nabokovfan87

I don't even know how I'd do it, but I'd totally smash my head into that handle accidentally. Be careful!

ok ok ok..... I see the photo and I'm like. OH SNAPS RTBS! That's awesome. Then I see a green phantom, then a cory, then an albino cory. That's awesome, nice setup!!!

Interesting.... I wouldn't expect to see any nitrite. Cycle is there but it's.... overwhelmed or slow. What is your filtration on this tank like?

It would be cool to see 1-2 tubs dedicated to special interest species of some sort! I am very glad to see a species successfully reintroduced to the hobby. It would absolutely be an interesting talk to have to discuss how species like this can be saved, or how they can be introduced into the wild after they are "domesticated" in some capacity. How do you ensure breeding and genetics are stable, etc.

Phase 1: Replacing the foams only with results. I apologize for the poor filming attempt, it happens. You can see those compression marks on the bottom side of the filter sponge, which does show the basket itself is pretty loaded up and the media is crushing the sponge. This may lead to an alternate use case where you remove the majority of any other media and run only sponges. You'd have to cut them yourself, but there is definitely potential for this setup. Phase 1a: Showing the foams being replaced "fixed" the bypass once I adjusted how much stuff is jammed into the media basket. (It's full because I'm having to run crushed coral). Bypass is no longer from the rear of the HoB container, but the lower front window. Phase 1b: Showing a potential fix that is very common to anyone who doesn't want to fill holes in the media basket or cut out the bottom section of the basket to improve flow. This is the "window" cutout that I will highlight when I show basket mods. As you can hopefully see, there is still bypass on the left side of the sponge. It's mostly removed the bypass issue and there is water flowing through 3 sponges at this point. For most users this is going to be the setup for your filter.

Hey everyone, Well, it's finally here. Construction day. I have a few hypotheses that'd I'd like to test out, but obviously I'm a sample of one. I do have a bit of experience battling these stinkin' things and I feel like it's the right time to dive in and figure out the best way to solve these issues. The goal being, after these tests are completed I can provide a guide for others with a tier of mods to make on their HoBs and to resolve the issues they have as best as possible. Tier 1 being the least effort and subsequent tiers requiring a bit more effort. One thing I am specifically not going to do is to jam a bunch of sponge in the pump area as a method to try to stop mulm from going into the pump area through the swiss cheese that is the skimmer and the pump housing cover. Let's get started with Tier 1 (sponges) and I will sketch out the concept for next steps. I want to reference this video as a premise, but obviously the goal being we want to make this visually look good. Problem Statements: 1. There is an excess of openings on the intake and this forces most of the intake of the filter to be provided via the skimmer, pump housing cover, and minimally from the inlet pipe itself. The reduces the viability of something like an intake sponge and causes many issues for nano fish, flat bodied fish, or plants being sucked into the intake. 2. The flow path of the water itself in the pump is not well defined and the water constantly avoids filter media and filtration. 3. The pump is incredibly strong and might be too strong in some instances. the flow into the HoB filter basket can cause bypass simply due to the flow strength. (more on this later) 4. The filter basket design is very restrictive and tolerance on sponges is often undersized, which caused bypass when you do manage to get the water into the filter media basket. 5. Because of flow strength, media order, and bottom to top flow design, it's difficult to use something like purigen because of the high flow / bypass that forces lighter media off the top of the media basket and into the tank itself fairly easily. I want to attack these 1 by 1 and demonstrate each of these, but I will do this in a follow up post. First up we have the easiest thing we can do. Simply cutting new sponges that allow water into the basket itself. For the Tidal 35, this alone has resolved most of the bypass issues and has given me a few notes. Let's take a look at why this helps and what is really going on. If we look at the filter box itself and the basket, this is what we see. There is a bit of space below the basket itself. If Seachem feels like it, they can resolve issue #3 by adding some baffles in this space. This also means we might be able to use something like eheim mech (thanks pondguru for the idea) to diffuse the flow itself. The basket does have "baffles" or sort to hold up the sponge and this is partly just due to manufacturing and wanting to have a clean edge and encourage flow internally. It also gives the sponge itself a flat surface to rest on, somewhat. What I have realized is that by adding more media or adding crushed coral in the basket, this compresses the sponge into these grates and emphasizes the bypass even further. From the typical "pond foams" that you can purchase for filter mods with the bumps you'll end up with something that is slightly thinner in profile and this might also be easier to compress when loaded with heavy media. So, if we take a look at what is really going on internally we see the standard foam (right side above) which sits flush against the openings. If we swap this foam out with "bumpy foam" you see a bit of room for the water to flow into the filter basket. Realistically this does not fix anything, but it really does give you a bit more time for the basket to do it's job. Right now, after a deep clean I can see bypass almost immediately with a stock sponge. Normally I prefer to run 2 sponges, but there is often an issue with the seachem products. As mentioned above there is often some gaps out of the box. (Issue #4). Second to this issue, as you add more layers of sponge, each layer needs to have a slightly larger dimension outward. the media box itself opens up as it increases in height. This means that cutting sponge can be tricky, but it's very easy to achieve this. Once you get the hang of it, there isn't much difficulty and it can easily be done with a pair of scissors in between a water change. Here's the setup. I am setting up a NEW 29G aquarium in the living room, and I have the video above as a template. I also have my own experiences and testing, mods, and attempts to fix this issue previously on 5-6 versions of this product. I've used everything from the 35 to the 75 for a few years on each model in a variety of tank setups. Right now I have a newly purchase Tidal 55 for the new tank. I am going to be modding the filter and adding those parts into the existing setup one by one. I will have 1 stock filter, 1 modded filter, and be able to adjust things to test what really works well and what fixes issues (or adds more). I also want to reference this post as a deep dive into a lot of my struggles for those who want to see other photos and read a bit more about my past testing / current setup I will go ahead and record a video of the pump now, then add in the sponges and show the difference in flow. If there is an improvement, I'll continue to monitor things as the week progresses. One thing I will note as a final thought, is when I pull apart the filter, I try to pay attention to how clogged the sponge is and where is the much appearing at. Last time I cleaned it, there was a very defined grate/input pattern on the sponge and it was limited to the input side of the basket. The sponge itself was not clogged and it was only in the basket for a few days. all of the water was bypassing over the back of the basket and pretty much stopped going through the sponge/media. Let's get to it! EDIT: FAQ Post here.

