Warren

Blue might mean you are at 7.4 which is ok in most cases. You really need a kit to tell you how much over 7.4 you are. If your tap water is over 7.4 this will do it and there's little you can do to bring it down other than adding acid. As Caryl says, check for items in the tank containing Calcium...

What type of filter do you use?

Sounds good, keep us posted on his progress. Clowns are pretty tough fish but difficult to treat. Good luck!!

She's not wrong!! I know I'm an evil one... 8) Pity you're not heading towards Napier, you'd be welcome.

Welcome and Enjoy!

Why have a stand? You're building a tank from scratch so it's easy to integrate what would be the stand as part of the tank... If you do have a stand, as long as the bottom of the tank is made from ply you won't need poly.

If you use marine ply it will be ok with the odd splash. It will look a lot nicer if its painted. I stained mine a dark colour which also brought out the grain. I then varnished it to seal the wood. Epoxy resin and matting is available from boat builders, pool makers etc. If you buy it from retailers you'll pay nearly double. The materials for my 3m tank cost about $250 to give you some idea. I paid trade price for mine because I didn't know anyone who could get me a better price. The key to keeping the cost down in any project is knowing someone who can help you get a better price.

The best way to seal a ply tank and add extra strength is to firbeglass it on the inside. Use a chopstrand mat and polyester resin. You can cover this with gelcoat to get any colour you want. I did mine matt black which looks gloss black with water in it. The drawback with black is the tank is very dark unless you have heaps of plants. I only used black in mine to get a big contrast from the background to the plants...

Yep, 19mm will be fine. You'll need to use a good quality ply though, not packing grade. Marine ply would probably be best...

I found Nemo, he's standing next to me!

One of the small mining cities in Indonesia...

No worries. I'm fairly sure the power board in my area isn't as good as your's. I know most of the faultmen in my area and it's from them I've got half the story... The other half has developed through experience. My ex also used to work at the local PB too as a sparky. We've made up some fairly decent sized DC systems for power stations, the biggest was at Huntly. Still quite small however. Our biggest UPS is 3MVA and we are currently quoting on a 50MVA frequency converter running at 600VAC (only 42kA). Sorry, off topic too but I felt like it also...

Steroids + foods high in colour enhancing ingredient bring out very good colours. This fish often fluoresce!

8)

Batt, inverter & charger costs more than a simple UPS. Standard wet batteries don't have a memory problem, just aren't designed for repetitive deep discharging. Deep cycle are. Standard lead-acid cells will typically only give 100-200 full discharge / charge cycles before their capacity drops significantly. They can be discharged and charged very quickly however. They are designed for short-term high current, - like starting your car. Deep cycle are designed for long discharge at low current. They can handle up to 1000 discharge / charge cycles. There are many factors effecting battery life other then charge discharge cycles. Battery life is highly situation specific.

Comments not aimed at power generation and distribution networks which are maintained well. Was talking about local networks at 11kV...

The only time you can get compensation is if the power company stuffs up. Turning my power off by accident qualifies for compensation. Accidentally dropping the 11kV onto the 400V circuit and blowing all 230V outlets and appliances to bits in your house also qualifies. Power cuts do not... I have hundreds of fish and plants and about 40 Discus + exotics like Borneo Tigers etc. Very expensive to replace...

They are pretty expensive. It cost me about $1000 for my setup, but because I work with this type of equipment that's a cheap price. My system can backup just about my whole house for 24+ hours. I currently have the UPS on my tanks and computers. To properly backup just a filter would cost about $150-250 as Caryl says. If you want a longer backup time you need a better type of UPS starting at about $450. If you want to add more batteries to go up to 12+ hours, add about another $300. The way I look at it is, it will cost over twice the cost of the UPS to replace all my fish at retail prices. I see the one-off cost of a UPS as insurance against power outages. I don't know if others have noticed our power supply isn't as good as it used to be. Most of the lines are very old and are not maintained very well. Normally it takes a fault before equipment is replaced. It all comes down to the greedy power companies maximising profits at our expense, - ie, loss of service due to a fault rather than regular maintenance. It also means I never have to worry about my filters stopping. I have a long holdup time only because I travel a lot. It allows me to organise someone to get the generator going if I'm away (my Server sends me a message when the power has been off for more than 30 minutes). It is pretty rare to have an outage longer than 4 hours. I had a case when I was flatting in a block of flats where the Power Company disconnected my power while I was away. They had intended to disconnect the flat next to me as they hadn't paid, but did me by mistake. I was away for 2 days, so I don't normally get anyone to look after my fish for this time. When I got home the lights wouldn't go, but the lights were on in the tanks and the filters were still running thanks to the UPS. When I contacted the power company they told me there had been a mistake and they would fix it straight away. About an hour later the same sparky turned up to reconnect me. He said he'd disconnected the power the morning before. At the time I had 3 days backup supply. It was this event that made me setup an AutoDial system to let me know when the power was off. Had it not been for the UPS I would have had very dead filters and maybe a few dead fish instead of no problem at all. If you don't travel much or if there is someone round most of the time you can get away with a pretty standard UPS. If you travel a lot and no one will be home a longer time is advised. In the last 10 years, I've had 5 major power outages lasting 2 hours or more, 3 of them being 5 hours, 9 hours and 36 hours. That’s at least 3 times I would have had to re-cycle filters. If the power goes off for 3 hours+ while you are out and comes back on before you get home, there is some risk that your filter will poison the tank when the power comes back on. I don't want to recommend a UPS to everyone as they are expensive and in most cases unnecessary. It's up to you to judge for yourself what risk you have...

