Guppy Guy
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Posts posted by Guppy Guy
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So here is my (almost) completed bulkhead. The only reason this one isn’t completed is because the print failed halfway through, but the bottom still works as a proof of concept. The inner, small tube is the return line, and it puts water in the tank from the top of the bulkhead. The larger tube is the intake line, and water comes in through holes on the side of the bulkhead. At the filter below the tank (still making that), the small tube will detach from the large one and go directly to the pump. This complicated setup is so I only have to look at one piece of equipment in the entire tank instead of two. Let me know what you think!
Also, it may be a few days before I update again. I have been having software issues with my CNC machine, and the filter is a good challenge that I still need to figure out. Don’t worry though, I will be working on it whenever there is time. 🙃
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After literal hours of grinding, filling, and cutting, I finally have the old gumball slide out, leaving room for the filters. Now, I am going to hop on the computer and model two different mason jar lids as adapters for the tubing, and change my intake to have a lip for extra waterproofing.
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Ok then, I’ll do it. Thanks!
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On 7/15/2022 at 9:45 AM, Guppysnail said:
But I do not see where it says not aquarium use.
Maybe I read it wrong, but the red circle with a slash looks like an aquarium to me, but maybe I was wrong. I think I will use it and cross my fingers that nothing bad happens 🤞
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On 7/14/2022 at 8:55 PM, Guppysnail said:
Is it the thick
I have 2 sizes I am using. The Larger intake is 3/4” OD and 5/8” ID. The smaller return is 1/4” OD and 0.170” ID. Note that the intake (large one) will not be in contact with water on both sides, just the inside. The return (the small one) will contact water on the inside and outside, since it is inside the intake.
Both labels say the same thing, so here is one of them:
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I just went out and bought a bunch of vinyl tubing for my gumball aquarium project(see signature) and got back home and realized that the tubing is “not for use with aquariums”.
It says it is safe for potable water, so why isn’t it aquarium safe? Can I still use it? Thanks
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As some of you may remember, I started researching filter solutions for micro tanks a few months ago. After getting the knowledge I needed from that thread(thanks everyone!) I set to work designing a filter, over and over again since I couldn’t decide what I wanted. I think I know what I will do now, so I decided to start this thread to keep me motivated.
My plan for the light is simple. I will 3D print a lid that fits over the bowl, and install 18 LEDs in a piece of CNC machined acrylic that fits in the lid. The cherry on top is connecting a power switch to the original gumball dial for light control.
For the filter, I will 3D print a custom bulkhead that houses both the intake and return lines to keep it as small as possible. The return line will run inside the intake line and split out at the filter, which is a 3” PVC pipe filter I designed awhile back. It will fit in the gumball machine base so I won’t have to look at it 😁.
I have already sanded the machine itself, so all that is left is to paint it, but I will do that last so as to not scratch it while test-fitting various components of the build.
I have attached a few photos of what is done so far, and I will update this thread every time I get something done. Enjoy!
The gumball machine before sanding:
After sanding:
Custom Bulkhead design:
Acrylic that the LEDs will attach to:
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I have salvinia growing in my 3 gallon tank, and from my experience, it is a medium speed grower and wants plenty of nutrients and light, and no water agitation.
The only way that I have found to kill it is when a snail jams your filter pump and the overhead sump that the salvinia is in drys up 😂
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So, I failed. I had to go on a business trip over the weekend, and came back to find that 90% of the fry died. I assume that it was because I was not here to do water changes, and I overfed a little before leaving. Also, that specimen container was extremely small, and I firmly believe that the more water volume a tank has, the more stable it is. The 5 fry that did survive were all half dead and weren’t going to make it, so I put them out of their misery by letting the zebra danios have them.
Next time I try this, I will have a mesh breeder box so they are in the large water volume without the predators, and I will feed less with more variety. I will start a new thread if/when that happens and will link it below. Thanks for following my journey, and I hope you learned something.
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Here is a pic of Dad watching his baby’s through the glass. I dunno if he wants to eat them or care for them though 😂.
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Today, the fry started free swimming! I’ve heard that once they get passed the wiggler stage, its easy going, so I hope thats true. I am going to start them on some frozen BBS from my LFS today, as I haven’t had time to hatch any lately.
As far as care goes, they are floating in a specimen container in the 30 gallon the eggs were originally laid in. Every day, I use tweezers I 3D printed to remove any dead ones and other mulm, and a 50 ml syringe to do a 75% water change, replacing the water with tank water. There is also a small air stone gently making bubbles to keep the water oxygenated.
Excuse the photo-bombing guppies. They are sad if they aren’t in the picture 😂.
