The epic discus project

[fischkopp]

epic [ˈɛpɪk]

noun

• 1 A long poem, typically one derived from ancient oral tradition, narrating the deeds and adventures of heroic or legendary figures or the past history of a nation. [...]
• 2 Informal an exceptionally long and arduous task or activity: the business of getting hospital treatment soon became an epic

adjective

• 1 Relating to or characteristic of an epic or epics [...]
• 2 Heroic or grand in scale or character: his epic journey around the world a tragedy of epic proportions informal particularly impressive or remarkable: the gig last night was epic these CEOs are paid salaries and bonuses in the millions despite their epic failures

[Oxford Dictonary]



Some of you who have seen the tank have encouraged me to start a post a little about this project. It's starting to come to a point where I am happy with it so I will share my journey.

But why is it ɛpɪk? I have to admit to myself that I underestimated the amount of work that has to go into it when I do many thing from scratch. I took a day of here and then to finish major parts, but most of the work is done on evenings or weekends. Add summer time and busy work, as well as other projects of course, and it can take quite some time until you have a finished product.

The idea to setup a discus tank was born a few months/years back. I decided to make it a DIY project, meaning that I would build or at least plan everything myself, in order to setup the tank the way I had it in mind. There were a lot of ideas I wanted to implement, and I often had no idea how I would do it since I never took on a project like this. However, I enjoyed doing it and learned a great deal about custom aquarium setups, wood and metal work, plumbing and sump setups, wiring, and many more ...

It is now three years ago that I first started to think about this project, but a few month would pass until the present aquariums where moved and the place was ready for it. This new tank should house discus. I always loved them, but never kept them before because I didn't have a big enough tank. That would change as the designated place for the aquarium allowed a tank of 6 foot length. It could have been a foot more, but that would have been difficult to move. I am not a very good scuba diver, so I decided 2 ft height would be enough, and since my arms aren't longer than that either I went with 2 ft depth as well. So the final dimension were 6x2x2, a nice size tank that holds 180 gal. Sweet. I had picked up a 75 gal earlier that year, and that was the biggest tank I ever owned at that point. Instead of setting it up though it was doomed to become a sump from the early beginning. That sums up the system to about 250 gal. I thought that would be a good start for discus.

So far the teaser, more to come ...

[Peekay]

interest piqued!   

[daworldisblack]

interest piqued!   

+1 ! I'm a sucker for DIY projects and its DISCUS! I love them! Alas space and resources are an issue so maybe somewhere down the road so your set up might be the inspiration! Waiting in anticipation!

[charlie]

You guys are in for a treat - the build of the OVAS century 

[bizfromqc]

Looking forward to see how this develops... and PICTURES 

Sump three times the size of my display tank now... AWESOME
(ok... maybe one day, I'll get a bigger tank)

[touchofsky]

Looking forward to the journey, and yes, pictures, if you can 

[exv152]

Fischkopp, are you growing out your discus yourself, or are you buying mature fish? I've done discus myself (profile pic is one of mine), because if you do plan to growout your discus the work has just begun.

[fischkopp]

Thank you for your kind comments. Yes, there will be pictures. I have taken a few after each major task.

But first of all I like to thank everyone who was involved in this project, lend a helping hand, did brainstorming and offered ideas.

I like to thank my better half Winnie for tolerating aquariums in hallways, lots of noise, dusty rooms, a minor invasion into the kitchen, silicon smell, occasional floods, and most of all that I spend a lot of time on it.

A big thank goes to Ken who helped a lot on stand and lights. Without him I wouldn't be able to pull it off.

And I would like to thank all my other fish buddies (and I am sorry if I forgot you in here) Errol, Peter, Ed, Mark & Mark, little Al, big Al, Rebecca, Enrico, Brandon who helped or contributed in one way or another. It's a great community that we have here at OVAS!

A special thank you goes to Evelyn for her valuable advise on anything Discus, and of course for bringing some awesome fish to Ottawa!



I should also add a little disclaimer at this point. A few things that I have done are a little unconventional and may even appear over the top. By no means I want to give the impression that a nice aquarium has to be done that way. It's simply what I thought might be nice features in the setup.

These were requirements for this project:

• It has to look nice. The number one requirement from the boss.
• It is a discus tank. The discus comes first.
• It has to be planted. That's because green is so pleasant on the eye.
• It has to be low maintenance. Because a day is short.
• It has to look nice. No point starting this project without being clear about that.

So I came up with a couple of things that I wanted to realize to achieve all that, and few few more that I though would be cool:

• Starphire. Because glass isn't just glass.
• Furnished metal stand. Good looks have clean lines.
• Sump. Good tank is clean too.
• Automatic water change. Because the day is short.
• Dimmable lights. It's for show.
• Controller. Because I won't be pushing buttons.

[fischkopp]

Fischkopp, are you growing out your discus yourself, or are you buying mature fish?

Hi Eric,

I raised juvenile discus in the progress, as well as adding semi-mature discus to the group. Yes, you are very right that it is A LOT of work. More to come on this as well ... 

