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karpomatic

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  1. karpomatic
    I attended my first fish swap on 8/21! I did okay. Sold a lot and brought some home. Also won a 75 gallon Marineland setup! I've painted the back and bottom flat black like the rest of the aquariums in the fish room. I've picked up a few 75s for cheap and will be refurbishing them for use in the fish room. Last night I added the 75 that I won to the rack.
  2. karpomatic
    I haven't done any updates here in a while so here it goes. Things have changed quite a bit in my Fish Room corner of the basement. Not long after my last post, I had a heater malfunction that cooked my breeding group of L397's. By the time I noticed it was already too late. I moved them to another tank but none survived the night. My Uaru have bred twice so far this year. The last batch had 192 fry. The current batch looks like in the 70s but they won't be counted until I move them to a grow out tank. I've been shipping my Uaru around the country with mixed results. Most have arrived without incident. My biggest issue was shipping three adult Uaru and having USPS damage the box causing one of the fish to perish and one to be injured. USPS and PayPal claims later, everything is back to normal. As always, please check out all my other social media. I'm North Vineland Tropicals on Facebook, Instagram, & especially Youtube where you can see videos of all the fish I'm selling and my 220 "mostly" South American cichlid show tank. I'll be at the O'FishShell 1st Anniversary fish swap on August 21st in Mountain Top, PA from 11am to 5pm. Last I heard there was close to 20 vendors and food trucks. Come out and buy some fish! Now, here's a few photos of what's been happening.
  3. karpomatic
    I got my next rack cut down to 93" tall x 24" deep to fit in my basement. I have no shelf racks or cross bars for it though. I was thinking of cutting them down again to 18" deep so I can sit 40s or 75s right on the shelves.
  4. karpomatic
    Air has been piped in. The metal needle valves are a pain to thread in by hand. I ended up using my drill to get them in the PVC. I ran lines to all my tanks even if they're not currently being used. The pump is very quiet, I only hear the bubbling of the sponge filters if I'm not directly below the pump. I am going to insulate the little shelf it's on as it's below my bedroom and I can hear it slightly while trying to sleep. If that doesn't work, I'll attempt to lower is a little so it's not completely boxed in.
  5. karpomatic
    Thanks! Here are a few photos. Look me up on youtube under North Vineland Tropicals for videos. I'm not allowed to post a link.
  6. karpomatic
    I guess it will officially be considered a fishroom after this is installed. I can't add anymore tanks until I upgraded to a central air system. This should do nicely for a while.
  7. karpomatic
    I did the maintenance on all my aquariums on Sunday. I had to take a video of my 220 as the Uaru colors were incredible. I love these fish. 220 gallon after fresh maintenance
  8. karpomatic
    All my Uaru love cucumber!
  9. karpomatic
    Shims under the stand.
  10. karpomatic
    Oh, that's my dad and brother, I had no say in it. My dad is a perfectionist and my brother just got his welding certifications for his work last year. You can't even tell he capped those corners. I did all the grunt work of prepping, polishing, painting, & staining.
  11. karpomatic
    LOL. Yeah. I'm glad I wasn't the one drilling them all.
  12. karpomatic
    Not really. The aluminum afforded the strength I needed at roughly half the weight as steel and no need to be as bulky and reinforced as a wooden stand.
  13. karpomatic
    Don't be sorry. We're all here to help each other. I'll try to answer them in order. 1 - I love using a sump. The maintenance is so easy compared to a canister filter. I've got an FX6 on my 75 and its a great filter but I hate doing the maintenance on it. Yes, I have separate drains per overflow. From my research I was better to do it this way as one drain has a tendency to be more powerful than the other and the pressure could hinder the other drain. The returns are a single pump with the PVC teed to each side. What you can't really see is that the returns are connected at each end to a spraybar that runs across the back of the tank at the water line. I have not been able to do anything about the bubbles, I've tried different configurations on the drains but it didn't change any. It's not terribly noisy. 2 - I ended up taking the socks out and just using filter floss. The socks were restricting the flow to much and starving my pump. I would have been swapping them out every day. I'm running the sterilizer separate so I can slow down the flow thru it. The slower the flow the better the UV works. I purchased a tiny pump that only does about 5gph. With the UV and the temp at about 82° F I've never had a disease. I barely get algae on the glass. 3 - Just something I'd like to add. I'll need to take an updated photo but I have A LOT of biological media in this sump. Two CerMedia blocks, 6 or so bags of volcanic rock, and some ceramic cylinders. Also, 8 bags of Purigen.
  14. karpomatic
    I just posted 3 threads under the journals.
  15. karpomatic
    From 9/27/21 - This is the build of the canopy for my Marineland 220 gallon aquarium in photos. The entire unit was constructed out of white pine. I looked an tons of photos online for inspiration. I originally wanted the two front sections of burned wood to open like the doors below AND have the entire front tilt up but, my father the engineer said that was a tall order. he could do it but it would weigh a ton and be super complicated. So, we simplified my idea down to having the entire front tilt and just mimic the front doors below. Please check my other post on building the aluminum stand for this tank.