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On 6/8/2022 at 1:48 PM, FishPlanet said:
Not aquarium related but saw this funny one on FB:
My excuse on the way to the fish club 😂
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I just finished moving the wrigglers into a specimen container to grow out. I used a thin piece of 3D-printed plastic to scrape them off the pipe, and it seems to have work really well. I also painstakingly removed as many eggs with fungus as I could, using tweezers. Now they are floating in the back of my 30 gallon tank in the container.
I know they will have to eat in a few days, but I don’t want to have to go through the hassle of hatching brine shrimp, and I only have adult brine shrimp frozen. In Dr. Axelrod’s book “Freshwater Angelfishes”, he mentions boiling an egg, taking the yolk, and squeezing it through a handkerchief in the water for food. Is this still valid 70 years later? Unless anyone has objections, I think I will try it. I would love to hear opinions though!
Sorry about the low resolution of the picture. I had to zoom way in to capture the fry.
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Hello everyone!
I recently had a pair of angelfish in my 30 gallon aquarium pair up and lay eggs. This wasn’t the first time as they would do it every now and again. They would just eat the eggs and carry on. This time though, I decided to take the eggs out and artificially raise them. They laid them on a piece of pipe I had in the tank, so removal was easy. I moved it into my 3 gallon tank(linked in my signature), and added an air stone and a single guppy to keep it cycled. Now they are starting to hatch into the wriggling stage, so I will move them into a specimen container later. This is already farther then I thought I would get, so I am extremely excited. I also just lost my favorite angelfish this week, so if this succeeds, maybe I won’t feel so bad about the loss. Here is a small video of the wrigglers just moving out, as well as a picture of the eggs. I will update as soon as I change something.
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After a month or so of being empty, I have employed this tank with a new job. It is now an angelfish egg hatchery. I have a pipe that the angels laid on vertically in the tank, with an air stone on it, janksilly(Is that a work lol?) help in place with my PVC log. There is also a single guppy in the tank to keep it cycled. I don’t expect to get much the first try, but you never know 😉.
The water is cloudy in the picture because I stirred up a bunch of mulm while positioning the pipes.
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My angelfish just laid eggs on a pipe I had in the tank, so I moved it to a 3 gallon tank(the one linked on my signature) with an air stone. I don’t expect to get lucky on the first try, but I will start updating there. Thanks for this thread @JRinFL, this has helped me.
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Ok, so today, the 2 other angelfish decided to spawn out of nowhere. Could this have anything to do with what happened to the other one?
I also took the eggs out of the tank to try and artificially hatch them, but now the other two are “fighting”(one lunges toward another, either stops short or gently nudges). Is this normal?
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So the other day, I did the hardest thing I have done in my life. I cut open my angelfish that died to look for internal parasites and found this. I forgot to take a regular picture, but I did get one from under my microscope. It is attached below.
Inside her were probably 50 or so small(<2mm) black lines so to speak that may or may not have been parasites. I don’t know what these are, so opinions are welcome. It took me a few days to post this, because like I said, it was extremely difficult.
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On 6/2/2022 at 2:35 PM, nabokovfan87 said:
You can develop OTS with a maintenance schedule in place. It happens
Even if it is OTS, wouldn’t all the fish be affected? I fell like if it were anything to do with water quality, the more susceptible fish like the catfish or guppies(mine are sensitive to water quality. Hardy as usual to everything else though) would show signs first. My angelfish seem to be the hardiest in the tank since they are the last ones to show signs of problems when something happens.
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On 6/2/2022 at 2:09 PM, Brian said:
I wonder how old it was when you purchased it.
When I got her about 3 years ago, she was really small. Before I bought her, I talked with the store about her, and she was locally bred, and used to local water conditions. When I got her, she was about the size of a golf ball, and has since grown to be baseball sized. That tells me that she was no more then 5 years old, probably closer to 4.
On 6/2/2022 at 2:09 PM, Brian said:I have to wonder if there was a very drastic environmental change (poisoning, water temperature) that may have caused this.
There are no cats in my place, and I don’t use any air sprays or aerosols. The only thing I can think of is the vent that is above the problem tank, but it sucks air in. Not out. I have not had any problems with this vent in the past poisoning water or anything. There is a hood on top of the tank that has a pretty tight fit(as in 90% of the water surface is covered. The 10% remaining is for the filter/heater lines) and there is no dust or anything else on top of it. Also, if it were water quality, the other fish would show signs of it too. Over the years, I have learned how to see the slight difference of color in a fishes finbase, and that is how I know my ammonia and nitrite levels are off. Anytime the algae starts growing, I know it is time for a water change since the nitrates and/or phosphates are too high. Every time I test my water, my prediction is always extremely close to the result, so much so that I would have done the same things weather testing or not.
