Hiding Equipment From View Using Acrylic.

[TCB]

Just thinking about the best way to hide all equipment in the planned tank (i do not want any equipment at all to detract from the scape).
I came up with the (probably not original) idea of hiding the equipment in each corner of the tank using 3mm black acrylic (the rear and sides of the tank will be painted black and the whole of the tank will be built into a false wall (well that's the plan at least).
Hope the petty poor diagram helps, not exactly to scale!.
I thought of heating up the acrylic with a heat gun and bending it to form an almost semi-circle shape and then i would silicone it to the glass, leaving as big a gap as possible above the substrate to allow for flow etc.
However i am not sure if this would prove a problem by reducing the amount of CO2 getting into the water, also i am not sure if this would be safe for small fish, what if one was to get stuck up behind the acrylic?.
If anyone has any thoughts on this i would be very grateful, failing this method, all i can think of is using ADA equipment, but that is going to cost a lot of money,

cheers,

TCB.

 

[Fish'InMN]

I am not sure how the water enters one side and leaves the other? Is there a closed loop, sump, or wet/dry that removes water from one side and returns it at the other?


Regards,
Marty

 

[TCB]

I am not sure how the water enters one side and leaves the other? Is there a closed loop, sump, or wet/dry that removes water from one side and returns it at the other?


Regards,
Marty

Sorry about that, yes it would be an external canister filter,

cheers,

TCB.

 

[Fish'InMN]

Great, that eliminates any worries of CO2 loss, imo, as you have a closed system. The CO2 going into the canister may cause some burping or other problems, but you will have to test it and see.

The other concern is how the water will move in and out of these acrylic partitions. The one on the left, water out, can be a simple overflow.

The one on the right could be the same design, basically a reverse overflow where water fills towards the top and overflows into the tank. Or you could cut a few slits in the bottom, above the substrate, to give better flow around the bottom of the tank. If you cut the slits small enough, water will still fill upwards, otherwise it will act as a normal overflow... <Pause while I doodle> If the water flows over the top and exits the bottom above the substrate, you'll have CO2-saturated water exiting at the bottom rather than the top, meaning more CO2 will dissolve.

Hopefully this gives you some ideas!

Cheers,
Marty

 

[TCB]

Great, that eliminates any worries of CO2 loss, imo, as you have a closed system. The CO2 going into the canister may cause some burping or other problems, but you will have to test it and see.

The other concern is how the water will move in and out of these acrylic partitions. The one on the left, water out, can be a simple overflow.

The one on the right could be the same design, basically a reverse overflow where water fills towards the top and overflows into the tank. Or you could cut a few slits in the bottom, above the substrate, to give better flow around the bottom of the tank. If you cut the slits small enough, water will still fill upwards, otherwise it will act as a normal overflow... <Pause while I doodle> If the water flows over the top and exits the bottom above the substrate, you'll have CO2-saturated water exiting at the bottom rather than the top, meaning more CO2 will dissolve.

Hopefully this gives you some ideas!

Cheers,
Marty

Thanks for the reply Marty,

just to reiterate, the acrylic will not go all the way to the bottom of the tank, in fact i planned to have it above the substrate (ie. not touching the substrate at all), it is because of this that i wondered if any small fish might get stuck behind them.
Hope i have explained myself correctly,

regards,

TCB.

P.S. nice diagram, how do you do that? (going off line till tomorrow)

 

[Fish'InMN]

Heh, MSPaint is great.

You may have trouble with dispersing the flow (from canister) enough to not disturb the substrate, which is the reason I neglected that part. If you are set on having them above the substrate, then your only issue will be the dispersion of the flow from the canister, and most of that overflow mumbojumbo can be ignored. Lots of ways to do this, I'm sure you can think of something.

Cheers,
Marty

 

[Rooster]

...strips of glass, rear painted black ? Or strips of mirror would be "invisible" maybe ?

 

[TCB]

Heh, MSPaint is great.

You may have trouble with dispersing the flow (from canister) enough to not disturb the substrate, which is the reason I neglected that part. If you are set on having them above the substrate, then your only issue will be the dispersion of the flow from the canister, and most of that overflow mumbojumbo can be ignored. Lots of ways to do this, I'm sure you can think of something.

Cheers,
Marty

Hello Marty,
so you don't think that there would be a problem with small fish swimming up there?, secondly, how much flow does a planted tank need if any?,

cheers,

TCB.

...strips of glass, rear painted black ? Or strips of mirror would be "invisible" maybe ?

Cheers Rooster, not a bad idea, but i am not sure what kind of paint would be safe in a tank, any ideas?

 

[Fish'InMN]

Well, the only true trap would be on the side where water is being taken out of the tank. Real small holes in the acrylic guard, a very tall guard with little clearance above and below, etc. will deal with this. The other side will return water, so they may fight the current but they'll always be pushed out. There are lots of numbers thrown around for flow rate, I think the most common is 4-5x tank volume.

Krylon spray paint has been used by reefers for a long time. It will depend on what you can find locally and I have no experience with UK's hardware stores.


Marty

 

[TCB]

Well, the only true trap would be on the side where water is being taken out of the tank. Real small holes in the acrylic guard, a very tall guard with little clearance above and below, etc. will deal with this. The other side will return water, so they may fight the current but they'll always be pushed out. There are lots of numbers thrown around for flow rate, I think the most common is 4-5x tank volume.

Krylon spray paint has been used by reefers for a long time. It will depend on what you can find locally and I have no experience with UK's hardware stores.


Marty

Thanks Marty, much appreciated,

regards,

TCB.