invert Posted March 9, 2004 Share Posted March 9, 2004 but where did you get the curved glass front Link to comment
trmiv Posted March 9, 2004 Share Posted March 9, 2004 How are you going to handle evaporation on the weekends? Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 10, 2004 Author Share Posted March 10, 2004 I'm actually going to make up an air driven auto topoff system. I'm planning to use a battery powered pump. The glass is actually a curved glass picture frame. You may notice tha the edges are beveled a fair bit. It goes from 1/4 " to 1/8 ". not a big issue and it kinda looks nice IMO. I had to remove the metal portion from the glass. There are larger ones available and I am planning to make a larger bowfront tank (5 gallons or so) fairly soon. That one will probably cost me around 30 to 40 dolar to make I think. Maybe less. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 12, 2004 Author Share Posted March 12, 2004 YAY!! My new lights showed up today. I went with two 13 watt 50/50 and am not dissapointed. For this tiny tank it is probably more than adequate. My only problem is that I bought hte 13 watt retro kit from Hello Lights. not truly a problem I suppose, but since the ballasts are not remote I have a feeling things are gonna get pretty warm around here. At the moment I have ghettofied the top of the tank just so I can have lights until I get a chance to finish the hood. Has anyone here separated the bulb socket from the ballast on one of these fixtures? i was thinking it might be possible to make it a remote ballast. I suppose I could always order a second set of sockets and just wire them from the stock ones. As always any input would be great. Pics will be posted in a couple of hours. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 12, 2004 Author Share Posted March 12, 2004 With two 13 watt 50/50 bulbs. /edit: Doh, I appologize for the salt water spots on the front of the tank. Link to comment
DLeAnnM Posted March 17, 2004 Share Posted March 17, 2004 Any updates? Love the tank so far looks like really good handiwork and creativity especially with the curved pic frame! Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 17, 2004 Author Share Posted March 17, 2004 An oak hood is in the works. I'm planning to modify the pc fixtures so that I can have them remote ballast. I've rigged up an old computer power supply to hold em (gutted it basically). I think the hood should be done in about a week or so. It all depends on how much free time I manage to get. I put 3 zoos in earlier in the week. They were taken from my 4 gal round. THey aren't opening as much as I would like, but then they have gone from a 27 watt quad and a 9 watt actinic over a 12 inch deep tank to two 13 watt 50/50's over a 6"tank and they are about 3"from the surface. I think they just need time to adjust as the light is considerably brighter. theyone hermit I've put in is still doing well and I'm seeing some green algae starting up. All params are at zero. I had the bonus of using LR that I have had in a flow thorugh system for about 8 months soit was definitley fully cured. In a month or two I may stick a sexy shrimp or two in there. I think the .6 gal main tank space is a little too small for fish. THe whole system is 1 gallon. A signal goby would be nice, but I'm thinking that the space is jsut too cramped and it wouldn't be fair to the critter. Link to comment
noone Posted March 19, 2004 Share Posted March 19, 2004 I have no problem with a computer cable, but is db9 pins serial cable for modem. I'm tired to see many wires outside of my tank, i pút 2 balaster for the lamps (13 wats), and one 12 volts transformer for the fan in a little box in the floor. And i connect all to a db9 female conector, one in the box, one in the hood, its run about 2 or 3 months and no problem yet If you want, i make diy moonligths, this is the diagram and pictures of lights finish work with 110 volts and you can connect from 1 to 3 leds in the same circuit Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 19, 2004 Author Share Posted March 19, 2004 Nice, Thanks. I guess I was just concerned about the guage of the wire. Most serial cables use 28 guage and I wasn't sure if it could handle the total amps etc. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 OK SO here are some over due pics. Muich of this could go in the DIY section, but I decided to put it here and just keep my tank in one thread. I have finished off the hood and as a result of not haveing my clenup crew in place until yesterday or so I havehad a bit of hair algae showing in these pics. The hair algae is almost all gone as of this morning though. 2 blue leg hermits and an astrea have seen to that. I have added a small number of zooanthids to the tank, but htey are not opening fully. I think it may be due to the increased light intensity. They come from a 4 gallon with 36 watts pc and this new tank has 26 watts pc with the zoos being much closer tot he water surface. I have also added what I believe is a proties frag that I came across while moveing a tank. I'll give it's full story later. The base for the tank will match the hood and will most likely be completed some time in the next month or so. These pics will include different shots of the hood. Sorry, but i didn't have access to a cmera during construction. Full view of the hood. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 Underside of the lid. Note the DIY clips (ignore the belly). Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 Close up of the clips. They were made out of the expansion slot covers off of an old computer case. I just used a bench grinder to shape the ends and bent them to shape. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 Inside of the bow. I made a frame and bent 1/8 inch oak. To get teh wood to bend I soaked some paper towel and lined the dish in the microwave with it. I placed the wood on top and then covered it with yet another layer of soaked paper towel. I then microwaved for 3 minutes, opend the microwave up and dumped more water onthe paper towel and ran it for another 4 minutes or so. It is very important to make sure the paper towel stays wet or you will burn the wood. I then used gorilla glue and clamps to bend the wood into place. There is not one nail in the entire hood which made it very nice for staining. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 With the lights installed. I just made a round notch in the back of the hood for the cable to to fit . THis allows me to remove the lid without the entire hood. Notice the DIY molex connectors I used for the PC's. THe work very well and to be honest, with the shrink tubeing over them I feel that they are much safer than the standard endcaps as mositure goes. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 I used a six pin molex connectore and a 4 line 18 guage wire to run the power. This lets me unhook the entire light system from the ballast. The extra two lines will be used to run 12v to my fan if I find I need it. I'll just use a cable keeper to keep the fan line and the light line together and keep things tidy. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 I bought the Hello Lights 13 watt fixtures for my lighting, but didn't like the fact that I would have two magnetic ballasts cooking my tank, so I made them remote. THere are two screws on each ballast. These connect teh ballast terminals to the endcap. I undid these and removed the endcaps. I then used simple clips from radio shack to slip over the ballast terminals. I Soldered the clips in place and used heat shrink tube to seal it off. You probably notice that I gutted an old pc power supply for this project. I've wired the fan to a 12v pin connector and use a regular 12v power supply for the fan. THe fan for the hood will be run from the same supply. Link to comment
SeaSide Posted March 27, 2004 Share Posted March 27, 2004 Very impressive. Are you a carpenter or technician? Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 Finally a tank shot. The hair algae is almost all gone as of this morning. So far I have: 2 blue leg hermits 1 astrea 5 green zoos 2 tiny newly budded shrooms 1 proites frag some caulerpa in the fuge Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 And even closer. If anyone can ID the small anemone in the top right of the photo it would be greatly appreciated. It is definitely not an aiptasia. It's the reddish thing. It seems to be nocturnal, has reasonably short clear tentacles that are tipped with a single white ball like tip. I'll see if I can get a pic after the lights go out and it is extended. I'm pretty sure that the little frag in the center is a porites. Since being added to the tank it has had it's polyps fully extended. The polyps have a very nice fluorescent green tinge to them. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 Even closer. The bubbles are actually from a WC gone wrong. LOL I was jsut working my method out for qater changes on this tiny tank. I can't wait to see how much fun it will be when I get my 1 liter up and running. Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 27, 2004 Author Share Posted March 27, 2004 Seaside, As a matter of fact I used to be in construction. Currently I specialize in aquaculture, which generally requires that I be a jerk of all trades. Link to comment
spongebillyboi Posted March 29, 2004 Share Posted March 29, 2004 cute!!! saw something like that DIY with a DYI skimmer and all... take home for 250 bucks minus fuge. Also, had shrooms and zoos a damsel and hermit... random pods.. good luck!!! Link to comment
1fish2fish Posted March 29, 2004 Author Share Posted March 29, 2004 So the lights were makeing things a little toasty in my tank. Well, actually it was more of a stability issue. I was swinging from 77.2 at night to 83.2 day. So it was time to add a fan. I used a 80 mm 12 volt computer fan that I had laying around. Unfortunately it had way to high an output and dropped the tank to 75 in under an hour. ??? So I went to radioshack and bought a rheostat and set that up, but it still didn't slow the fan down enough and my temperature issue continued. I should mention that the fan had (yes it is past tense) a temp probe on it. I decided to remove the theromocoupler. I just clipped the wires. If I bridge the two leads I get the full force of the fan, but I found that by leaving the wires uncoupled the fan speed was dramatically reduced. The fan now runs nice and slow. So slow in fact that I can't even hear it, but the temperature in my tank is remaining perfectly stable. Over the last six hours it has only fluctuated between 77.2 and 77.6. I'm now in the process of bringing the temp up to about 79 or so. Link to comment
Domino_Tang Posted April 1, 2004 Share Posted April 1, 2004 o___O am i seeing things! 1 gallon jesbus! hehe nice .... you gonna add a mini sump or any coral that would be hot but what would fit? and how would you make the water im not gonna ask what fish you would try to put in it just hope its tiny!like a guppie nice tank! skilllZ! Link to comment
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