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Rimless 5.5g High Tech-ish startup

995 views 5 replies 4 participants last post by  Aquaman6410 
#1 ·
I have an established 5.5 low tech planted and its been up for about a year. I now want to go high tech. co2, ferts and high lighting....the whole works. But I need to know what I should get and change out. I am making the 5.5 rimless with a diy method. I figure I would do it on a small tank since it is my first diy rimless. Anyway, I plan to have DHG, HC, and some kind of moss for the most part.

First off, I have black gravel in the tank. I am going to replace this but with what? I have some old established flourite in a 20 gallon I'm taking down, should I just use that?

I am going to use RO water since my tap water is horrible. I am going to use EI Dosing with KNO3, KH2PO4, Plantex CSM+B, and gh booster (since I am using RO) That should be cool? Barr's GH Booster is the same as Seachem Equilibrium, right?

I have an adjustable 27w 6700k fluorescent desk lamp which works awesome from my past experiences so that is good.

I have a 5lb CO2 tank with milwaukee regulator so it will be great for my purposes but I don't know the best way to diffuse it in such a small tank. I have a glass nano diffuser but is that even good enough? I dont feel they work that great. I am also using an Aqueon power filter 10 as the filtration. Should I switch it over to a Zoomed 501 or toms mini canister, or just keep what I have? If I have to change the filter, I only want to use one of those two because I dont want to spend alot on a new filter.

I would say the co2 is my biggest issue right now. I need to make sure I diffuse it as close to 100 percent as possible and achieve nice co2 levels easy.

Thanks for reading and helping!
 
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#2 ·
Have you thought of a diy co2 reactor? Maybe get a small canister like zoomed or toms and hook it up inline to the reactor.
 
#4 ·
Personally, I would bypass the reactor all together and run the airline directly into your filter's intake. I really don't think it's necessary on a small tank like yours.

I've had a Toms mini canister on my small tank since its start up and I've done CO2 and non. The thing about CO2 in such a small tank is you achieve a total saturation much easier and its too easy to kill your tank's inhabitants.

I found that using a small airstone and later a small glass diffusor both yielded good results, but using my filter as a reactor by running the airline straight into the intake actually worked too efficiently. My fish were not happy with me, as the CO2 levels in the tank climbed quite rapidly and I was never able to get them to a happy level.

If you plan to not have fish, by all means run the CO2 straight into your filter's intake. The HOB filter will give you some problems as they tend to gas off quite a bit of the CO2 in the tank, but if you make the switch as you mentioned to a Zoo Med or Toms, you will be fine.

If you do keep fish in the tank, I would use a small diffusor like the ones found on ebay or GLA's website.

Note that I did use DIY CO2 with the diffusor and pressurized directly to my intake, so that might have played some part. Pressurized is much easier to control though, so I think the difference is minimal.
 
#5 ·
I like the zoomed better and have both. On one of my 5.5, I use a HOB aquaclear on very low flow plus an Elite mini for diy co2, same light as you and growing HC + hairgrass nicely. The benefit of the HOB in this small setup is that there's no co2 poisoning. I might change the filter and use the zoomed since its just diy co2..... and start a journal...
 
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