Cheers,
Robert

[exv152]

I raised juvenile discus in the progress, as well as adding semi-mature discus to the group. Yes, you are very right that it is A LOT of work. More to come on this as well ...  

A word of advice, based on personal experience, buy all your discus from the same tank, that way they're used to each other's pathogens.  Too often I've heard of aquarists mixing discus and losing a bunch within a few months. Discus are renowned for carrying things they're immune to and passing it onto others that are not.  Also, min group size to get would be 6-8. What kind are you going to put in the 180 gal?

[fischkopp]

A word of advice, based on personal experience, buy all your discus from the same tank, that way they're used to each other's pathogens.  Too often I've heard of aquarists mixing discus and losing a bunch within a few months. Discus are renowned for carrying things they're immune to and passing it onto others that are not.  Also, min group size to get would be 6-8. What kind are you going to put in the 180 gal?

Yes, you are very right. Discus can vanish quickly, I learned that the hard way, too. The key is quarantine.
There are currently 16 discus in the tank. Various color strains, but no wilds.

[fischkopp]

The Tank

The dimension for the tank are 6x2x2. Standard 180gal. However, I thought it would be nice to have the front glass in starphire, so I went custom. The sides will face the wall, so I kept normal glass for them. If I would do it again they would be starphire as well. But that's not really a big deal.

The tank is eurobraced; that saves cost and weight since thinner glass can be used. A rimless tank would have been double the cost. The tank also got drilled to connect it to the sump.

I got the tank through Ray, who communicated with the builder, North American Fish Breeder in Toronto. He also brought the tank up for me. I must say the that I am very pleased with the build quality. It shows that NAFB have a few year experience in building tanks.

There are holes drilled. Believe me that it took me quite some time to finalize position and size. I had zero experience with sumps at that point, so I gave it my best shot. The idea was to use the big holes as overflow elbows, the small ones are for return. At that point I had two spraybars for each side in mind. A few month down the road I will dump that idea ...

I am a fan of black backgrounds, and one of the best ways to get that on is black vinyl. It's pretty cheap at the art store, and, once applied, gives a nice black tone. You just have to be a little careful that you don't trap any air when you stick it on. Use lots of water, a credit card of your choice, and a little patience; you will love the result It's pretty easy to remove too if you really want to do that.

tank as it was sitting on my floor for 3 months

vinyl background applied

[bizfromqc]

Very nice 

That piece of driftwood looks tiny in that huge tank, although I'm sure it's not! I'm a big fan of the black background and have always used the LFS backing applied with a bit of oil to make it stick. It's roughly the same process; oil, wipe, stick background, curse, get air bubbles out, curse some more and then you're done 

Now this vinyl you speak of from the art store, does it have any advantages over a regular LFS background? Easier to apply, cheaper, looks better?

I was thinking of going the "paint" route for the next tank using Krylon Fusion. I read many good things about it but If there's a better product out there, I want to give it a shot.

[pm]

I am a fan of black backgrounds, and one of the best ways to get that on is black vinyl. It's pretty cheap at the art store, and, once applied, gives a nice black tone. You just have to be a little careful that you don't trap any air when you stick it on.

And a word to the wise, put the background on before you setup the tank (like you did fischkopp).  I did mine after, and can't get behind the tank to remove the bubbles.... I just have to live with them for now.   

[fischkopp]

Thanks. There is another, bigger piece of wood, that made it into the tank.

Your method might just look the same; the idea is that there is no air gap between glass and background. Its just that oil, vaseline, etc are a lot messier to work with, and it's a real mess if you ever want to remove it. So is paint.

Price wise its probably similar. Vinyl is sold by the yard, $4-6 depending on the size. I got mine from De Serres.

Yeah, it's good to do that work beforehand. I have maybe 6 inches between the back of the tank and the wall. No way I could apply a background like this now.

[charlie]

And a word to the wise, put the background on before you setup the tank (like you did fischkopp).  I did mine after, and can't get behind the tank to remove the bubbles.... I just have to live with them for now.   

Very good words to the wise.
Fischkopp was the  person to introduce me to the Vinyl route & now like him i love it, him & Winnie was even nice enough to do a demo on my 79 gallon tank for me , maybe they will be nice enough to do a demo @ the next plant meeting   .

[fischkopp]

The Stand

I had done 4x2 constructions in the past. The work well and can be done on a low budget, but they tend to be very bulky as well. So I decided to get a metal stand. The tank is standard size 6x2, so you can get a metal stand in any LFS.

But I found that the stand would probably not work for me: I was planning a 75gal sump that is 4 ft long; I was afraid that the bottom may bend do to the weight being unevenly distributed. But more so, the stand was pretty low, so there wouldn't be much space to work inside the sump. So custom it is.

My friend Ken knew an experienced welder, it was on me to organize the metal for the stand. Commercial stands are mostly build of cold rolled steel, which has the advantage of being stronger. That allows the use of thinner and hence lighter material. But it's also a lot more expensive, so hot rolled steel it was. I used square tubes, 2"x2", I can't recall the thickness though.