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I don’t know though. I mean, she had been in there for 3 years before it happened, as did all the fish that died from it. And the last water change I did was a 30% one only 2 weeks ago. Tuesdays water change was about a 60%water change, simply because I needed the old water for the quarantine tank. Also, I just added some guppies to the tank about 2 weeks ago, after the water change, and they all are as healthy as can be.
I try to keep the ph around 7.5, but it never falls below 7.0. I measured my tap water, and its ph is 7.0, so I do have to use a little alkaline buffer.
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I do water changes every 2-3 weeks, and clean the filter in the old water every time. I also gravel vac with every water change, which is usually a 30-45% depending on how dirty the tank is and how long its been since the last one.
I feed every morning around 10am. I only feed once daily. I feed flakes mostly but will feed frozen brine shrimp(cleaned and drained) a few times a week instead.
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Hi all. As you may have seen, I recently lost one of my favorite angelfish to an unknown cause. That wasn’t the first time it happened though, it was about the forth. I created this to try and figure out what it is, where it comes from, how to prevent it, and how to cure it. I want to hear all input and opinions, as well as any theories you may have. I will put my details below. Thanks for contributing everyone!(If you don’t want to read all this, only the 2nd and last paragraphs are vital)
The first memorable case I had was with a Dalmatian molly about a year ago. The second case was a guppy, and the third was a swordtail. All the victims were in perfect health and perfect water parameters to begin with. All had been in the tank for at least a year, though the angelfish and swordtail had been in it for 3 years. There were no obvious symptoms that slowly became noticeable as with most diseases. It was just “first day, perfect health, second day, almost dead, third day, dead” Every. Single. Time. Let me break that down. The first day, as mentioned above, the fish was perfectly fine. Acting normal, looked normal, and behaved normal. The second day, they just dropped. All the victims would kind of shimmy around for the first hour or so, and then drop to the bottom of the tank and sit there on their side. They all would try to swim around, but just didn’t have the strength to. The worst is on the third day though. In the morning, I would have already moved them to a hospital tank, medicated with various medications I will talk about later. They would try to eat the food I put in front of them, but don’t have the strength to swallow it. It truly is the most pitiful thing I’ve ever seen, and I hate re-seeing it every time a fish gets this. Then about midday, the fish improves. It can eat normally, acknowledge my presence, and almost swim upright. Then it suddenly dies out of nowhere. It also happened with every fish.
The medications I used all gave the same results as mentioned above. I tried plain aquarium salt, pravipro, marycen, pimafix and melafix, focus, metroplex, and stress coat. The water parameters were the same as the tank it came out of(temp 76F, ph 7.5) and I used a 1:3 ratio of new water to old tank water. I also put substrate in the tank to help cycle it, as well as established filter media and an extra air stone.
It is worth noting that all these fish were in the same tank, and that tank is still running today, as is this problem. The tank they all came out of is a used 36 gallon bow front, and when I get it, it had been empty for 15 years, so no cross-contamination. There is a bubbling ship decoration that came with the tank, and PVC pipes that add shelter and style to the tank(they look old since they are covered in algae). The substrate is a 2:3 ratio of sand to gravel. The light is a fluval aquasky 3.0, the heater is a Eheim jäger, the filter is a fluval 307, and the air pump is an aqueon quietflow(I think). I will list the fish, though know that not all of these were in here at once. The tank has always been reasonably stocked. The fish include 3 angels(now 2 😞), between 3 and 5 guppies(still there), a swordtail(one of the victims), a molly(first victim), a swordtail(victim), a whiptail catfish(still there), 4 zebra danios(still there), and snails(I try to remove them, but they always come back).
I don’t know if this is a common issue or not, or where to begin looking for it. If you have had similar experiences, please share. I am thinking it is some kind of bacterial infection, but I would like to know your theories as well. If I can come to some kind of conclusion, I will share and hopefully be able to update with good news. I will also be contacting local fish stores and interviewing many people, so I will post the results here. Thanks in advance for sharing!
Edit: it is worth noting that I posted this more for research then help.
Vintage Gumball Machine Aquarium Build
in Photos, Videos & Journals
Posted · Edited by Guppy Guy
I just finished what may be my favorite part of the entire build. I wanted the original quarter dial to have a purpose, so I added a rotary switch to it as a light control! The only difference in appearance is a small nut holding the switch, but nothing that looks awful.
Now I have a question for those following; Should I glue a 2022 quarter in the original hole? Leave a “Love” reaction for yes, and a “Sad” reaction for no. Whichever one has the most votes by the end of tomorrow is what I will do.