I use big trickle filters on all my tanks. The type of media I use is Effisubsrat, Siporax, Biohome (Manta Marine) and Bio Max. It takes up to 3 months for this type of filter to fully form but only hours for it to die. It starts being really efficive after about a month. For this reason I use UPS (Uninterruptable Power Supplies) on all my tanks with a minimum of 12 hours standby time. It makes sure none of my filters die.

Keep you pH as close to 7 as possible, but slightly acidic. 6.5 - 6.8 is good to aim for. When the pH is less than 7 the ammonia is not nearly as toxic as it is in the ammonium form which is much less toxic. Ammonia becomes 10x more toxic for every pH point above 7, so don't let that pH rise. Be careful with waterchanges. If your pH is below 7 and the water you use for the waterchange is above 7 you can actually do more harm than good as the ammonium will become toxic ammonia. Best to check the water first... Nitrites are a sure sign that your tank has only just begun to cycle. It means the bacteria have formed to convert ammonia to nitrite, but not nitrite to nitrate. It will be another week or two yet. Fish should never be added to a tank before the cycling process is complete as it causes them undue stress or death. It's very easy to do a fishless cycle...

Go for the Philips or Sylvania TLD96 range. They are 5 phosphour 6500K daylight tubes. You get excellent colour rendering of the plants and fish and super-fast plant growth. See if you can get them at trade (use a mate in the electrical trade if you can). You should only pay about $13-14 +GST per tube. These are equivalent, if not better than the best LFS tubes at $65+

For filters I'd go with a trickle / sump type - its far more cost effective for the amount of filtration you get. To keep a tank that size clean you'll need to turn over at least 4000L/hr, maybe even 6000L/hr. I turn over 6000L/hr on a 1100 tank. It would take at least 4 Fluval 404's to equal this at $1000+ You can put it above the tank and use gravity to return the water. If you use this method, you drill the filter and put the pump in the tank. Advantages; no worries about the sump overflowing if the pump stops, low micron prefilters can be used to get very clean water. Disadvantage; if the filter blocks you get a very wet floor and an empty tank. If it goes as a sump below the tank then you drill the tank and put the pump in the sump. Advantages; tank has not pump in it, tank cannot empty if the power fails. Disadvantages; cannot use low micron prefilters, sump can overflow if the pump stops. Correct sizing of the sump will fix this problem.

According to the glass thickness calculator in the 'Articles' section of the website, you need glass 12.58mm or thicker. This assumes a saftey factor of 3.8 (recommended by the glass manufacturer). 12mm would be ok. 10mm will give a minimum saftey factor of 2.4 x the glass breaking strength and is probably safe enough. Most aquariums available at petshops only have saftey factors of around 2-2.4 The Front, Back and Bottom should probably be 12mm. The ends can be 10mm. The front to side butt-joint should be double thickness giving a 20mm wide glue join (use a 50mm wide strip full height). So should the bottom front and back edges. There should be a 100mm wide (min) 10mm glass rim around the top inside of the tank with 2 braces 200mm wide or 3 braces 150mm wide front to back. Tanks built like this don't break unless the glass wasn't cleaned and glued properly or the tank is on an unlevel base. My tank is L2400 x H650 x W820 and is 25 years old.

Definately part of the problem if not all of it. Filter bacteria will start to die after about 30 minutes of the filter being stopped. After 4 hours they are all dead (depending on filter type). They then decompose into toxic ammonia and nitrites. Filters must always be left on. If a filter ever stops for any length of time it's best to remove it and flush with tap water (or your normal water source) to remove the toxic substances. If it is the only filter then the tank will cycle again...

Do either of your 10 or 0.1 Micron filters have carbon in them? (0.1 Micron filters pretty much cold sterilise the water so you won't be introducing many bacteria, if any to the aquarium). If there is carbon in the filters, it's might be the cause of the problem. I use RO water which is similar to rainwater (assuming your tankwater comes from rain). I've had to remove the output carbon filter as it was causing my water to go milky after waterchanges. The water quality is just as good. If your tank water comes from a well then you might be getting a precipitate reaction in the aquarium when the new water is added. Your problem may be bacteria bloom however. To find out for sure, try using unfiltered water direct from the tank (if it is safe). You shouldn't need to add conditioners either... This will prove if it is the carbon causing the problem. If your water is from a well, catch some rainwater (shouldn't be much problem at the moment) and use that for waterchanges. If it's still cloudy it will be bacteria. If it's bacteria you may be overfeeding a bit.