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Ira

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Posts posted by Ira

  1. 23 hours ago, livingart said:

    No it looks fine just asleep, it is an albino or white chocolate gourami.

    When it wakes up and opens its eyes you will be able to see if the eyes are dark or red.

    Unfortunately, I found it dead this morning with a big chunk bitten out of it.  I'm not sure which fish killed it, but I'm thinking it was probably one of the severums. :(

     

    chocolatedead.jpg

     

  2. My father in law bought me a fish for my Bday,  can anyone help ID it?

    It doesn't move around a lot, and it's getting harassed a bit by the other fish.  I think it might be a female bristlenose?

     

    chocolate.jpg

    Here's another pic, I think it's trying to dig around in the sand for food.

    chocolate2.jpg

     

     

  3. Doing my weekly water change and I notice the FX5 isn't pumping.  That's ok, I think I cleaned it about this time last week, and replaced the impeller.  And it shuts off for a few minutes the same time every day.

     

    5 minutes later:  Still not running.

    10 minutes later:  Bugger.

     

    I've pulled it out poked and prodded it, pulled the impeller out, put it back in.  Out of the water it spins, but rattles a lot, jerking frequently.  I've put everything back together and it *SEEMS* to be working fine.

     

    I don't trust it though.

     

    I can't find anywhere to actually buy one though, anyone know where to look?  Nothing on Amazon, Fishpond doesn't have them available, redwood and Hollywood don't have them listed.  Pretty FX5 and FX6 pumps are interchangeable.

  4. Hmmm, from the FAQs and things on EQC's site, they don't specifically mention ponds.  But it does say that landscaping isn't covered, which presumably a pond would be included in.  Hope they do cover it though.

  5. Yeah, the glue holding them down is garbage.  So, I used a bit of liquid tape across them, you can see in the pic,  it's surprisingly seems to be working.  At least on those points, it's coming loose between them.  If they start falling off I'll try hot glue, I love hot glue. :)

  6. A small addition...

    lights18.JPG

     

    Now the front panel of LEDs is on a switch, so it automatically turns off when I open the lid.  That means I don't get blinded every time I want to feed the fish.

    This was in the original plan, but ended up being dropped because I was getting impatient.

     

    I used a screw to give some adjustment in the switch otherwise it would have been just luck if I got the switch to turn on and off correctly.

  7. So,  I bought some cheap LED strip lights and put them into my 4ft, 400L tank.

     

    So, a bit of a build log:

     

     

    lights1.JPG

    Day 1, 0 hours.

    Here's the tank hood,  was 6 24 watt CFLs(3 burned out) and two 4 foot fluoros(Dead)

     

     

    lights2.JPG

    Day 1, 1.5 hours

    All the old lights pulled out, cleaned up, a bit of bleach and meths to clean up the wood.  And I've started cutting wires ready to solder to the LED strips

     

    lights3.JPG

    Day 1, 2.5 hours

    Pre-tinning the wires and then pressing down onto the little copper pads seems to work...HORRIBLY, These things are horrible to solder,  little tiny pad and melty plastic all around it?!?  Ok, well, I managed to do it, kinda ugly...But ok.

     

    lights4.JPG

    Day 1, 3.5 hours

    Slowly working through all the strips, one by one and throwing them in a pile....

     

    lights5.JPG

    Day 1, 4 hours

    Laying them out in the hood, piling anything convenient on top of them to keep them from rolling up...

     

    lights6.JPG

    Day 1, 4 hours

    I swear, I didn't do that....

     

    lights7.JPG

    Day 1, 5 hours

    All laid out,  wires all joined together...

     

    lights8.JPG

    Day 1, 5 hours

    Ugh...That looks horrible.  I'll figure out how to tidy it up tomorrow.

     

    Day 2

    I can't be bothered with it...

     

    Day 3 

    Oh, I know, I'll get some brass rods and solder the wires to it like bus bars.  It will look cool!  Should make expanding it easy too.

     

    Day 4

    Can't get to a place to buy the rods.

     

    Day 5

    Got them!

     

    lights9.JPG

    Day 6

    AHHH, this looks even worse!  I didn't consider how much heat it would take to solder to giant rods, big, ugly cold solder joints EVERYWHERE.

     

    And I ended up pulling off half the solder pads and wires from the LED strips.  I'm going to have to start this all over.

