Epic Overhaul/Builds: 3D Backgrounds 300g-125g-120g

[aclockworkorange]

Oh yes Justin your backgrounds are sooooooooooooooooooo amazing. LOL.

Good score on the tetras, I will get you a list of corys we stock from your biotope area.

And you best not get rid of that piece of DW you have I've been eyeing!

 

[Nyvar]

to give folks ideas on their tanks

I think you can check that one off your list. No matter what you say, you're DIY skills blow me away. I admire the way you want things to be perfect. If I ever do a major project, I know I'll be thinking to myself, "Now would Justin be satisfied with this?"

Oh, for corys from the Llanos part of the Orinoco I was able to dig up: habrosus,
melanistius, metae, melini.

 

[JK47]

Really cool. I can't wait to see everything done.

Thanks Dave!

Looking good so far JK47! Only problem I see is that Hoplarchus psittacus dont like 3D backgrounds. . . you should send it to me for safe keeping

She is gone. One day when I have a big tank/the kids move out I will keep them again.

Oh yes Justin your backgrounds are sooooooooooooooooooo amazing. LOL.

Good score on the tetras, I will get you a list of corys we stock from your biotope area.

And you best not get rid of that piece of DW you have I've been eyeing!

I won't sell the wood I promised you. You can have it free for helping me plant my 10g I'm need a hand flipping the tank over to fill tomorrow if your still down to come over? Good looking out on the Corydoras, thanks! Check out Nyvar's comments you guys think you can get c. metae?? They are AWESOME.

I think you can check that one off your list. No matter what you say, you're DIY skills blow me away. I admire the way you want things to be perfect. If I ever do a major project, I know I'll be thinking to myself, "Now would Justin be satisfied with this?"

Oh, for corys from the Llanos part of the Orinoco I was able to dig up: habrosus,
melanistius, metae, melini.

^ how? How are you able to cross reference quickly, the species and collection point? It takes me hours to do that. You got skills


Plumbing is 100%. Sealed solid, painted yada yada.. Side note for you younger members: If you paint your plumbing and they are hard seated in bulkhead fittings, besides the obvious use fish safe paint (Krylon Fusion) make sure and tape off your bulkhead fittings. If you get paint in the threads it's much harder to get them on tight. There isn't always a ton of room under your stand to be fiddling with them. Save your back, you'll need it when you get old like me lol... I seat the bulkhead fittings with the tank on it's face so I can tighten easily then flip the tank down.





Oh and I painted over my left and right marker on which side is which. My bad.. Probably shouldn't have done that.



So now I am one day behind. Tomorrow the tank will be finished. I just had to get the old paint off and redo it. It will never not bother me cuz I'll know it's back there. I did the whole thing by hand with 1 used razor blade I had. Don't do that, my fingers feel like hamburger... By a $3 scraper..

Tha tank made it about 5 minutes before I flipped it. Way to much work on a ladder.













It chipped off in about 1/4" strips. Not sure why I thought that would go faster than it did. That sucked..



I switched to the 10 gallon for a break.

 

[JK47]

This tank has been waiting for me.. I get it, it's not a monster but having a smaller tank is absolutly wonderful. This tank needed wood bad! (filter is temporary BTW, eheim coming this weekend)



I got crackin on the wood and cutting it to fit. It was larger than it seemed at the LFS.



I cut two of the back legs off of it and it helped a little.



It still would not fit down into the sand like I wanted though. You can see what I mean from the side shot.





I stopped takin pics and just kept cutting, fitting, cutting, fitting. It still won't fit all the way.





This is where it is as of now. I am going to have to start over tomorrow. I really wanted the long leg to go over the rocks into the sand and same with the other legs. It's tall enough to drill and plant inside the wood but I don't want to do that until I get the fit right.







Do you guys think this is even worth the effort or am I the only one that thinks it's a killer piece? I should have stayed in bed today, nothin went right! I can't even work on a 10 gallon lol..

 

[makoshoemaker]

The wood looks perfect. This really makes me want to attempt to make a biotope. I actually think I may take all of the blue that I just painted on the back of my tank off. Because the black looks more visually pleasing.

 

[JK47]

The wood looks perfect. This really makes me want to attempt to make a biotope. I actually think I may take all of the blue that I just painted on the back of my tank off. Because the black looks more visually pleasing.

Thank man. I really do like this wood too. I am just not used to small tanks lol. IMO the BG color depends on the fish you keep. I keep SA cichlids and they come from very dark slow moving water. I have a 36" T5 on a 96" tank if that tells you anything. My 120g houses my favorite species on the planet so I didn't want to take any shortcuts. If I was into saltwater I would have a blue background though. Ocean colors. Same with African cichlids. What do you keep?

 

[aclockworkorange]

Metae? Yeah of course we have those, they have those everywhere! AKA bandit corys. They are really common. There are 3 other corys that look really similar to metae, we also have all 3 of those, and we have panda corys, and about 20 other kinds
As far as "rarer" corys, we have the C121s and we have some red laser corys right now. Not sure how those fit in your biotope though. Google pics of the c121s or corydoras adolfi (very similar species) to see them. They look like big bandit corys but they have orange on their head.

 

[Michiba54]

She is gone. One day when I have a big tank/the kids move out I will keep them again.

Ohh, that sucks.

This tank has been waiting for me.. I get it, it's not a monster but having a smaller tank is absolutly wonderful. This tank needed wood bad! (filter is temporary BTW, eheim coming this weekend)

Do you guys think this is even worth the effort or am I the only one that thinks it's a killer piece? I should have stayed in bed today, nothin went right! I can't even work on a 10 gallon lol..

That that tank will be awesome (its already nice) once you get that wood to fit just right, wish I could buy driftwood like that locally.

Is the first piece of background supposed to act as an overflow or is it just to hide the equipment?

 

[makoshoemaker]

I currently have a Buttokoferi in a 20L and I am setting up my sump for my 65 I just bought. But I plan on getting a couple oscars for that 65. I know they create alot of waste, but i figured a 700gph return and and overflow box of the same would be the perfect amount of overkill for my tank

 

[JK47]

Is the first piece of background supposed to act as an overflow or is it just to hide the equipment?

It's a seperate chamber so I can have plants take root back there (open top tank). It's full of substrat pro as bio-media and media for the plant to take root into and act as a filter at the same time. I am so used to sumps I just built a submerged one in this tank too. I wanted to try something different with each tank/background and haven't seen it done before so I tried it.

I currently have a Buttokoferi in a 20L and I am setting up my sump for my 65 I just bought. But I plan on getting a couple oscars for that 65. I know they create alot of waste, but i figured a 700gph return and and overflow box of the same would be the perfect amount of overkill for my tank

That butti is going to be a MONSTER! Good taste

Metae? Yeah of course we have those, they have those everywhere! AKA bandit corys. They are really common. There are 3 other corys that look really similar to metae, we also have all 3 of those, and we have panda corys, and about 20 other kinds
As far as "rarer" corys, we have the C121s and we have some red laser corys right now. Not sure how those fit in your biotope though. Google pics of the c121s or corydoras adolfi (very similar species) to see them. They look like big bandit corys but they have orange on their head.

I could care less about biotopes honestly.. I care more about good husbandry and like perameters/temperment than collection point. The only true biotope I will ever do is an Atapapo tank one day. The 120g is for my s. maps to live a stress free happy life and have a chance to spawn.