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My custom build shallow tank RESCAPE (The 3 Peaks)

jarcher1390

Member
Joined
6 Aug 2012
Messages
127
Hi All,

I have been designing a tank, cabinet and light stand for a year now and i've finally got it built and now got water in it.

So this is my dry run (well you know what i mean) for the tank to make sure my set up works before i start the scape.

Hope you enjoy the video.



Tank will hopefully scaped shortly

Regards

Jonny
 
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Really nice work Jonny, congratulations on the results. I look forward to seeing your scape. Did you also make the turning light-"pole" yourself?
 
got any progress pics of the stand build? Looks great. Is that a few spaces for wine bottles?! I also quite like the light fixture, how'd you make that (and how is it attached)? giving me ideas for my stand!
 
I really like. Looks very "laboratory grade":cool:. I would only do one thing: Put something in front of the leds as to not go blind hehe.
 
Nice....

Couple of things to look out for....please ignore my advice as you see fit...

1. The Hydor inline heater should be operated vertically.
2. The atomiser should be operated vertically.
3. Running the atomiser on the filter inlet means it will need weekly (or quite frequent) cleaning, you will need some way of taking it out easily without having to drain things down.
4. Too much light spread for my liking. You have some super sexy LED fixture :D but you are wasting the light to light your wall and blind the viewing public.:lol:
5. I assume you have some way of reducing the light level, as from the video these LED's look bright enough to vaporise plants and farm algae, especially when starting out.
6. I suspect you will have flow issues trying to run flow across such a large width tank. I assume you have at least x10 flow from the filter.

Great :thumbup:
 
The heater and atomiser doesn't have to vertically as long there flow passing by.

Putting the atomiser on the inlet actually diffuse co2 better but yes it need cleaning frequent. Other than that the light stand and tank is very nice. Love the way you done with the light fixture. You have good diy skills.

cheers
Ryan
 
The heater and atomiser doesn't have to vertically as long there flow passing by.
Wrong. Prone failure if not installed vertically.

From the instruction manual. Please read.
Heater_zpsakfuxuto.png
 
If there are any areas wihin the heater which are higher than the top of the outlet tube, air can get trapped, as well as if there are any nooks and crannies (such as heating coil? no idea what these look like inside) that may trap air if not vertical. So depending on the internals of the heater, it may or may not be fine. Considering there will be lots of gas coming from the atomiser, I wouldn't risk horizontal!
 
There is a chance of a big bubble getting trapped in there making it possible to burn the heater if its not vertical. Chances arent very high, but why run the risk.
Like i said i never had a problem with 3 of my tanks. Heater are over 2 year old too.

Its up to Jarcher by the way. Sorry about this i didn't want it to carry on in your journal
 
First of thanks you all for your likes, kind words and also the words of wisdom.

Im glad I made the video and making this a dry run as i hadn't even considered some of the points made. I also discovered i have an uneven floor :-/ so will need to empty it and stuff some stuff under the right hand side leg.

All the best very nice and practical setup love the diy!
I think you will be safer with the heater & atomiser in a full vertical position. My 2 cents.

Im going to swap the heater and atomiser around and see how that works. From what i have gathered from the comments above is that the heater will work in any position but the more horizontal runs the risk of developing a fault so I'm going to try and make them more vertical I don't see any point of running the risk of causing a fault if it can be easily avoided.

Really nice work Jonny, congratulations on the results. I look forward to seeing your scape. Did you also make the turning light-"pole" yourself?

Thanks Henrik J, I'm very lucky to say that I have a friend that employs a carpenter and he has a metal work shop which he took my designs and concepts and made them look "almost shop bought" as a friend of mine put it.

got any progress pics of the stand build? Looks great. Is that a few spaces for wine bottles?! I also quite like the light fixture, how'd you make that (and how is it attached)? giving me ideas for my stand!

Thanks Rahms, i don't have many but ill have a dig around my computer and see what I can find. Yes that is spaces for wine bottles!!! 14 to be exact ;) ill get pictures of the bracket that holds it all together for you.

Nice....

Couple of things to look out for....please ignore my advice as you see fit...

1. The Hydor inline heater should be operated vertically.
2. The atomiser should be operated vertically.
3. Running the atomiser on the filter inlet means it will need weekly (or quite frequent) cleaning, you will need some way of taking it out easily without having to drain things down.
4. Too much light spread for my liking. You have some super sexy LED fixture :D but you are wasting the light to light your wall and blind the viewing public.:lol:
5. I assume you have some way of reducing the light level, as from the video these LED's look bright enough to vaporise plants and farm algae, especially when starting out.
6. I suspect you will have flow issues trying to run flow across such a large width tank. I assume you have at least x10 flow from the filter.

Great :thumbup:

Thanks ian_m, I actually don't mind the light spilling over and i think will look better for my scape that way. The lights are 2x TMC aquabars 1000 freshwater i think i can get dimmers for these lights but I'm not convinced by dimmers to be honest. I have actually took out my seneye and done some light readings and i can vary it from 15par to 74par / 574 lux to 2741lux by varying the height of the stand and having one aqua bar at a time. I will post my finding on a graph later on.

The tank volume is roughly 100 litres and I have a JBL profie greenline 1501 rated at 1400lph for a 14x turn over. I suspect it may not be that high because of the shallow tank height, inline heater and atomiser. I suppose only time will tell if its enough.......I HOPE SO

Very nice tank :)
Can you share its dimensions?

The tank is 100cm(l) x 50cm(w) x 22cm(h). The cabinet is 88cm in height, i was actually a little worried about the cabinet height before I got the tank but now I like it. The light can be raised or lowered in a range of 76cm. Hopefully so i can find that sweet spot in my light levels

I hope i've covered everyones comments and post if not directly. I'll get the charts and a couple more pictures up when I get a moment.

Regards

Jonny
 
Hi all

So i though some of you might like to see the out put of PAR at the various heights with one or both lights on.

I took 3 readings on each height and number of lights. one 1cm below surface (top), 2nd 10cm below the surface (middle) and lastly the seneye sat snuggly on the bottom of the tank (Bottom). Hope the charts are clear enough for you.

17985858376_cb72917c4f_o.jpgPAR Readings by Jonathan Archer, on Flickr

Edited new chart as suggested by Rahms

Regards

Jonny
 
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What are the specifics of your LEDs? Manufacturer/power/number if DIY!

I think people will find it easier to interpret those graphs if its an XY scatter, distance from light on X axis and PAR on Y. Then you add a curve (series) for each # of lights. It took me a minute to actually work out what was going on! :p
 
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