One method might be to dilute the tap with a % of rodi water. Long term this should provide better stability than dosing powders and having the PH movement. If you figure out what % works, you might be able to consistently achieve a lower PH.

Can you run a test on water out of the tap and then after 24 hours or aeration?

I'm going to be a bit cautious and say they can most definitely jump out. Some fish just naturally will do that regardless of species. They have the bodyshape to do it. I've heard of them doing it, but I've never had a danio that would. Definitely wont! They scooch around and are very polite in an established tank. If you have any concern I'd recommend the pygmy cories. When it comes to the other varieties and "established tanks" what I mean is that if the plants can be uprooted pretty easily it might happen. It happened just with flow in my tank and hairgrass. The corys today I watched them eating algae off of a bit of Staurogyne Repens and it hasn't been uprooted or had much issues from the corys themselves after fixing the issue of not having the hairgrass deep enough. They tend to be very apt to avoid things honestly, but I totally understand the concern.

Staghorn looks like.

That's exactly what I was going to ask about. How is the basket designed. The tidals probably work really well stuffed with sponge if you can get the water forced through it. Tetra has an AP150/300 might be what you need. I ran 2x 75s on my 55g and 75g. On that big of a tank I'd probably run 2x the 110s just to get enough circulation.

Are you also dosing salt with the meds?

Update. I bought the tidal "refill" of matrix so I could fill media in tanks and get it cheaper than wherever. They don't really have that stuff local so I just opted to see what on earth actually comes in this package. Funny enough, whomever informed/answered the question on amazon regarding how the item is packaged specifically said it includes only the media and not the bag. It indeed includes the actual "good" media bag they produce. So there is a way to get one of a reasonable size with fine mesh. The Tidal 55 bags are probably universally the best size.

Added a video to the OP. Randomly popped up on the YT feed (thanks robots). I definitely agree!

