Ikea and tank, bring fear to ones heart.....

I do hope you are going to amply reinforce the book stand to take the tanks weight. This tank with water and substrate could easily top over 100kg.

You will need major diagonal bracing to stop the book shelves collapsing.
 
Yup... you really need to reinforce the IKEA stands... or you'll probably have a really bad time.
I've reinforced one of those just for a 50L tank.
 
kadoxu said:
Yup... you really need to reinforce the IKEA stands... or you'll probably have a really bad time.
I've reinforced one of those just for a 50L tank.
Click to expand...

ian_m said:
The word Ikea and tank, bring fear to ones heart.....

I do hope you are going to amply reinforce the book stand to take the tanks weight. This tank with water and substrate could easily top over 100kg.

You will need major diagonal bracing to stop the book shelves collapsing.
Click to expand...

I am experienced with these ikea bookshelf's and I do understand your concerns, I will reinforce the bookshelf's, also using a sheet of 18mm hardwood over the top, I currently use a 4x2 kallax atm for a 60p and 45p which will ruffly be the same weight as the 5ft bookshelf tank, this setup will use 2x 2x2 bookshelf's which will help with taking more "vertical" weight and also less prone to diagonal movement.
 
I think I have decided to scrap the idea of using a river manifold, it will just take up to much room in the small tank, will run a wavemaker or similar instead
 
doylecolmdoyle said:
I think I have decided to scrap the idea of using a river manifold, it will just take up to much room in the small tank, will run a wavemaker or similar instead
Click to expand...

It was a tank like this in the latest Vlog by George Farmer on the tube. Take a look and get some inspiration


Skickat från min iPhone med Tapatalk
 
Jocke said:
It was a tank like this in the latest Vlog by George Farmer on the tube. Take a look and get some inspiration


Skickat från min iPhone med Tapatalk
Click to expand...

The huge one in Germany? I did see that, was so cool, Im pretty set on just a powerhead now, down the track I may try a manifold but for now I want to keep the tank looking clean without to much equipment
 
You could always use one of these....
http://www.maxspect.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=227&Itemid=750&lang=en

These are the doggies danglers of wavemakers but have an unfortunately wallet thinningly price.

With these you will be able to alter the flow during the day so you can give the fish (and plants) a rest at night for instance.

I have my wavermaker on a timer in my tank. It comes on when CO2 comes on, but goes off at 7pm for when I am likely to be in the lounge, just to keep things quiet.
 
ian_m said:
You could always use one of these....
http://www.maxspect.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=227&Itemid=750&lang=en

These are the doggies danglers of wavemakers but have an unfortunately wallet thinningly price.

With these you will be able to alter the flow during the day so you can give the fish (and plants) a rest at night for instance.

I have my wavermaker on a timer in my tank. It comes on when CO2 comes on, but goes off at 7pm for when I am likely to be in the lounge, just to keep things quiet.
Click to expand...

I did look at these maxspect gyre's, someone local to me is actually selling the 30w version of a good price barily used, unfortunately it is to wide to fit in the 210mm wide tank (the wavemaker is 300mm wide)

I am interested in a vortech mp10wqd but they are very pricey, I will probably just go with 1x jabeo sw4 with the option of adding a second if needed, these wavemakers are small and compact and controllable
 
I bought a cheap wavemaker for my tank. In less than a year it started misbehaving, by spinning backwards when powered on !!!. Seller replaced it, but again in less than a year just stopped working, the motor going open circuit.

So did what I should have done in the first place, bought a geniuine but expensive Koralia. This was incrediably quiet compared to my cheap one and is still going 4 years later.
http://www.hydor.com/eng/prodotti-tecnici/movement-pumps/koralia-evo.php
 
I placed a 4 foot 240 litre tank across two kallax a while back, I screwed them both together, and in hindsight this is an absolute bomb scare lol, but it worked
 
It is a bit concerning using the kallax bookshelf but i like to live on the edge 😛 this tank will only be about 60ltr, I currently have a 45p and 60p on one 4x2 kallax and they are fine.

Picking the tank up this weekend, the actually scaping of the tank will not happen for a few weeks, I have sourced a big 1300l/h canister filter and ordered a jebao sw4 wave-maker (controllable up to 4000l/h), have officially scrapped the idea of the manifold, will be interesting to see how the flow goes in the tank, plan is to set up as per the diagram below. Also ordered one 5ft LED tube with a 2:1 ratio of 8000K+4000K whites with 30 degree beam angle, plants will only be low light, the tube will be hung high above the tank via CADE Luxury Light Stands, which will screw into the kallax bookshelf's, the LEDs will be controlled by a tc420.

Tank-Mockup-v6.jpg
 
A well put together Kallax is actually quite sturdy - even on (suitable load) castors - just use the max # of dowels (need extra as there are more slots than dowels in the kit for some reason)

The high gloss finish version is as water resistant as any basic fish stand - though care needs to be taken with both to avoid water damage (slow leak, persistent drip, major flood where water can seek into the screw etc slots)

It's worth checking IKEA maximum loads on their various shelves, benches etc (Kallax line rates higher than many)
 
alto said:
The high gloss finish version is as water resistant as any basic fish stand - though care needs to be taken with both to avoid water damage (slow leak, persistent drip, major flood where water can seek into the screw etc slots)
Click to expand...

You have have just talked me into splashing the cash for the high gloss white finish, I was planing to get the basic white as they are half the price... I have a full wall full of Kallax shelves in my study (opposite wall of where this bookshelf's tank will sit)

They are great for storage and living in a small apartment I need to maximise storage. Picked up the tank today, its all wrapped up in a MDF crate, were it will sit for another few weeks, just hopping its not cracked inside there, I need to store the tank outside for awhile so I dont want to open it yet.
 
Here IKEA high gloss finish is 130 vs 100 (80 vs 60 if 2 shelf), so well worth the extra,
& high gloss grey-turquoise has been on sale for 100

(If you find the right person, they'll look for upcoming sales 🙂)

Yeah Kallax is one of the better series IKEA has come out with, though the extras (aside from the casters) are rather overpriced
Got some Lekman Boxes on clearance that work great as "drawers"
 
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The tank! I snuck a look inside the box to make sure it was not cracked and it looks great, cant wait to get this out of the box and onto my stand, hoping next weekend or the following.

IMG_7088.jpg

These are the rocks I am going to use, they are natural river rocks from the area I live in, Western Australia.

Resized_20180205_100011.jpg
 
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