my masterpiece

[sneasle]

yikes, wow.

[COM]

That's actually a reasonable price. I've seen them go for over $50.

[biggallon]

Originally Posted by sneasle

Looks good.

I love swordtails personally. I'm liking the serpae and Benous Aires tetras more and more as well.

i am new to this place , i have a 240 gallon fish tank and i am only twelve and i have questions about P.H. by the way serpae tetras die easily.

[Scuba Kid]

Uh, serpae tetras aren't hard to care for at all. They really don't "die easily"...I think you need to check your water parameters.

[emc7]

I couldn't kill serpaes either. Are they killing each other?

[sneasle]

Serpaes are a hardy fish. I agree, if you're fish are dieing, you need to check your parameters.

Please don't hi jack this thread. If you have question make a new thread or do a search for your problems.

[wifishman]

update, hey peoples i havent forgoten bout you. work has been demanding over the past couple weeks, alot of people requestiong time off this time of year.... however the stand and canopy are done... the pluming is coming along... im having a hard time figuring out what pump to use.. i dont want to have to much flow going thru it so im thinking of 2 cannister filters... my lfs has some rated at 650 gallons each. then doing 2 returns with spraybars to keep some of that deterious from settling on the bottom...... the flow wont be to great either. as i think they had a mag7 equivalent for pumps..

as far as the serape tetras go, im getting major contradicting reports with the more i look into them... seem to be somewhat agressive... not looking to get any agressive fish...

[emc7]

rated at 650 gallons each

for a tank that size or gallons per hour? The rule of thumb for small tanks is flow at least 5-10 times the size of the tank per hour. Spray bars are good for spreading out the output flow and slowing it down. The more you churn the surface, the more air exchanged with the water. More oxygen is good for fish, but you lose CO2.

Two identical filters is a good idea.

[wifishman]

gallons per hour sry

[emc7]

Ok 2* 650 Gallons/hr divided by 150? gallons is a turnover rate of 8.76 times per hour. That fine.

Is the tank a 150? Thats what I calculate from 8 x 4 x 4, but the size got eaten with the original thread.

[wifishman]

replace the 1 with a 9

[wifishman]

Originally Posted by emc7

for a tank that size or gallons per hour? The rule of thumb for small tanks is flow at least 5-10 times the size of the tank per hour. Spray bars are good for spreading out the output flow and slowing it down. The more you churn the surface, the more air exchanged with the water. More oxygen is good for fish, but you lose CO2.

Two identical filters is a good idea.

since im going with smaller fish ive always read that the waste produiced is less... and i seriously going too need 4000-5000 gph for filters?

[sneasle]

Still with 5-10 turns per hour, its a good range

Smaller doesn't mean less poo. Have you ever kept cats?

[wifishman]

everything i have read is smaller means less waste... a 5" fishes waste would be larger than 2 2.5" fish....
if yall are right i may have too look into the sand filters like they use for pools......

[emc7]

Neons do make less waste than goldfish and as size goes up, the rules change, its more like a pond. And if you stock it at 1/4 capacity, you could have 1/4 filtration.

Ok, this time I get 950 from 8x4x4. That makes more sense, it has the same footprint as 16 55 gallon tanks. Hmm. 16 canister filters?

[emc7]

It seems that pond people use bead filters that look like pool filters, but are different inside. http://ponddoc.com/Store/Filters/Pro...ruction123.htm

Are you losing your sump space by making the tank a bar?

[lohachata]

wifish...when you are ready for plants contact cory fry at bayleespapa.com..or go bid on some of his auctions on aquabid..his prices are amazing.while he may not do little 10 or 20 dollar orders but he has some insane auctions that are $100 on AB called "whack job"..check him out..i guarantee that you be more than happy with his plants..and his plants are way bigger and nicer that anything you will get from liveaquaria..or most other places around the country..one of his auctions has a pic of his kid holking an ozelot sword that is almost as big as she is..

[emc7]

Try http://www.bayleesfishees.com/ instead. I got food from them at an ACA past and was really happy with everything (small cichlid pellets, algae wafers). Cheap and the fish "eat it up"

[wifishman]

thanks for the link, once everything is set up im going to shoot him an email and say heres 500 bucks what you got for me....

here where i am getting stumped. filtration. in a prev post it recomended 5-10x turnover. so im going to need somewhere around 5000-10000 gph which i can accomidate my question then becomes about flow. how much is too much.... because that seems more like a reeftank for turnover... now since waste settle to the substraite and the bacteria convert it and the plants use it do i really want a low level spray bar to lift up that waste? as u saw on my stocking list which i have yet once again altered and will post here shortly i have a lot of mid dwellers so id assume i dont want to have the flow concentrated there. and if id use i higher level spray bar to much surrface agitation will rid my tank of the precious co2. so i am just dumbfounded as to where and how to put my returns.....

my new stocking list
25 cardinal tetras
15 cherry barbs
25 glo lite tetras
15 head and tail light tetras
15 rummy nose tetras
15 lyretail swords
15 harlequin rasboras
15 penguin tetras
15 albino corys
10 chinesse alage eaters
15 zebra dainos
15 diamond head neon tetras
15 x-ray pristella tetras

now getting back to the flow question... would i be better off capping all my returns that are drilled into the tank running 1/2" to 3/4" returns over the top that way i could stagger them?

thanks alot for all the help. u guys are wonderful in dealing with me and my issues.. i know i ask alot of questions however i am only doing this once and i really dont want a single major issue to arise

[sneasle]

I'd consider adding some loaches and pleco's. With that size tank you could easily add some of the larger species as well. Aside from that, I really like that stocking list. It will be a site to see.

Ya might considering adding a small group of a larger schooling fish, to give a bit of variety and contrast to the larger schools of small fish.

More filtration is always better. It may just be me, but I would not see a problem using your old hook ups from when this was a reef tank.

I don't think your fish will have a problem with the flow, especially in such a large tank. They will just cruse around having a good time. I tend to think the best way to install filters is to have them pull 'dirty' water from the bottom of one side of the tank and dump the 'clean' water at the top of the opposite side of the tank. Granted, this may not fit in with the plumbing you already have, but I don't think it is worth the time, effort, and further mutilation of that tank to move the pipes.

Use the hook-ups that you have, it should work out fine.


Thats gonna be lots of plants. You may want to go in and build some structure (rocks caves and whatnot) so you can have some plants in all the vertical levels of the tank. There are some plants that would get tall enough, but I think having them grow to that height wouldn't look as good as giving them something higher in the water column to grow on.

Maybe some rock caves with 'plateaus' where you can put some substrate and plants? I think that would look pretty wicked.