I had a premise that came to mind based on a few conversations with others here on the forums. I wanted to ask anyone who wishes to try to find these items on their next trip to the local shop. Post your photos and potentially over time we can make a new list to keep things fresh. Whether it's a big box store or a mom and pop store, whatever you can find (or can't) seems to be useful information. I mentioned it on a comment on a video once, but a company like fluval or seachem, designs these product lines where you need to buy something on a month to month or semi-often basis. Eventually, those items either disappear and we all end up resorting elsewhere to find them, typically an online shop. This change has led to a lot of products just not being carried by shops around me. So, without further ado, and I have no idea if I'd even find these in my local shop, but hopefully this is some fun we can have on the next shopping trip. The goal being to give everyone a feel for "what is typically available" to hobbyists at a physical store. LIST 1: 1. Amano shrimp 2. Ceramic filter media 3. Fish Meds 4. Moss for aquascaping (excluding a moss ball) 5. An interesting "all in one" tank 6. A sera or eheim product 7. A glass lid for a 20L aquarium 8. aquascaping scissors 9. caribsea sand 10. A replacement pump or impeller for any HoB filter

Interesting! I might have to ask you some stuff about it via DM. It's the only one I haven't used. are they something like an aquasky LED or Tube? I probably should check all my tanks filled.... I always check them empty and then glance at them full. With a tank that big, pretty critical step. Nice touch. I wanted to ask, you mentioned the pond armor on the surface of the stand. Would you ever consider adding a rubber mat as well just to keep the surface from absorbing any water or does that seem like overkill?

I got another chunk of time and cleaned out the QT tank, repeated the same thing. Call this a reminder to everyone, clean out your pumps! I cannot recommend it enough, to go and find a little impeller cleaner kit. Q-Tips work, but these little things are just so useful and randomly so hard to find. https://www.amazon.com/Marina-10680-Impeller-Brush/dp/B0002AQEI0/ref=pd_lpo_2?pd_rd_i=B0002AQEI0&psc=1 I observed the tanks and was just, very satisfied today with how clean they were. I watched the corys do up-downs for about 20-30 minutes. I don't know what they are looking for, besides a spawn location, but they do it all day long! My other task for the day was moving a few things around and setting up the cafe. It feels so nice to have it back and to be able to use the grinder and have real coffee again. This is where my QT tank used to sit, which is now on a much stronger surface. I got the new filter and the goop to fix the filter (more on that in the experiments section when I have time to sit and work on it). The goal being, within a few weeks I can drop in some new media in the old tanks, move older media to the new tank with the new filter, and it's going to be so exciting to be able to pull out some rocks and scape this thing. I also got the shims someone had recommended me, those arrived today. I can *finally* setup the stand and feel comfortable with the placement. Small steps, but so many things finally happening. part of the day.... "monitoring growth". Looks really good! Nice setup. Feels like a shrimp heaven now. Definitely will be fun to see where it goes. 🙂

I saw this video, link below, the recommendation being when you lay them flat, put them on a towel to avoid one of the pads mixing results with another pad. This provides a bit more "clear" result than something like sitting it on a surface that doesn't absorb water.

How are you planning to remove the copper from the tank now? Carbon or another method?

Mulm absolutely helps. In my first successful spawn I had moss balls with mulm, rocks for them to hide in. The fry can be incredibly smart. Prior to that point, I would think something like the Co-op baby fry food or repashy powder would work just fine in a breeder box scenario. I know some use a turkey baster to siphon out fry boxes too! Have you tried the ziss egg tumbler?

I have 12. I could easily have 15 and be good. It all depends on what the scape of the tank is. If you have wood, I'd say the shrimp have a bit more grazing area to go and pluck food off. Big/tall rocks would work as well. (It's a 29G tank as well) Edit: Here's a photo from yesterday 🙂

