Thunderstorm

hiya, I placed mine over top of my 6ft tank which has a 2ft water depth so gives it a darker blue look but still lots of light to see the fish at night with. Placing the LED's at different heights can give differetn effects, closer to the glass lid gives a spot effect while farther away from the glass gives a more spread effect. On fixing them to the hood i had thought of small bore water pipe (15 - 20 mm) with a split up the side, place the wires inside the tube with the LED hanging out the side then use tube saddles to fix them to the hood.

I posted this a few days ago but it dissapeared so i will post it again, TYhw warehouse has 90 Blue LED's in a Xmas decoration string for $40, the controller has 8 settings including a slow fade out - fade in of 3 sets of the leds so when the LED's are placed right it looks like the moon is shining through a forest canopy being moved by the wind, very cool. I bought a set and have been playing with them. Click the pic to see a bigger version. Looks better with ya own eyes.

hiya Jude It was at port waikato, we went up fo a nosey as had finished visiting friends in pukekohe so had a spare few hours. that long twisty piece is totaly hollow all the way through leaving just the wood shell with lots of holes, the catfish will love it Thanx Peter

hiya Browsing the beach with the family and what do we find? the coolest driftwood ever Click here to see then click each photo to enlarge Just need tanks to put them in hehe

hiya recently i added sensor light to my house with a little modification, I needed the sensor to switch 2 x 500 Watt halogens but the sensor unit is only rated for 300 watts, so a relay and a bit of wire and time is all i needed to beef it up So anyway i created a guide for others who want to do the same, I know its not a fishy related guide but it can be applied to the fishy devices we use to take care of our tanks. Anyway read on and i hope it helps some one Click here for the guide Thanx peter

hiya Nice tanks ya got there I like the big open one. Thanx peter

looks good misnoma. may i make a suggestion? you could place your heater and spraybar and such in the middle of the tank so when the plants grow up they will hide them then they wont be visable from the 3 sides.

Looks awesome i like the hollowed log too.

hiyas thanx for everyones comments most encouraging, I must be doing something right lol. Yes that wood is awesome, i was suprised at such a piece when my friends walked in the door with it, thye bought it for their 4 ft, they were going to chop the ends off and glue it to each end of the tank to make it look like it was floating mid-water but couldnt get it past the tank braces so hence it went in my tank. Big thanx to them Bill - in the pic the "lace" you can see is prolly the osiris (Echinodorus Osiris) . i dont have any lace in there even though i would love a piece of it. Its a awesome plant. Thanx Peter

awesome Would be cool to have a fishroom to breed kribbys but with all my other projects that will have to go on the bottom of the list for a while. I have 2 garages one is perfect for one as i cant use it as a garage cuz its been placed sideways with the doors on the end instead of in the side and to get a car in you need to either do a handbrake slide sideways or jack up the front and pull it round, lol so its a junk room. but anyway. Gazza - in pic 11 those lights, are they under the gravel in that tank? or are they just visable cuz of those rectangles you have in there? Thanx Peter

thanx Alan hopefully someone can make use of it Thanx Peter

Hiyas. recently i went in search of a temp controller that will switch 2 or more heaters. put off by the price of industrial controllers i found some other bits and made my own. I created an article for those interested in making one. Click here for the article Thanx peter

hi caper mine just grows, I trim it back by cutting the tops off to just below the waterline which makes the plant grow bushy by sending off shoots from the laterals. Why do yours keep dying? Do you have enough light, nutrients? or have you some fish that eat it? Thanx fay for your comments Peter

hiya tanksman I got Yeast fermentation CO2 but it isnt enough for the tank of its size so im making a system from a soda stream bottle so see how that goes. May just have to buy a bottle and reg i think. Jude, crypts are my favourite then swords, eventually i would like many kinds of both Thanx Peter

Hiya caper, the bushy stuff is ambulia, I have nicknamed it the "noxious weed" as its taking over hte whole back of the tank, Not only does it grow new shoots from the laterals, it also is sending out runners under the sand which i thought was weird. The fish with the neon is a male pearl gourami. Thanx for your comments hehe, sure jude, when they send new plants not sure when though they are still growing up. Thanx for your comments too

hiya thanx for the comments thought i would do some closeups of some of the plants, still playing with diferent settings and techniques with the camera. Rose sword Mini sag Amazon sword Rotala Crypt, not sure what kind Java fern Crypty stuff Peter

hiya kermit Got them from the bunnings in manukau. they are Phillips alto TLD 58W / 865 Daylight white. Thanx Peter

Madcookie, I bought some from bunnings a couple of weeks ago, they have cool white and daylight white, They cost me $7 or $8 each for 5ft ones smaller would be cheaper i guess as i didnt look at the smaller prices, but dont buy starters from there, they wanting $4 each for them Peter

Hiya for those that are interested, heres a photo update on the 6 footer. Will have a better designed sump arriving soon for even better filteration. Have added a few more plants , mini sag is spreading nicely as is the chain sword and the ambulia. the crypts are slowly spreading. All fish happy and accounted for.

I found this thread on another forum about algae eating fish. Its very useful and informative Click Here

awesome

hi, yup a CO2 diffuser. Suphew, yup, im doing what you suggested now, and the bubbles get split into millions of tiny bubbles by the pump an you can see them getting absorbed by the water when they get blown into the tank Seems to be working quite well

uummm peaceful? From this site http://www.thecichlidgallery.com/article_cacatuoides.htm I dont know much about this fish either but the first site i went to look it up says otherwise

here's how i built mine for the 6ft. Made from 2x4 for the top an bottom frames with 4x3 legs and a 18mm ply top, all nailed with 5" nails and glued with no more nails. The corners on the top and bottom frames are mitred together, not butted together. Those 2x4 legs at the back was a precaution cuz i had holes going right in the corners so the 4x3 legs would have been in the way. The whole thing will be lined with baby corro with cupboard doors on the front.

yup, its actually arched as well which you cant really tell from the pic. doesnt work to well, but i have another idea for a diffuser which im going to try out