Jim's 60 Gallon High-tech Planted Journal

The p&p was about £30 but that was because i bought £500 worth of gear off of them which included 25kg of quatz graval and 10kg of DEPONIT-mix as well as the filter, pressurized CO2 system (that was £200) which i hope is worth every penny saying that, seriously look on ebay because you can get a great deal on there as you can see from my other posts

I bought some YADY fish food from there the other day and its here already and postage was only €5 which i thought was a bargin consindering it came from Germany

Also as i said before mate, try and find someone that can can fill it (your CO2 bottle) b4you buy it. You dont want to spend the money and find you cant get it filled

I will try and post the pics later, feeling a bit hung over, went to Tiger Tiger in London last night and still fill drunk

jimboliana said:

Also as i said before mate, try and find someone that can can fill it (your CO2 bottle) b4you buy it. You dont want to spend the money and find you cant get it filled

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My LFS does fills for £10 - 15. I've got my eye on e-bay for a good deal as we speak.

As for your hangover - just carry on drinking!

I've just studied your lighting. Is the metal halide dead centre in the unit? The reason I ask is because if one has a centre strengthening brace (as I do) then it will block the light path.

Yes the light is dead centre but i dont understand about 'centre strengthening brace'. The light has two adjustable wires on the other side from which it will hang that come with the light.

My mate John who put the shelf up put a load of fixing brackets in the wall to hold the weight, i'll be putting the light up next week and take a pic so you can see, i dont think any light will be blocked

As for the hangover i took your advice a had a couple of pints, fill alright now

Will you be performing the recommended Dennerle water changes - 25% every fortnight?

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I prob will at first just to see how it goes then adjust accordinly really just to get off to a good start. I want to do a fishless cycle, where do you buy Ammonia from?

Just fitted the light onto the shelf and switched it on, my is it bright, the missis hasn't seen it yet but i dont think she is going to like it much

Never mind though ha

I will post some pics in the next couple of days

jimboliana said:

Yes the light is dead centre but i dont understand about 'centre strengthening brace'. The light has two adjustable wires on the other side from which it will hang that come with the light.

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Here's a pic of mine. Obviously a metal halide centrally mounted isn't an option for me - and two is way too much light in my size. I assume 150W is the smallest bulb size?

Why bother with a fishless cycle? I'm sure you could have success with the Dennerle method of stocking as described in their guide. Unless you plan on not stocking heavily with plants from the very beginning

I think you can get a 70W bulb but i just got one that Arcadia recommended on there web site which was the AH120 which has a 150W bulb for my tank depth which is 18"

My tank does not have 'centre strengthening brace' so no problem on that front

Why bother with a fishless cycle? I'm sure you could have success with the Dennerle method of stocking as described in their guide. Unless you plan on not stocking heavily with plants from the very beginning

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Yes i was going to go with the Dennerle method but i'm not sure if i want any of the fish they suggest, am i being too picky? Then if i didnt use them fish i didnt want to put in fish i wanted and then them all die on me with the amonia spikes etc

Any sugestions?

If you plant heavily enough from the outset then you won't experience ammonia spikes as such. If you intend having softwater i.e. < KH 4 then your pH will be well below 7 anyway (as you will be injecting CO @ 25 to 30 mg/l I assume) where Ammonia is more Ammonium and less toxic. Nitrite is more toxic at lower pH but your plants will readily absorb both these toxins.

I have read reports of many heavily planted high-tech tanks that have not gone through the traditional nitrogen cycling processes. Obviously this technique is only really relevant to those with set-ups exhibiting very fast plant growth (usually attributed to high-tech ones like yours).

I'd recommend a decent algae crew anyway. 4 to 6 SAEs should do well for starters. Some Otos (10 to 12) and Amano shrimp when you've been up and running for a few months.

BTW That is a photo from my 34 Gallon in my signature. My camera is an Olympus D-230 2 Megapixel. Cheap as chips but has a great macro.

As you say i will be injecting CO2 and i will get an RO unit in the next week or so (looking at a small Aqua-Medic unit, just getting a price). I want to get an RO unit as this will softern the water and reduce KH and reduce the amount of CO2 that i am using.

I will be planting heavily as you say so it looks like i need to get an algae crew as well then, also i have looked on the net about the UV and alot of people don't recommend them so i might keep hold of it just in case

The picture looks fantastic, as i said before i want to get a digital camera and looking at the little sony cybershot cameras (about £250 i think) but for 2MP you have done wonders

Well i got some more pictures for you all. This is the corner after a couple of coats of paint (no its not finished yet)

Right so after that (that was friday night/saturday morning) John came round a fitted the cabint and shelf like below. The cabinet and shelf cost £150.00 and fitting was free (i should think so for that price! )

I think he has done a great job as it is fitted, i can still take the top off to drill holes etc for the plumbing

So then i had to put the tank on it to check that it fitted which i did

This pic i opened the doors so you can see inside where the sump and the CO2 gear/pH controller is going to be housed

The next thing to do was attach the light which you can see below, I will have to take the tank off again to put a thin piece of rubber to take out any inperfections in the top and even though you cant see or feel them it does not mean they are not there, better to be safe than sorry

You can also see the excess wire from the lights i will trim these when everything is ready and in its place as i need to be able to hang the light from its lowest point as well as it's highest The electric cable coils round the left wire and through a hole onto the top of the shelf with a lead in the back left corner coming down behind and into the cabinet which will be painted so you cant see it. That will be connected to an adaptor which will then come out the side of the cabinet with one plug

and last pic for the moment is one with the light on, i did say it was quite bright as you can see this was taken about 4pm this afternoon though the blind in the window was down which took out alot of the daylight

All i am waiting on now is the sump and the pump which i hope will be here sooner rather than later, so in the mean time while i am waiting for the sump i can finish off the rest of the room and the woodwork round the picture frame

Looking good mate.