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70g Rimless "aDrift in Shanghai" (56K warning)

5K views 21 replies 13 participants last post by  zenche 
#1 ·
so after moving to Shanghai last April, I've not had an aquarium...until this past week! super stoked.

the star of this tank...as the name of the project might suggest, is this gorgeous piece of driftwood.

Custom made...120cm x 45cm x 50cm = 70G roughly
4x52W T5HO bulbs
a 1200L canister filter
3 big bags of fluval stratum
plants...don't know any of there names...things here are all in chinese!

some photos.

Brand spanking new!


Setting up


Front shot


Back shot


Some detail shots




 
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#7 ·
well, they're unreal because they're that way still from the store i bought them from. I'll try to sneak a video of the store this weekend...ALL of their plants look unreal. I'm not feeding them anything and am a bit scared how they will react because of that...my tank doesn't even have co2, though i'm considering it...
 
#8 ·
Stunning tank, and gorgeous driftwood. I can't wait till I'm able to have a tank like that but for now I've got to settle for my 60p and 45p since the girlfriend nixed any bigger tanks for now. She did however say I can get as big of a tank as I want when we buy a house so, patience!

Are you injecting CO2 or going low tech?

Thinking of any mosses for the wood? I think it would look fantastic with some fissidens or mini pellia creeping up one of the limbs
 
#14 ·
Sorry I missed this Zenche,

To attach moss to driftwood you can use fishing line or cotton string (which is what I use) and wrap it around the moss to the wood then tie it off to secure it.

I've had the best luck with separating individual fronds of the moss and laying them facing the same direction on the wood with a slight overlap, making sure I never just pile it on. I prefer the cotton string since it'll deteriorate after a period of time and by then the moss will have attached itself to the wood. [I tried just throwing some on my wood before and tying it but ran into issues with it just not looking good and not growing how I wanted it to, since then I separate it and do it in the above way with success]

I've also used superglue to attach moss before with success (with flame moss). You can see the glue till the moss grows over it though.

I've also known people to cram some moss into the cracks of driftwood and left it alone and had it grow by itself, just have to make sure there isnt too much flow that will knock it out of the crevices.

Another option, one that I plan on using on a couple of pieces of wood I have soaking right now is to drill some holes in it and stuff some Mini Pellia I have into the holes and let it grow out that way.

The tank is looking great. Glad you got some CO2. How are you getting the gas to the tank without a regulator? I dont see how you could given the high PSI coming out of the CO2 tank itself. Are you referring to a needle valve to adjust the CO2 rate?

Not sure if you are able to use Ebay or something similar in China but there are alot of good regulators online. You can build your own for a reasonable price at least here in the states. You could also try to get a basic paintball regulator and get the Adapter for a regular CO2 tank to adjust the pressure. Needle valvles are available online as well. ADA has CO2 systems as well but I havent used them. I've only used their tubing and diffusers.

-Blue
 
#10 ·
well, the macrandra look horrible now, sigh...no CO2 regulator to be found here, so it's just going through straight via ceramic diffuser. hard to control. still messing with proper lighting too...the tank does get direct sun light if the curtains are left open in the living room. currently running the bulbs for 7 hrs/day right now. too much/little?

changes -
- took out all the moss flooring I had
- added bunch of new plants this past weekend
- lost 2/3 of the rummies to ick over a week while i was on business trip
- added 3 beautiful koi angels
- swapped direction of the drift wood (also hacked off 6 inches from one of the limb to make it fit better in the tank

 
#13 ·
Thanks!

It's definitely cabomba of some sort, though can't tell you anything more since none of the plants are labeled. I just point and tell them how many pots i'd like and then we haggle.

from the photo above, you can probably see about 7-8 pots, for reference. each pot ended up costing me $1.40 USD-ish, and i got 10 total (some are more visible from other side of the tank).
 
#16 ·
Thanks for the reply CB. well...I guess there must be a regulator..just nothing with any sort of gauge to check the pressure, or a needle valve to finely control the output, etc.

as for the moss...i might try the super glue method this weekend...the tying down thing sounds too much of a pita...i have clumsy fingers. and taking this huge piece of dw out from the tank is really annoying! i'm thinking of filling in the rows of this part
with some flame moss or something like it.
 
#22 ·
well a couple years later, and the tank looks very different both in flora and fauna. very bubbly cuz of pumping out co2 to keep the plants happy. getting a reactor in a couple days to hopefully remove that. have 9 discus, 2 rather large siamese algae eaters, 9 cories, 5 rummies, a few nerites and too many assassin snails in there. used to have about 20 amanos...but they must not have liked my water params cuz they all eventually jumped.

 
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