My 3ft Setup

Hi guys,

New here so thought I'd post a few pics of my setup.
3ft tank, Aquaclear 50 HOB and filtered powerhead for filtration and flow.
1x white T8 tube , 1 x blue T8 tube (both 20w and seem to be doing a good job).
Painted the rear glass black and built the canopy for it, all wiring is hidden in trunking between the lights, extractor fan is mounted on the opposite side to the HOB, mounted a 3 switch box for each light and extractor above the HOB, and fitted a switch for the powerhead.
Went and dug around the local nature reserve river and waterfall for all the rocks/stones/wood and siliconed some together.
The plants are real, and seem to be doing well. Even sprouted a second plant which I cut off and move to the centre at the back.
I'm also busy making a cabinet wrap for the lower part of the tank stand which should be done in the next few days.

Currently the tank has 4 cichlids - an earth eater (altifron), peacock, jewel and what to me looks like a red zebra.
Im in the process of sourcing a 4ft tank, and will be building one up soon to move them into....seems the 3ft just isnt big enough, and I want bigger dammit :biggrin:

Anyways, thoughts and criticism welcome....cheers!

(Last 2 pics were taken with the lights off.....was late and I didn't want to disturb the troops)

 

Looks good @Mugsy. Would you consider making and selling a similar canopy for a DIY challenged guy?

Also, what type of cichlids do you have in there?

 

Hey RaD,

I'm honestly no experienced wood worker, so I'm not sure I would be able to make and sell one to you confidently.
What I could do is email you the templates from my one, that you could take to a hardware store and have them cut up for you. Then all you would need to do is screw it all together using self tapping wood screws (so much easier than the mission I went on with a jig saw).

The fan is a straight forward 220v bought from VRS Electrical wholesalers, cost R120 and wires straight into a normal house hold plug (if you want a switch then that would have to be wired in)
I'm more than happy to tell you how to do it, it really is pretty straight forward.

As far as the cichlids, I have 1 earth eater, 1 peacock, 1 jewel and what appears to be a red zebra (although when I bought it from the LFS they had it down as a red emporer)
They're small enough at the moment to live well in the 3 ft, while I try to source a 4ft tank and start getting parts together for it.

 

That would be great if you had some sort of plan I could work from. I actually thought it was metal, needless to say I would need to take it to a carpenter. lol. I'll pm my email.