richms

Making the cover for my 4 footer, I have found that I cant quite squeese a normal 4 foot fluro fitting in there, and I dont what to ghetto it by putting it on an angle or having 2 3footers etc, Anyway, as the t5s are a little shorter, they should fit no worries, but I really want to get some batten holders then a roll my own with endcaps and seperate ballast. Plus I will be able to squeese some more into the space compared with the old fitting. So, where can I get some bare T5 HO battens? I asked at mastertrade when I was getting some new tubes for the garage lights and the guy grunted and said dunno.

Because those cheap crap energy savers will be down a lot in light output within 2 months of 8hr/day use, randomly stop turning on after not much longer and cant cope with being in an enclosed fitting. The ones I used were from bunnings, they are the same as the edapt ones at warehouse. 6400k is rare in energy savers, most being that horrid 3700k which is oranger then a normal incandesent.

Heat loss is a function of tank area and ambient temperature If you reduce the tank area exposed to the cold room, you will decrese the power needed. I have a 300 litre tank and have had to put 700 watts of heat in it because its long, tall and thin, and the room is bloody freezing, still sinks to 23° overnight when the room gets to 7° but I figure its cheaper to heat the tank then the whole house like I did last year, since we are not really using the lounge as much.

Whack a heatpump in to heat the fishroom up somewhat, any heat it creates is heat that the heaters in the tank dont have to, and at at least a 3:1 efficianry ratio that will save a fair amount.

you can pop the top off those and then pry the grill out and replace the carbon rather then getting a new cartridge. Buying those is a very expensive way to get carbon.

Not all power outages are there fault, we had a case at a mates bach where the power was going out for hours at a time, turns out some asshat kids were flipping the big switches on the power poles that are used to isolate whole suburbs. Problem stopped after school holidays

Have you discussed a credit for the line charges with your energy supplier yet?

Ive been pulling 250 watts on an inverter at idle and the alternator was still holding it at over 13 volts, so it wasnt discharging the battery. Dunno about the cost thing but it works fine here for power cuts, plus I dont have to worry about fuel going stale or even worse, the damn think not starting when needed like the infrequanlty used lawnmower does.

I tried a UPS on one of them and it wouldnt have anything to do with it, just kept flashing AC fault. Whatever you do use as many surge protectors as you can lay your hands on. A mate has had 2 go braindead and rev up and blow things plugged into it up (one case was a set of party lights, the other was a junk tv set) - They take them back without asking anything so I guess its something they expect. If all you care about is filters and powerheads then perhaps an inverter and just leave the car idling to stop it running flat is a better option?

borrowed a test kit and tested the pH and it was below 6 which is as low as the test would go... yowch.. Anyway, got a big bottle of ph up and have dosed it twice and its sitting on 7.2 at the moment. Still a mystery why it was so low because I do 40% water changes weekly. Put another light ontop but no reflector yet so not doing a hell of a lot. Still really have to get about to building a nice hood for the tank.

They are live snails. They are looking fine other then the shells which are looking quite crappy. Looks like a trip to hollywood is in order tomorrow

I also got a PM suggesting that its lack of calcuim in the water and they need more light.. Ok, more light I can sort easily enough, but whats the solution for more calcium? I do major water changes in the tank because of the goldfish being such messy eaters so I dont think that it will be a ph issue as when I last checked the tap water on the shore (back when I had a fully functional test kit) it was always pretty much on 7. IM going to go wire another 4 foot light up and stick it on the tank to help with that issue. Just wondering if the low ph is a sure thing or not before I go buying another test kit etc.

Ive got 3 of these in my goldfish tank, I really know nothing about them, they just came with some goldfish I bought. Anyway, there shells are looking all chipped up with little 1mm wide lines in them like they have being eroded or something. Any ideas what the problem could be?

They seem to be the only major source of blockage on mine. I pull a string thru with a rag tied to it to try to clean it out. Sometimes I tried taking them outside and putting the nozzle of the garden hose onto the rubber bit, but that seemed to leave a lot still in there. Stupidest idea ever having the corrogated hose, its really poor for flow too because of all the drag

All the fluvals I have seen have come with white sponges, but my one in my goldfish tank went orange from the dye in the color enhancing food that just seems to go straight thru the fish and into there crap going into it.

Screw into the wood thru the metal so that you have no screw heads on the outside, measure the screw against the wood and metal to make sure it doesnt come out the front of the wood. For doors get some kitchen cupboard hinges because they will let the door sit flush with no hinge visable, but you need to drill a well controlled hole into the door so that the mechanism sits in it, too far and you drill right out the front. You will need a drillpress or super-good handskills to do this.

depends on the look you want. Some people are happy with the cheap freedom/criterion look that MDF painted gives Others like real wood thats stained or polyurithaned Others like aluminuim sheets for the sides of it, the limit is your wallet and imagination. Keep in mind that you can get cheap pine and stain it to look darker etc so dont just go running to the pre-loved kauri unless thats going to fit in with your decore. And some like me just put an old sheet there to hide the stuff underneith it

Doesnt matai smell bad? I would still go for a steel stand with wood panels rather then trust the whole thing to wood. You could get a basic steel stand and pretty it up with wood that way you dont have to worry about the strenght of the joints or putting a back onto it.

Swap for energy savers would be my vote. Save power and less heat so its win/win. just dont get the cheap bunnings ones, there lifespan seems to be measuered in weeks

The stuff used to insulate houses has fire retardant in it. I would assume the stuff sold for underfloor would as well since its approved for the use.

All the ones I have seen online are designed to attach to a surface, are there any around which are simple caps that rely on you mounting the tube another way - I have some ballasts coming my way but need to connect the tubes into them.

And as for the missing parts, were the ones you got factory sealed or had they being opened by the retailer?

No, I was answering the complaints about the primer and having to suck on the outlet hose. I cant think of anything grosser then that myself. The primer is one of the best features on the filter in my opinion. The only way I can see that the water would bypass the sponge and media trays is if there was a gap between the media trays, and they fit together very tightly. The gap at the top between the impeller area and the inlet may need a slightly better seal, but I always see a slime mark across it when I open it where it has loads where the intake is exposed and none where the outlet is, and if any was bypassing it there it would soon stop with the slime, infact when I had the media choke up totally in a period of neglect the water flow did stop, it wouldnt do that if it was bypassing at the top.

I find that so long as the syphon is still in the inlet pipe, and I drain the outlet pipe before connecting it back up (Just open the valve a bit into the top of the empty, open filter before putting the lid on) that once its connected up the syphon will fill the filter entirely and the outlet hose all the way up to the tank given about 1 min to do its thing, no sucking on mankey outlet hoses needed If the syphon has broken because I took the inlet pipe out of the water then it starts easy enough with a few pumps of the primer, so long as the return pipe is empty - that seems to be the key to it working well.

DSE are really expensive for LEDs, have a look on trademe for some that are a hell of a lot cheaper.