     

    lights10.JPG

    Day 7 Hour 1

    Got some chocolate blocks/ screw terminals, should work a little better....

     

    lights11.JPG

    Day 7 Hour 2

    Looking much more tidy now.

     

    lights12.JPG

    Day 7 Hour 4

    I cut ends of the strips off, left the entire solder pad this time,  should only lose a little bit of light.

    New wires soldered on, went MUCH better this time.  Same process, pre-tin the wires then press down on the solder pads.

     

    lights13.JPG

    Day 7 Hour 5

    First set plugged in and powered up!  Oops, one strip isn't working... Just didn't get the wire into the terminal before screwing it down so it came loose.

     

    lights14.JPG

    Day 7 Hour 6

    The rest of the strips are wired in and powered up,  I've adjusted the voltage on the power supply to 13v and it's drawing 90 watts.

     

    lights15.JPG

    Ok, 12.85 volts, the voltage dropped a little...

     

     

    lights16.JPG

    Day 7 Hour 7

    All ready to go, I've put some liquid electrical tape where the wires are soldered to the strips, and on each of the solder pads the rest of the strips.  I've put on the sides too there, so hopefully it will hold the strips down, the adhesive backing isn't the greatest.

     

    Oh, and there are a couple LEDs in the lower right that are dead.  I...Uhh....May have not noticed that strip fall on the floor at some point and then I may have stepped on it...

     

    lights17.JPG

    Day 8

    Fish are happy to have some light, I think.


    I turned the voltage back down to 12v, the lights are drawing 60 watts at this voltage.   They look brighter than the 3, year or so old 24w CFLs, but that's not hard.  It's a moderate brightness, I'd say, not really bright but good.  I'm pretty happy with them.  I think I'll buy more strips and add a bit more power.

     

     

    The parts:

    The LEDs

    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00D83BGVS/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

     

    Total about $25

     

    The power supply, 150w 12v

    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00DECSE8G/ref=pe_2602560_239856390_em_1p_0_ti

     

    Bought locally, $80

     

    All the wires, screw terminals, solder etc you can find anywhere, I'm not going to link to those.  A wire stripper, liquid electrical tape, odds and ends another $50 NZ

     

    Total cost: About $155

     

    Maybe I should have spent a little more and bought a nice LED fixture....Oh well.

     
  8. 14 hours ago, Pennyleigh17 said:

    Hi,

    I'm wanting to know a bit about bala sharks and was wondering if anyone could give any advice.

    1. Are they best kept on there own or in groups? I've heard they do best in groups, is this correct? If so how many at least to make a group?

    2. What are good tank mates?

    3. What size tank would you recommend for juvenile bala sharks? I can upgrade the tank as they grow. And yes I know they grow huge :)

    Thanks

    1.  Yes.  The standard half dozen or so.

    2.  They're basically non aggressive, so any other moderately sized active fish. 

    3.  I'd say something in the 4 foot, 400L range minimum.  More mature you're looking at 6-8 foot.

     

  9. Is there a reason you want to use plywood rather than glass?  That small size glass is going to be pretty inexpensive anyway.  And the whole tanks go for pretty cheap.

    Cheapest lighting would be something like a 4 foot fluoro fitting, or even a couple small clip on lamps.  Which 10w floodlights are you talking about?

    Better to go with a good canister filter than a sponge filter.

  10. 1 hour ago, fishyNZ said:

    Pic below taken a week after video above.  Managed to save about half a dozen fry and put into a 60L tank, with sponge filter.

    20170209_182658.jpg

     

    Pic below taken today.  After several weeks, the initial few fry I've managed to save have now grown to slightly more than a centimeter.

    scene00026.jpg

     

    Also, their parents have managed to spawn and successfully hatched another batch.  But as I've not been able to separate them out into another tank, sadly those fry just became food.

     

    That's sad.  They sound pretty rare, would be worth setting them up their own tank.

  11. On 2/27/2017 at 6:05 PM, kiwis said:

    I've got a tank which i'm slowly turning into my first marine aquarium. I'm thinking about putting a glass panel along the back and having the sump in the main tank. Is there any real reason I shouldn't do this?

    Yeah, because it will take away space from the main tank.

     

    Quote

    Also what size sump should you have for vs the size of the main tank? working out if I have room.

    As large as possible.

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