I finally have a chance to sit, think, and type out a few notes. When I first watched this I was very, very confused. 1. I don't think it's ethically "OK" to offer this tank and not offer the stand. If that's the plan, there should be a "rimless" version that has the decor piece but not the same pump/cabinet integration. From a manufacturing perspective, this is a VERY easy thing to do. You buy the tank, you get X items, you buy the stand and you get the products to upgrade your experience and make it easy to WC. The tank itself should be a bit more standalone or they should've just gone full into the easy WC ecosystem. 2. He wants the new hobbyist to set it up, but then does all the work for her except pouring a thing in. He was very emphatic in his "I'm not putting this together, you are!". As a designer, this is part of the job. Being able to let others show you flaws in the product. This is something where my experience viewing it was probably very different than others. 3. I think the "nicest" feature of the tank is actually the hood design. I saw a video where the light failed and was replaced with an aquasky, there was a pretty big gap on the hood as a result. I've seen their hood designs in other situations, I don't know why (and assumed) the light in there was already an aquasky. Just a note. An updated version should just use that light. 4. The "2 buckets of water" should probably be 3. I'm going to suggest 2 buckets of tank water, 1 bucket out of the spout to clean the media. Gravel vac wasn't often enough for most "new hobbyists" and the focus as mentioned in the OP was to keep things hands off. I think the best logic for this is to use an UGF instead of the back mounted iteration of that type of filter. you can "revolutionize" the hobby so to speak by actually offering a modern UGF design with a system like this. Just a note. 5. I would've liked to see a nod or mention to real plants. Even to fluval's own products. 6. Maybe there could be an app or something to give you a water test result. This is something extremely common to the coffee industry where you get a strip to test hardness. One of the standard "6 in 1" test strips that give you PH, KH, GH is all you need. Giving this information to a new hobbyist up front as well as a recommendation of how to use that information should be part of the process. You integrate all of this into an app or video tutorial and that information is easily digested for "good ranges" for a typical community tank. This also pushes their own products that help to fix any GH/KH/PH issues and would point towards something like a chemical media spot on the filter box. Even as simple as, "if you ever have sick fish, this compartment can be used to add extra carbon or other products to your tank as well as your heater to keep it out of sight" 7. There should've been some mention of cleaning the filter inlet. This all goes back to the hood design. Demonstrating the gravel vac and 2-2-2-1-1 rule is weird to me when you're trying to talk through it, but not actually showing the process yourself (their recharge product should've been in the video, or at least just use STD water conditioner). 8. Having 2 months between each gravel vac is just.... too much time for me and is going to lead to a lot of issues with algae I would think. They should've had a small stool, or a longer hose to at least reach the flow. This highlights a flaw in the bucket design because it's not something that is used to hold the hose in place and prevent a spill in some way. Aqueon WC system comes with the exact same product, but includes a bucket/rim attachment to hold the hose. Just would've been nice to see that simply integrated into the bucket design. No replacement of filter media? 9. A heater included but no thermometer might be a pretty simple spot of failure. 10. It would've been nice to see some sort of indication of water line level, evaporation, and making sure water doesn't go below a certain point. Part of their method should include top-offs. This isn't included because of the whole recharge product system and not use of STD water conditioner. 11. Might've been nice to have an integrated power plug and some cheap in cabinet LED lighting to highlight the spigot. This also would highlight spills and help to give some light for anyone who can't tell they just spilled a bunch of water. Probably should've included a towel too.

Yeah. There's a lot of things glossed over.

A lot of it for me too isn't just height, but specifically space. Tanks like a 55G makes a 75G seem like 2x the floorprint. It's physically very similar but there's such a vast difference in space and utility. I specifically think a lot of fish would do so much better with a larger floor, even less height, but it's hard as a hobbyist to provide that outside of a very expensive pond setting. I don't think you can compare, even something like Joey's big internal "pond" to something like what OFR has with their massive cichlid tank. One is 12" deep and the other is a massively different footprint. At some point. You need a koi pond or something massive just to have a more natural ecosystem and keep multiple types of cichlids. It's one of the most difficult "community tanks" for me and I always see fish getting beaten up as a result of not having the space they need or the right environment. It's all over YouTube unfortunately. A lot of African cichlid keepers will end up with species only tanks, which theoretically is absolutely fine. But I think at some point when you compare that setup to something like the OFR massive pool they converted and have those same types of fish in, there is very different behaviors and very different experiences for the fish. ^^ that's kind of why my next tank might be a frag tank or lowboy or something. Special order, if that's something that ever happens.

I think this was absolutely the premise for the tank. The only real video I saw online was hobbyist who removed the filter and just used the tank. (missing a section of rim basically) Things really stood out to me as someone who has seen my siblings struggle and they do want things to be this easy to care for. Something like gravel vac they'd likely never do, but an UGF might alleviate that issue and provide a better design. It touches on using media but specifically avoids sponge and having to touch anything to clean it (again, besides gravel vac) and I know that's a plus for some. The bucket isn't overwhelming but seems very small. I don't like how it glosses over topics like water testing or using dechlorinator properly. At least saying "we have other products that make this easy," seems to be a better way to go than their renewal kits, if you can even find those. There was a lot of thoughts walking away from this video in comparison to my own experience keeping tanks. It seems like every company wants to have this "all in one" or "tank in a box" situation but doesn't really want to make it affordable (PetSmart) or make it easy. The last time I went into the big box store the only thing on sale was kits. $200 for a 20G tank. Because it was a tank with a HoB. Nothing else. The next week I got the tank I wanted for $40.