  16. karpomatic
    I used some pine boards my dad had left over from when his house was built for the doors. However, I needed to get the polyurethane off. So I burned and sanded the boards and accidently used the Shou Sugi Ban method. I had no idea it existed until I started burning the wood with a blow torch. My dad then assembled the doors. My father then drilled and tapped all the holes for the 6 piano hinges and the door magnets. We attached the doors and coated them in Tung Oil inside and out. We plan on making a canopy in the same method once I'm done refurbishing the aquarium. 8/30/21 - Yesterday was the big day. Started at 550am and got done around 430pm. swapped out my 125 for a 220 on my DIY aluminum stand. It's the next day and I'm still exhausted.
  17. karpomatic
    The original post is from 6/29/21 on another site. I'm reposting is as I cannot link to another site. This is my DIY in photos of the aluminum stand that was built by my built by my Dad, elder brother, and me for my Marineland 220 Xhigh aquarium. Part 1 - It's made of 2" square aluminum that it cost about $250. The dimensions are 72.5" x 24" x 24". I drew up the plans with my father's assistance. I did all the prep work. My brother did all the welding. I then ground down all the welds. Then prepared the frame for paint with 0000 steel wool and acetone. I then applied 2 coats of primer and 2 coats of semi-gloss black.
  18. karpomatic
    On 8/29/21 I took the 125 down and replaced it with a 220 gallon that I resealed. The stand and canopy were custom built my me and my father. I'll post build threads on those as well.
  19. karpomatic
    I'm copying my text from the original post on another forum since I'm not allowed to post the link. The original post was from 5/30/20. Enjoy! I'm going to take a crack at building my own sump for my 125 mostly South American 125 gallon aquarium. I have been using the one in the photo for 3 years now and it's okay but it was originally designed for saltwater and I'm hoping I can do better. The planned dimensions are 48" x 15" x 15", approximately 46 gallons. I'm building it out of 1/4" polycarbonate and sealing it with the Weldon 16. I am basing it on the attached photo I found online. I'm looking for constructive criticism and help only. It's planned for the water from the tank to pour into the socks on the left, flow into 2 or 3 Cer-Media bio filter blocks, then spill over and down thru the vertical section but with 3 levels instead of 2. Cotton batting at the top, volcanic rock, and/or bio-balls. I was thinking of adding another vertical section of 3 levels with more filtration and purigen as the top level. Next it will flow over into the heater section and finally the return pump on the far right. One of my thoughts is, if I add another vertical section that would flow up then to the heaters, should the water flow under the divider to the pump or still go over spill into the pump section? **I removed the logos from the sump diagram as it's just used as a reference. ** Skip to 7/20/20 for the next installment. Well, it took 6 weeks for me to get the correct polycarbonate. I had to reorder since I ordered the incorrect width. Anyway, it took about 13 hours from start to finish. We started with three sheets for 32" x 48" x 1/4" clear polycarbonate. We cut it with a table saw and hand sanded all the edges with multiple grits of fine sandpaper. I'm going to give it 24 hours to set up then it will sit with water in it for a week to check for leaks. I'll also be putting a pump in it to see how it will flow. From 7/21/20 - I let the Weldon 4 and 16 cure for 24 hours then added water. I've got a few leaks but nothing too bad. I dried it out and will seal it again after the joints have a chance to dry out. Then on 7/27/20 - After fixing the leaks, I let it sit in my garage for the entire week with an 800 gph pump circulating water for a week. Friday night I finally installed it. The entire process took about 4 hours. I also replaced all the tubing. Here is a photo of it up and running. I am currently using two 200 micron socks but I think they're too fine. They clog up quickly and restrict water flow. I may switch to 300 micron and see how that does.
  20. karpomatic
    I'll answer what I can. I've originally bought a used 125 setup that had been a reef tank so it came with a sump. I used it for a few years but didn't think the design worked for my tank. So, I scoured the net for different designs and came up with one on my own. I built it in the summer of 2020. I'm going to post a thread here on the build. I had a link to it on another site but that's a no-no here.
  21. karpomatic
    Dirty Jersey!
  22. karpomatic
    Hey everyone! I'm Karpomatic, from Southern New jersey, and I've been keeping freshwater aquariums off and on since I was 12 so... 33 years. It's my Uncle Paul's fault. he had a 29 gallon with Neons in the 1980s and all I would do is stare at it. Now, I'm in my 40s and have the space and funds to start a fish room and breed for profit. I've currently got a 220 gallon show tank with a an aluminum stand and canopy custom built by me and my father. It's filtered by a sump custom built by me. I've also got a 75 gallon mixed community that kinda serves as my quarantine tank for now. In the basement that's becoming my fish room, there's a 125 with a breeding pair of Uaru. I'm on my third successful spawning from them. Lastly, there's a 20 gallon holding fry from the last clutch that are already sold. I am now in the process of setting up a rack for breeding. It will have two 40 gallon breeders, two 20 gallon longs, and four 10 gallons. I may add more but that's just to get started. I'll be purchasing a linear piston pump to run all the sponge filters. Currently, I'm working on painting the backs and bottoms of the tanks black. I hope to have the rack running in about a month, time permitting.
  23. karpomatic
    I'm new here and just found this thread. I love Uaru and have multiple breeding pairs.
  24. karpomatic
    I bought the Husky rack from Home Depot. I keep changing my mind on adding plywood over the wire rack...
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