75G or 90G Tank?

[RobD]

How about that - less than a year with my 46G BowFront, and I'm ready to get something bigger. Why? Guess I'm not completely thrilled with the bow, and I want something with a bigger footprint. Something 48" is what I'm thinking, the wall can't tolerate much more than that. Going to keep the same community fish, maybe add a few more.

I ruled out the 55G, seeing as I wouldn't really be gaining anything in size.

I was thinking of a 75G, but I have the chance to get a used year-old 90G with dual-strip lights and a stand for $225. A new setup in my area is $374, so I think this isn't a bad price. I'll need to construct new doors and re-paint, but that's minor. One perk to living in a college town at move-out time!

I see the 90 (24"H) is about 4 inches taller than the 75G (20"H). Now, I'm an average-sized adult. Is this extra depth going to be a real problem for cleaning and stuff? The top of the tank comes to my shoulder, so I am going to have to stand on a chair to siphon this thing. (The stand is taller than your LPS variety). I use a Python for cleaning.

My Eheim 2026 should handle the filtering, so no need to get into that discussion.

So what's the opinion? Is a 90G a good choice, or is that not the optimum dimension? You know, like a 35 gallon octagon sucks because it is too tall and really acts like a 23 gallon for bio-load.

 

[NoDeltaH2O]

I have looked at tanks and found that I can reach the back bottom of a 180 gallon tank which is 24"deep by 24" high. I am 6ft tall average proportions, no long arms really. I fyou are going to do live plants then I would go with the 75 since it will be a little easier to light, but without live plants, go for volume.

 

[RobD]

Okay, I'm 5'11" - about the same as you. I am "dabbling" in live plants, but not taking them serious as of yet. Some of those WalMart bulbs, some hornwort (me thinks that is what it is, you can tell I'm not serious about them!) I thought I'd try out. My 46 has a 25W bulb with reflector, so I'm only doing .5-.75 WPG now.

 

[NoDeltaH2O]

go with the 90gallon then. 2 strip lights sounds like four 4ft long bubls? That would be about 160 watts, or a little under 2wpg, enough to grow some very low light plants with

 

[RobD]

Well, I went and picked up the 90 gallon tonight. Once I fix up the doors on the stand, I get to start the fish-moving process. Not looking forward to this part, but I think it will look nice when I get done. I saw my local store had a 50lb bag of pool filter sand for $8, which should be enough to give me about an inch of substrate. I'm thinking of giving it a try.

 

[NoDeltaH2O]

Sand works fine, and looks really nice, although it is a little harder to clean than gravel, but many people use it so you won't be the only one. SO what will you do with the 46gal after moving the fish to the 90gal tank?

 

[RobD]

I don't care if sand is a little harder to clean. If everything stays on top of the sand, it should be easy enough to suck up with the python. Right now I have to avoid the back area of the tank so I don't suck up the plant roots out of the gravel anyway. So hovering over the top of the sand to clean it might actually be easier.

As for my 46 gallon, I'm afraid it is going up on the selling block. I only have one location in the house that is fit for a tank. To put up the 90 means taking down the 46. It's not even a year old yet. The wife has a friend who has a friend saving up for a tank, so maybe I have a buyer already and don't even know it. I was going to use it to replace the 35 gallon hex I maintain at work, but the secretaries won't give up 3' of wall space anywhere for it.

Say - does anyone have a recommendation on what to use for the splash shields on the backside of the light fixture? When I first looked at this tank a week ago, I swore I saw the two shields (he was using HOB) inside the cabinet. But when I picked it up, he claimed he never had the shields. Since I use the Eheim, I wanted to block up the rectangle holes with something better than duct tape ;^) Any ideas?

 

[TurbineSurgeon]

You can get replacement splash shields from any decent LFS or online (look towards the bottom of the page).

 

[RobD]

Well, I'm looking for the Perfecto strip that goes with the 48x18" double-fixture hood. My only LPS (within 35 miles) doesn't have them, though they do have the same hood. I might try to see if they can special order the strips. I also e-mailed Perfecto about online locations to buy the strips, but haven't heard back from them yet.

No big rush. I'm still cleaning the hood. Luckily I work in a Biology department, so they can make up some stronger "vinegar" which is doing wonders for getting the gunk off the hood. 10% acedic acid seems to be a good strength, I think normal vinegar is like 4-6% acid or something like that.

 

[RobD]

Nah, it is worse than that. It is the Perfecto double-fixture light. There are two 48" light fixtures with this hood. Each fixture has its own plug and switch. Inside the fixture is two 24" (I think 24") bulbs, 20W each. So that makes 2x2x20W=80W for my 90 gallon. Puts it more like 0.88wpg, or some very low low light plants.

Of course, I'm only pumping 0.54wpg on my bowfront right now, and the algae seems to grow well.

As an update, my DIY stand is built and stained. The hood has been cleaned up, and I just need to clean the tank itself. Maybe this weekend I can convince the wife to help me haul the tank from the garage to the yard so I can do that. Then it is into the house and the fun begins!

Picked up a 50lb bag of pool filter sand, and about 60lbs of PA fieldstone. The eggcrate is cut and ready to go. My Hydor 300W heater arrived, so I can put that into the Eheim outflow. Still need to run to Home Depot and get some pink styrofoam to put between the tank and stand.

go with the 90gallon then. 2 strip lights sounds like four 4ft long bubls? That would be about 160 watts, or a little under 2wpg, enough to grow some very low light plants with

 

[NoDeltaH2O]

OverDrive them Please!!!

 

[RobD]

Can you do that with these Perfecto lids? Got a good place to start to learn how to do that? From what I remember, it just shortens the life of the bulb, right? I think these strips have the old silver-slug starters in them, nothing electronic. I hate being at work and not having the fixtures in front of me...

And replacing this hood with something else will sour this tank purchase for me. I already scrapped the stand and built my own (~$100), so my $225 for tank&hood will be pretty sucky if I scrap the hood too. I looked at the price of a retro kit at AHSupply, gonna have to wait for that as well - thought of doing a DIY hood for that.

OverDrive them Please!!!

 

[RobD]

Heh heh, off to the DIY section of the forum...

 

[RobD]

Update: Spent several hours last night reading about ODNO, seems like an easy way to get more lighting. I tore my fixtures apart, and they are 2x24" individual ballast lights in each of my two 48" fixtures. Man, I wish they were the newer design from Perfecto that had the 48" bulb. Not much room in there, and it would take 4 shoplights ($28) from HD to modify these lights to be 4x20Wx1.5=120W of ODNO. So I looked up in my garage and said "Hmmm, that shoplight looks like it will fit over both glass openings on my hood." A little loss to the plastic gap between them shouldn't make much difference, right?

So I picked up a can of Rustoleum high-heat matte black spraypaint and two lights from HD this morning and will ODNO one of them. Then I can make a simple wood stand to hold/seal this up over the hood and project through the two "windows". This would give me 2x40Wx1.5=120W of ODNO for half the cost, and make bulb replacements cheap now that I'm using just 2 48" tubes instead of 4 24" tubes.

I looked at the AHSupply.com, and I think I would need a 2x55W kit for each of my fixtures. Doing one fixture (at $65 plus bulbs) would give me 2x55W+40W=150W, and both would be 2x2x55W=220W. I guess if I was really needing 2wpg or better, I'd have to take this route. But I can live with 1.33wpg for under $25.

Once that is built, then I need to figure out whether to get the 32W T8 bulbs or the 40W T12 bulbs.

Edit: Changed my math to show ODNO at 50% increase, not 70% increase at 2XODNO.