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New house, new tank. 210 gallon Aqueon

26K views 163 replies 14 participants last post by  Crazygar 
#1 ·
I used to have a planted 280 gallon (72*24*37), but sold it before putting our house in the market at the end of last summer. My fish and shrimp were moved to a 37 column for the interim. We finally sold our house in Minnesota and have moved down to Northern Illinois. I was able to find a 210 gallon Aqueon aquarium with a nice sump for a great price used. I had a couple of friends come over and help me get it moved and into my basement. The problem was that I had not yet built a stand, so it stayed on the 2 by 4 frame/sled that I built to transport it on and some furniture dollies. I now have most of what I need to get everything set up, but can't really invite 3 friends over to help lift it up on to the stand because of the current pandemic.

The aquarium has 2 megaflow overflows on the back wall, and I plan on running a sump. I have pulled out the old bulkheads to replace them and was pleasantly surprised to see that I can plumb 1 inch bulkheads in all 4 holes. I plan to run each overflow in a Herbie setup with a full siphon and an emergency drain. The aquarium will go on an interior wall that accommodates the stairs. I am planning on placing the sump in the space beneath the stairs for better access.

I intend for this to be a low tech setup, with shrimp and small fish. I'll post later with pictures and the equipment that I have purchased for the build.

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#2 ·
For equipment, I'll be running the zeroedge sumo that came with it. It'll be heated by vivo-sun 300 watt titanium heaters x 2, controlled by an inkbird 306t. My return pump is a Jebao DCP-15000. For lighting, I am going to be using some dimmable slim LED fixtures that I found on Amazon and control through a smart dimmer.


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#3 ·
I plan on putting some lighting together based on these lights I found on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074HR9RY5/ref=cm_sw_r_em_apa_i_N1mHEb138B54T

I am starting to think I am going to want focus the light down though, so I am contemplating pulling the chips out of the fixtures and adding some reflectors. I'll need to strip one down and get some measurements and see what I can come up with.


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#5 ·
I've got guppies, mollies, corys and some plecos from my last tank. I like live bearers, since they are pretty good at populating the tank by themselves.

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#6 ·
So, I like the little 15W fixtures I bought, like the color, they are dimmable and have a decent CRI, but they are a little bulky relative to their output. They are cheap, so I am ok giving a little more effort to make them work. Looked a little bit at getting reflectors, but the reflectors (if I found ones that would fit) are likely to cost 50% more than what the lights each. I'll have to decide on a DIY reflector and try to keep the light in the tank where it belongs.

Don't know if I mentioned this, but all 4 holes are big enough for 1 inch bulkheads, which makes me think that dual Herbie overflows are going to work well.


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#7 ·
Got the light put together for the most part, just need to tune it some once I get the tank set up. Went with 13 of the 15 watt pucks.


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#12 · (Edited)
I think that I'd like celestial pearl danios, but that could get expensive. I've filled tanks with feeder guppies before and really liked them, maybe I will use my current tank as a quarantine tank for some of the feeders.
 
#13 ·
Frick, a cross brace is broken more than I had realized. I had seen the crack towards the middle, and was going to bolt some aluminum to it. Going to have to try to find some custom cut glass to fix.


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#15 ·
So, quick update. Over the weekend I got one piece gooped up and clamped in. Let it set overnight, pulled off the clamps and thought it looked good. I was upstairs playing with my kids about 30 mins later and hear a loud noise from the basement. The cross brace fell into the tank, chipping the corner of the glass, but thankfully not the aquarium. Some investigation showed that I had accidentally grabbed a tube of clear sealant that I had bought for another project, not silicone. This stuff doesn't adhere as well to glass and takes longer to cure. I bought two braces so that the tank would look the same on both sides, so I'll use the chipped one on the side with the intact plastic brace. Once I get all of the gunk scraped up, I'll try again with the right silicone. That could have been an expensive mistake.
 
#16 · (Edited)
Attempt #2, let's hope I didn't mess it up this time. Not my best silicone job, but it is where nobody will ever see it.

Two minutes after getting the clamps set, I catch my 4 year old starting to take a clamp off to play with.


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#17 ·
Attempt #2, let's hope I didn't mess it up this time. Not my best silicone job, but it where nobody will ever see it.

