20 Gallon tank diary

[sammydee]

Hi.

I got my tank today - it's a 20 gallon long, and it only cost me a tenner, with a nitrite & pH test kit, and some anti-fungal medicine! Bargain or what?

Here's a pic of it:

[Picture of tank

Now I need to work on making a hood for it. I'll let you all know how it goes.

 

[Navarre]

Very nice!

Now the work begins!

 

[stellablu]

Are you sure its a long? I have three 20g long tanks and your tank seems a bit tall. It looks more like a 30g to me.

Oh...what do I know? heh

 

[sammydee]

It is 30x12x15, so three inches higher than a normal 20 gallon long - more like a 23 gallon. I like that little bit of extra height, I think it looks a lot better than the 12 inch high tanks.

 

[sammydee]

Oops I repeated myself.

 

[Salt Freak]

were is the braces

I don't think that silicone will hold 200 pounds of water

but nice tank though good bargain

C_F

 

[sammydee]

Should it have braces?

I have another tank exactly the same dimensions that's held together only with silicon, and it has never leaked in six years.

 

[Salt Freak]

whats that black strip along the top is that part of the brace.

 

[Michael Roth]

We have 5 20 gallon tanks, and not one has a brace, nor the 15 gallons. however when we get up to he 33's, all of ours have braces

 

[sammydee]

The black strip at the top is just purely cosmetic - to hise the top level water mark. I am going to rip it off because my home built hood will come down below the water level anyway.

I started my hood today YAY! It looks pretty good already - I think that, although I am DIYlexic, it might turn out ok. I'll get some pics of it tomorow.

Sam.

 

[The Reefer]

I have a 35 gallon long, and it doesn't have a brace on it. Though it does seem to bow a bit. It's held the 75 pounds of rock and water for over a year now. But if I was to get another, I would deff. recomend one with a brace in it.

 

[sammydee]

Ok so moving on to lighting now... anybody know how much 6500K and actinic 24" bulbs are?

Thanks.

 

[Salt Freak]

not more than 20 bucks a peice heres some bulbs

http/www.drsfostersmith.com/Product/NavR...m?N=2004+113350

here are the two I have on my tank

1. http/www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod...6&N=2004+113350

2. http/www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod...0&N=2004+113350

the atinic white is not 6500K but 12000K

 

[sammydee]

Found a site in the UK that does arcadia 24" tubes for £6.50! All of the other sites I found have them listed for at least £8.40.

So I'm getting both tubes and the ballast soon in the post. Nearly finished on hood construction too. I'll post pictures up here as soon as I can be bothered to take them

Sam

 

[sammydee]

OK, tubes and ballast arrived today so I'll be puting them in the hood tonight:

A couple of questions:

I know that live rock is ridiculously expensive in the UK (£10 a kilo), and I will need about a kilo per gallon of it. As my budget is quite restricted, can I add say five kilos, and keep a very low bioload (like one fish) until I get some more live rock? Will that work?

Also, instead of a deep sand bed, can I use the eggcrate idea from GARF.org? Or does that have to be used in conjunction with a deep sand bed? I think deep sand beds look ugly, but I might just make it like two inches dep at the front, going to six inches deep or so at the back, and that won't look so ugly I don't think.

Thanks.