HotTunaCartel

Finally got around to taking a pic. This is about 1 1/2 inches from the water line and it works fine with plenty of agitation

Was just thinking about doing this, going from light sand to stratum. The black sand looks stunning!

I think as @Scapexghost said, a single medium would be fine. I just put this in two days ago (In a 20 long) and this is how much it has trapped with just a ziss airstone in the sponge Yes, I'm dealing with algae currently but kind of amazed at the difference between the medium and small sponge filters.

In the past I've never had powerheads. But since having the aco powerhead I've noticed that the fish absolutely love swimming in the current. Its nice that it is not super powerful and there are still plenty of places for the fish to rest. The one thing I wish is that aco would make an adjustable powerhead so that i can tone down the power. I'd love to put one in my 20 long but its a bit too powerfull, ended up getting an aquaclear 20 which is about 1/2 of the gph as the aco but the aquaclear is built specific for their prefilters which I honestly think is a bit of put off. I was able to put a course prefilter aco on it but it doesn't fit as well as on the aco powerheads.

Made another top for my 10g quarantine tank today.

I agree with @Ken and @Beardedbillygoat1975. I'd leave it out until you're fully cycled then use it if you need to take out tannins or just have crystal clear water.

Totally forgot about this. I have two sets of these and they are great for adjusting the height and its great that they clip in tight. Excellent for getting a good spread across wider tanks. Takes about 5 days to get here from Puerto Rico. https://www.etsy.com/listing/978425278/fluval-30-planted-marine-and-spectrum?ref=yr_purchases

I have several tidal filters. They are nearly silent but do have a larger appearance. The internal motor is really what did it for me, auto shut off and self priming really helps. They also have a lot of room for media. Currently I'm only running sponges in my tidal 35.

I have, but I figure I'll do the same with acetylene and oxygen when I used to work at the dealership. We had tons of tanks in the oil storage room and after a while you can feel where the level is. Could also get a cheap scale and measure filled weight vs low co2 weight. I work from home so this is quite easy to check daily.

A few of the regulators I was looking at had that feature where it just pins it to a specific psi on the outlet pressure.

Little update, was messing around with the co2 and can not believe how clear water can be with just sponge filters and a power head Still only have the guppies until I can find a cheap 10 g tank for quarantine.

Looks like its all good now. Wrapped some tape around the inlet and outlet of the bubble counter and disassembled everything and made sure the regulator was close to vertical before I tightened down the nut on the regulator. Holding at 25psi now for the last 30 mins with 1pbs.

I was finally able to get a co2 tank yesterday to start running my greenleaf single stage co2 system. So here is my dilemma. I watched a ton of videos and researched prior to ordering it now setting it up I'm a bit confused. Here goes my process. Please correct me if I'm doing something wrong at some stage. 1. open valve on co2 bottle. 2. adjust working pressure to 30psi 3. adjust bubble counter and run say 3 bubbles per second. 4. after I open the needle valve the working pressure starts to drop to below 10psi and the bubble counter slows down. 5. readjust the working pressure back to 30psi and readjust the needle valve to readjust to 3bps. I'm not sure if this is correct of if I'm doing something wrong. I though once you open the working pressure that the bps should stay the same as that is past the working pressure valve. I did check for leaks and did not find anything. I do have a citric acid/baking soda single stage generator on my smaller tank but the working pressure never moves on that one. any help would be great Thanks

Finally got my co2 up and running. Had a lot of trouble trying to find a place out here that would fill and or exchange tanks. Wanted to just check everything was working correctly. Still need to straighten and bend the co2 line to size but works good so far. Over the next few days I'll start testing for co2 drop throughout the day to get my bps dialed in. Diffuser under ACO powerhead with course pre filter sponge.

lol I hear ya. When we used to keep Oscars I was always afraid to even gravel vac

Yea the tidal is interesting. Here are pics of both, on the tidal you can see the big duckbill output that really blows the water across the top. Link

I think i'm going to stay with the Tidal. I'd much rather have happy fish than faster growth.

ahh thats right the marinelands have that flat output as well

The guppies were to get rid of an infestation of mosquito larvae we had. They destroyed them in about 5 days

I ended up taking it all out. I had about 12 full size almond leaves 30 or so alder cones and plenty of oak roots that usually stain really well. For me, blackwater looks best with all the little bits on the bottom, but it just kept going clear so i cleaned it all up as it just looked dirty without the dark water. This is about as dark as it would get then clear up within a few days

So the last few days I have been testing running co2 through the intake of an aquaclear and tidal filters. I'm pretty much just putting the co2 diffuser below the intake and let the filter take it up and push it out of the output. My 20 long I have stocked with 5 harlequins and 7 neon tetras. With the tidal I notice the harlequins absolutely love and I mean LOVE swimming in the current created by the tidal. They spend hours a day doing it. Video of what they do. If you haven't seen a tidal, when the water is filled up to the lip of the outtake the tidal blows the water across the surface and then down the glass. The issue is that the intake is not as strong, it just doesn't suck in the co2 as strong as the aquaclear. I ran the aquaclear a few days later and noticed that the harlequins just kinda sat mid tank and swam around I think because the aquaclear spills out and down which is great to stir up and filter out stuff from the bottom. But it has a much strong pull and diffusion of co2 throughout the tank. I ran both tidal 35 and 55 as well as the aquaclear 30 and 50. Jut something I never would have thought about while testing these two filters.

This is I believe 48 long by 18 deep and 12 high. I made it from a 75g we had in the basement. Took it all apart and just cut 8" off the top of the tank. I was going to go with all stratum but then said let me save some money and did a 50/50 stratum and eco complete. oops lol

Thank you. Actually surprised at how much growth I've got so far with the stratum. The water sprite and crypts have been growing new babies already.

Well.... I just can't keep the tannins, I'm almost 100% sure its the volcanic soil that is sucking up the tannins. Maybe one day it will just explode and release it all. Anyways, just planted some more stuff I got ACO yesterday. As soon as I can get to a place to fill my co2 tank I'm going to add that in as well. I live in the middle of the woods and the closest place is like 45 mins. A little hazy, still waiting for the dust from the stratum to settle.

This method is fantastic. The last tank I started was done this exact way and worked beautifully. I filled the tank with active substrate, planted it out and just let it "simmer" for a few weeks and fed some flaked food every other day. When I started seeing algae I took some water tests and saw 0 - 0 - 20. Did a 50% water change and bam it was ready for fish.