Two minutes after getting the clamps set, I catch my 4 year old starting to take a clamp off to lay with.


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Whooa, only took two weeks until we got to see the tank ;) Makes it more fun to follow when you share the slight mishaps along the way so thanks for that.
 
#19 ·
Here's a picture of the tank and stand. I am going to put the sump and the water change reservoir behind the wall and under the stairs. I still need to do some work under the stairs. I am going to sheet in the bottom of the stairs, install an outlet and frame and install a door to keep the kids out. They like to hand from the conduit across the walls. Now that there's a live wire in it, I need that to stop.

Next will be some clean up and trying to lift a heavy ass tank while social distancing.


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#21 ·
Actually getting ready to do it now, but I need to get the electrical outlet behind it squared away first.


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#23 ·
It's probably close to time to leak test this SOB before I get much further.

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#26 ·
Found a great piece of wood while picking up pet food today. Fits perfectly. I will work on getting the hardscape laid out so that I can add the substrate. My larger pieces of wood have never got fully water logged, so I use zip ties to hold them together and attach them to the slate tiles. The slate and sand on top hold it all down.


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#28 ·
Very excited to see all of this set up!



Regarding the CPDs, they're not difficult to breed if you have a smaller tank and the time/inclination and an enormous group would look amazing in there :grin2:

Any ideas on planting yet?

There's a local guy that has a decent sized group of endlers for sale cheap, so I might go that route.

It's going to be low tech, so probably a mess of Val, a couple swords, eventually a carpet of crypts. Kind of depends on what I can find. I have some blyxa, corkscrew Val, a crypt, some Java Fern, Java moss and pennywort in my 37 gallon right now. In the current situation, I'm just taking what I can get.

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#29 ·
Jeez, you'll fit a lot of endlers in there! I loved mine though, looking forward to seeing all yours. Are they all the same breed or a mix?

If you're looking for something to keep numbers down a bit, Badis Badis are fine with harder water. Mine managed to single-handedly hunt down every single fry from 7 females in a moderate-heavily planted tank - although it's far smaller than yours!

Love a good mess of plants - I've had a mix of crypts in my main tank for a while and added pennywort a couple of months back. Actually really like the look of them mixed together.

Love that piece of wood by the way, good find!
 
#30 ·
I have what is probably too much wood in the tank. Added some water to see if the new wood will float and it looks like it will stay put. I would have added substrate, but I didn't feel like carrying 250 lbs of sand downstairs. [emoji846] I added 90 black bar endlers to my other tank yesterday. The mollies immediately started hunting fry so I made sure to quickly feed them. It looks like there are too many makes in the mix, so I'll need to find more females soon. I wasn't ready for more fish, but found a good deal from a guy moving. I'll try to get more pics up today.

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#31 ·
Change of plans: the space under my stairs was not level enough to put the sump there. The sump tank rocked diagonally on the floor, with one corner sitting 3/16" off the ground when 3 were touching. So the sump is going under the stand for now. The good news is that the drain plumbing was much easier to to this way. I got everything cut and dry fitted, then realized I forgot the valves. I'm glad I figured it out before I glued anything. Because I laid it out without the valves, two push on the other drains when I close them. Not a big deal, but not ideal. I am filling it all the way up to leak test the bulkheads and plumbing now. Still have to figure out the return. My return pump can handle 1 to 2 inch Barb's, or 1.5 and 2 inch hard plumbing. I was planning on using 1 inch PVC to make the returns and spray bar, but I am trying to decide if I want to go larger.



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#32 ·
The BDBS seems to be quite a bit siltier than last time, causing it to be more gray than black. I filled it up enough to test the overflows. With the low flow of the python, you can tell that the right overflow is just a touch lower than the left. Probably not enough to make a difference once the return pump is running.

Since I bought an oversized pump, I am going to start with the 1 inch return, then in crease from there if needed. I'll probably just start with a simple return to get everything moving first, then build my spray bar in a few days. I'll probably build a wooden box as well to house cords and use as a place to mount the pump control and heat controller.


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#33 ·
Still fighting cloudiness. I built a hang on filter and stirred it up again. Probably start moving some plants tomorrow.


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