Help me justify the set up cost :D

[Ami-Jane]

I got mine online from swell uk, seemed to be the best price at the time and is decent quality. I usually suggest that people keep fish suited to their water - but yours is very hard and your options are quite limited. One option may be to mix your water 50:50 with RO water but you need to think about the cost and convenience.

My local maidenhead aquatics sells RO at £3.50 for 25 litres (don't buy the jerry cans from them they are much much cheaper on Amazon ). I also have very hard water and did this for a while. Since my weekly water change is 200 litres I got fed up of lugging 100 litres per week from the fish shop and ended up getting my own RO filter. That is not without a cost though. Our water is metered (a lot is wasted when you make RO) and it takes me a couple of days to refill my containers after the weekend.

Thanks, again that’s helpful. Tank I’m looking at would probably be ok getting the 20kg bag.

I’m gonna go into my lfs on Saturday with a water sample so they can test it for me. Least I’ll know definitely what I’m up against and that may influence my decision. So desperately wanted a bristlenose but wouldn’t want to go down the route of buying specialised water or buying RO equipment.

This website has certainly helped me so far

 

[Munroco]

They wouldn't be my choice as I have softish water, but african cichlids might be an option. I've mostly moved on from cichlids these days but might be tempted to try a colony of shelldwellers.

 

[seangee]

I've mostly moved on from cichlids these days but might be tempted to try a colony of shelldwellers.

Cool - I'm very keen on some, but I sneaked a third tank in without asking for permission so I fear the fourth is still some way off

 

[Retired Viking]

Cool - I'm very keen on some, but I sneaked a third tank in without asking for permission so I fear the fourth is still some way off

I have two tanks- a turtle tank and my new 55 gallon freshwater tank, I would also like to set up more since I have several sitting empty in my basement but my wife rolls her eyes whenever I bring the subject up.

 

[Ami-Jane]

Been round a few LFS over the weekend. Seen another tank that looks right for me. It’s the Eheim vivaline 150.

https://www.eheim.com/en_GB/products/aquariums/fresh-water-aquariums/vivalineled-150-white

The Lido 200 is going to be too big where I need it to go and this is slightly bigger than the lido 120.

Not had an Eheim before, know they have been going donkeys years but doesn’t seem to be many reviews out there

 

[seangee]

Looks nice. You do (at least in the UK) pay a premium for the Eheim brand.
I have an Aqua One Aqua Vogue which is similar to look at and I have been very happy with that. May as well hang on till black Friday if you are buying new - although around here we seem to be having "black November"

 

[Essjay]

I used to have a smaller Eheim tank which was fine. I only got rid of it because we had some work done in the kitchen which meant there was no longer anywhere for it to go.
The only thing about the tank was that the quoted volume was the space occupied by the tank, it was not the volume of water it could hold. They included the air space above the water in the quoted volume.