My first Igwami inspired tank

[ILLUSN]

Hi all,

My mother in law was telling me that her little 2 footer at preschool was looking a little plain (i.e cr@p) and asked if I could do something about it.

Tank: 2' long 18" high 12" wide (80L)
Lighting: DIY LED 12x 3w 6500k epistar chip with 30 degree optics (32W)
CO2: 5kg fire extinguisher, tunze reg, Spiro diffuser, dupla CO2 line.
Substrate: UP AquaSoil + red sea floraRoot with bacterial starter
Filter: Marina slim 20
Heater jager 100w
Hardscape: granite from Auburn aquarium with some nice quartz veins
Wood: Grapevine trimmed to suit
Plants: Hemianthus callitrichoides(HC), lilliopsis, peacock moss, Subwassertang, Hyderophilla balsamica, Echinodorus tenellus (pigmy chain sword narrow leaf), amazon frogbit

throughout this build i wanted to see the effect of water on PAR so at the end you'll see the screenshots from my seneye PAR meter, great info for nerds like me but no to great for others

Appologies for the ifail(phone) pics will try and remember to charge the fuji next time i update, ip popular opinion warrents it i can try a clean up in photoshop to fish the over exposure from the LED's

[ILLUSN]

adding the substrate: using red sea flora root + included bacteria starter and UP aquasoil, basicly a knock off of ADA from taiwan it seems to work ok in a few other tanks I've seen but does leach ammonia

[ILLUSN]

setting up the tank substrtae, hardscape and wood, the plan was to go for kind a rver between a mountain and a hill, the results wern't great but i was pushed for time, so had to take ALOT shortcuts

[ILLUSN]

next up was the painfully slow process of filling the tank with water and planting.

the forground is HC with a little peacockmoss tied to stones ate the base of each "tree". theres also a bit of subwassertang tied to stones on the edge of the "river" near each "mountain".

A single stem of Hydrophilla balsamica fills in behind the big rock and help to hide the filter intake a little.

across the back is planted lilliopsis, I'll have to keep an eye on this as it starts to grow.

down the far right is pigmy chain sword for no ther reason other then i think it looks cool.

heres a quick vid to show the shimmer: you can just see the top of the CO2 system through the back of the tank.
http://youtu.be/maD736vY_L0

Also see the 2 PAR plots the first is "dry" measured on the floor of the tank with no water. 207 plenty enough to grow a giant clam in a marine tank. below is with water ans 227 is just insane!! even with the CO2 set a 2bps i might have to downgrade to 60 degree optics just give the plants 1/2 a chance but I'll let it run for a few weeks just to see.

[ILLUSN]

reserved for updates

[Mattzilla]

awesome mate

so geeky but so awesome lol

[Exotic Aquatic]

looking good jothy! welcome to the green side!

[ILLUSN]

Thanks Adrian, Awesome to hear from you buddy, this tank is entirely YOUR FAULT!

After you posted that vid on youtube my mother in law decided she had to have a tank like that for the kiddies LOL.

will try and update over the weekend, its growing in nice but I'm getting a little emersed type growth on the balsamica, hopefully it wont make the water toxic.