[MatthewMeredith]

Hello all,

Just wanted to start documenting my journey with my first big tank. I had fish when I was a little kid, and when my own son turned 4 my wife and I got him a little 10 gallon kit. He lost interest after a while, while my interest grew... I built a 12 gallon tank out of some old glass shelving and planted it in a Walstad-ish style. Then, while planning out a bigger build (43 gallon, which I thought was HUGE), I found this neat tank on Marketplace for $120. Had no idea what it was when I brought it home, but after posting on Reddit, I discovered it is a Fluval Osaka 260. It's a 260L (69 gallon) curved front tank in 10mm glass. It originally had a matching stand and light, but the one I found was tank only.
Here it is once I got it home - pretty rough shape and full of leaves:

I then proceeded to do a quick clean and a leak test:

No leaks! Great, let's build a stand. I didn't want a center post so I used 2x8 material for the "beams".

I put a piece of 3/4" plywood on top, and then a "nice" top out of 1" fir boards that I milled from trees I felled on my property.

Here it is in the living room:

The light there was completely unplanned - originally I was going to have the 43 gallon tank in a different corner, but the Fluval fit really well here so I just went with it.

Then, I cleaned it out..... And found a chip.

After much deliberation, I decided to risk it. I filled it with a UV cured resin (windshield repair kit) and put some water in.

Next up, substrate!

 

[MatthewMeredith]

For the substrate, I wanted to build up some terrain, so I filled two 5 gallon buckets with clay from my property:

I then added some Fluval Stratum to the two "islands". This is where my root feeding stem plants will go.

Then, I capped the whole thing with a VERY fine sand from a local river. It's almost like a "silt", and I was worried it would make a mess but the cloudiness wasn't too bad!

After that, I flooded it and started adding the hardscape - again, stones from a local river:

That's probably about 150-175lbs of rock. I then added a bunch of smaller detail stones and small gravel. I didn't do this very carefully, and I didn't rinse the gravel. I wanted it to look as natural as possible, so I just kind of scooped it in and let it fall where it wanted to. The water got REALLY cloudy from this, but I really like the end result. I also started transferring over some plants from my little 12 gallon (anubias nana petite and some kind of bucephelandra, as well as frogbit floaters), and put in the first piece of wood. This is dead arbutus from my property.

Finally, I added a couple more pieces of arbutus branch and some more plants! There is Vallisneria on the left (it was pretty beat up in the store but there are about 7 plugs in there), hornwort on the right, a bunch of anubias and buce scattered throughout, and clumps of dwarf hairgrass mixed in as well. I still have a bunch more anubias and buce to transfer once it's ready for the fish.

The light is just temporary until my Hygger shows up, hopefully this weekend. Heater is 200w - I plan on keeping it around 22-23c. Filter is a neat internal one by Nicrew. It has 3 modular chambers with little trays for media that are each surrounded by foam. Moves a decent amount of water, much more than I'll need. The idea of this tank is a sort of slow flowing river. I have it cranked right now to clear up the water as much as I can, but once the fish are in I'll dial it down.

I'm a little worried about the dwarf hairgrass - I didn't put down any Fluval Stratum in those foreground areas, so it's just planted right into the sand/clay. There's maybe 1/2" of sand so the roots should get to the clay pretty quick, but I'm not sure if there'll be enough nutrients for it to thrive. Maybe I should add some root tabs?

Cheers!

 

[MatthewMeredith]

Oh and I should add, here is my eventual stocking plan!

I'll need to get/make a lid before I add the killifish. I already have 1 dwarf gourami, 1 oto, 3 ember tetras, and 7 cardinal tetras, so they'll go in shortly. I'm thinking that I'll do a fish-in cycle seeing as it's such a tiny amount of fish, large amount of water, and decent amount of plants. My well water has 0 ammonia/nitrite/nitrate, 7.5-7.8pH, and 8kH. Even my 12 gallon that has those 11 fish has zeroes across the board with water changes every 2-3 weeks. Plus I can move the HOB filter over with the fish to get a bunch of bacteria in there as well (I've already squeezed the sponge in the new tank a couple times too).

Thoughts?

 

[evil8]

I like it a lot! Love the stand too!

 

[MatthewMeredith]

I like it a lot! Love the stand too!

Thank you! The stand is super strong... And it'll look a lot better once I get around to putting in a shelf or two, wrapping the base in T&G boards, and putting a door on.

 

[evil8]

Thank you! The stand is super strong... And it'll look a lot better once I get around to putting in a shelf or two, wrapping the base in T&G boards, and putting a door on.

I built mine with 2 x 4s, so of course I used a center upright. Your plan of T&G will look fantastic! Look forward to seeing your progress.

 

[itsdirk]

 

[*Ci*]

The Osaka 260 is a little over 68g filled to the rim. Looking good! Did the chip repair disappear after filling? I hope it doesn’t give you trouble.

 

[Frshwtr]

Cool tank! Subbed.

 

[MatthewMeredith]

The Osaka 260 is a little over 68g filled to the rim. Looking good! Did the chip repair disappear after filling? I hope it doesn’t give you trouble.

Ah okay, I was just going off a unit conversion that gave me 68.68 gallons. Close enough lol.
It didn't fully disappear, but it's definitely filled and smooth to the touch. Still keeping a very close eye on it!

 

[MatthewMeredith]

Well, the fish are in! I moved over the rest of the plants and the hornwort was already taking off, so I decided to move the fish over as well. Everything settling in nicely, and the 3 ember tetras were schooling with the 7 cardinal tetras. I stopped and got 12 more embers after work yesterday, so I have a nice proper school of 15 now! So amazing to see them flowing through the tank. It's such a different world compared so the 10-15 gallons that I'm used to.

My light arrived as well - I'm pretty happy with it and I have a nice 5 on, 5 off, 5 on timer set. It's the Hygger HG016 which must have been discontinued or something, but compared to the Hygger 24/7 it is 42w vs 36w, quite a bit more lumens, more LEDs overall, and has a remote control that can use the default programming or custom.

Today's task will be sucking up some of the mulm from the rocks and cleaning the glass!

 

[Frshwtr]

Looks really natural! I really like the small accent rocks. Started getting any diatoms?

 

[MatthewMeredith]

Looks really natural! I really like the small accent rocks. Started getting any diatoms?

Thanks! Ya the accent rock work was literally just me scooping a bucket full of gravel/sand from the edge of a river bank, and then dumping scoops into the tank. Very little "design" to it, but I'm VERY happy with how it turned out.

Not entirely sure if it's diatoms, but all the big rocks have a kind of browny powder on them. Sort of like a mulm. I was going to vac it up, but I think I might just brush it off and let it settle, as I have 0 nitrates right now.

 

[Frshwtr]

That's exactly what I spotted. Might be the start of your diatom bloom. Lots of silicates in natural sand.

 

[MatthewMeredith]

That's exactly what I spotted. Might be the start of your diatom bloom. Lots of silicates in natural sand.

Ah okay, you seem to know more about it than I do! Anything in particular I should be doing or keeping an eye on? I was just planning on checking my ammonia/nitrite/nitrate every couple days and let it do its thing.

 

[Frshwtr]

It's pretty much the start of the ugly phase in any tank. Diatoms use the silicates in sand to replicate as they need it to create their outer shell. Just have to let it go through the cycle and they will burn out. High lighting also contributes to the bloom.

Lots of water changes and vacuum/remove as much as you can.

 

[evil8]

Yeah... this is looking really nice. It's great to sit by the tanks and feel satisfied.

 

[MatthewMeredith]

Not a lot to update, but I cleaned up the front glass (getting a bit of diatom dust) and replaced about 5g of water while cleaning up some of the bigger rocks. Sure makes the different colours of the rocks pop without that brown haze on them! Really excited for how this is going to look in a couple months. Hornwort (I think that's what it is?) on the right is really taking off, Vallisneria not so much... But I'll be patient. Oh and all 12 of the new ember tetras are still alive! It has now been 9 days since I first put water in.

 

[evil8]

Hornwort (I think that's what it is?) on the right is really taking off, Vallisneria not so much... But I'll be patient.

I don't know how much it helps, but I think it does anyway. I stick a couple of root tabs around Valisineria to give it a little boost to start off.

 

[Frshwtr]

View attachment 1050904

Not a lot to update, but I cleaned up the front glass (getting a bit of diatom dust) and replaced about 5g of water while cleaning up some of the bigger rocks. Sure makes the different colours of the rocks pop without that brown haze on them! Really excited for how this is going to look in a couple months. Hornwort (I think that's what it is?) on the right is really taking off, Vallisneria not so much... But I'll be patient. Oh and all 12 of the new ember tetras are still alive! It has now been 9 days since I first put water in.

Once the val starts putting out roots and runners, in my experience it's growth starts to explode. I had to rip it out of my scape because it sent out runners all over the tank and was taking over.