After making a drawing and getting the dimensions I made a list of all pieces needed and send it of to the Superior Metal Centre. They sold me the pieces precisely cut. These were dropped off at the welder who did an excellent job putting the stand together. Once I had it home I cleaned it up and gave it three good coats of rust-free black paint. Another job done.

The stand in its place

[fischkopp]

Levelling

Levelling the stand is the one most important step before putting the tank in place and filling it with water. The forces due the water will only then be evenly distributed. Any carelessness at this step causes stress on the glass panels and seams and can lead to a disaster.

So I spend good 2-3 hours going back and fourth to all four feet until I was happy with it. It turned out that my (concrete) floor wasn't level at all. It fall by 1 inch! from the back right to the front left corner. The feet of the stand are 4x4" for better weight distribution, the shims are made of aluminum. Thanks again to Ken for making these, as well as helping me to move the stand into my apartment.

I used 3/4 plywood as base for bottom and top. I was a little worries that my wooden flooring will give a little under the weight of the tank, so I used the 75 gal for the sump to add a little bit of weight. All was good and level!

Leveling and shimming aluminum plates The 75gal adds weight ... ... and serves as up-scaled level bar

[Peekay]

That looks great! 
Funny how our perspective of size in photos works.  It doesn't look huge, until you say that the 'levelling' tank is 75G!

[bettabreeder]

I'm excited to see how this turns out! Did you consider painting the plywood black as well?

[bizfromqc]

I'd love a sump like this... except I'd use it as a display tank LOL
This is one massive tank/stand, it's going to look awesome.

I'm curious, what's the weight of the metal stand?

[fischkopp]

... maybe they will be nice enough to do a demo @ the next plant meeting  ...

Sure. Someone bring a tank and vinyl and we can stick it on.

Did you consider painting the plywood black as well?

No. I ironed some trimming to the edge of the bottom panel though. In it's finished state, the stand will be fully furnished with doors, so there is no need to paint the inside.

I'm curious, what's the weight of the metal stand?

It's big. When we saw it the first time we were joking that you could put a car on it! It will look less massive as soon as the tank sits on it. It's not too heavy. I can lift it, so it may be around 50kg? But you need two person to move it around because its quite big.

That was actually another point: We purposely chose the height to be the same as our kitchen counter, which is right next door. It places the tank on a very nice eye level once if you walk by or sit in front of it.

[exv152]

...My friend Ken knew an experienced welder, it was on me to organize the metal for the stand. Commercial stands are mostly build of cold rolled steel, which has the advantage of being stronger. That allows the use of thinner and hence lighter material. But it's also a lot more expensive, so hot rolled steel it was. I used square tubes, 2"x2", I can't recall the thickness though...

Very nice stand I must say. Do you know for sure if the four legs will sustain the overall weight of two tanks, which should be about 2000lbs with water? I'm not an engineer but wondering you had any other input from someone who would know. I've seen a similar shelf sold at lowes (w/welded joints) and it apparently can hold 2000lbs per shelf. But the shelf pieces are slotted and fall within precut holes in the posts.

[Stussi613]

Very nice stand I must say. Do you know for sure if the four legs will sustain the overall weight of two tanks, which should be about 2000lbs with water? I'm not an engineer but wondering you had any other input from someone who would know. I've seen a similar shelf sold at lowes (w/welded joints) and it apparently can hold 2000lbs per shelf. But the shelf pieces are slotted and fall within precut holes in the posts.

The weight of the two tanks will be evenly distributed across the entire frame, assuming that it was welded "true" which it appears to be, so the total weight on any given leg will be considerably less than 2000 pounds. The stands at Lowes have a 2000lb per shelf weight rating because it's likely that the tabs that go from the shelf into the frame likely have a 600lb shear stress rating, assuming there are 4 connection points from the shelf into the frame. It's very common for those types of systems to have a rating based on the amount of weight that will exceed the ability of any, or all, of the tabs, to succumb to shearing.

Since the tanks weight will be distributed across the entire frame assembly of each level the biggest consideration would be the shear stress rating of the joints holding the cross member pieces to the vertical supports. Without knowing the type of weld used to join them it's hard to calculate what the max shear weight would be, not to mention that the tank will be sitting over the actual legs on each side at all 4 corners.  I'd be willing to bet the max weight rating will far exceed the weight of the tank full of water based on the number of cross supports and number of welds that can be seen.

[charlie]

I think the tank has being on the stand about a year now & functioning could be wrong, Robert will elaborate.

[Stussi613]

I think the tank has being on the stand about a year now & functioning could be wrong, Robert will elaborate.

If it's been built for over a year why are we only getting a few snippets every couple of days 

I'm so excited to see how this build turns out!!!

[charlie]

Some of you who have seen the tank have encouraged me to start a post a little about this project. It's starting to come to a point where I am happy with it so I will share my journey.

[daworldisblack]

Lol.. I didn't want to burst anyone's bubble but I guess this was coming lol. Its up and running and its AMAZING in person

[bettabreeder]

Rah, not fair! I wanna see pictures then!!

[bizfromqc]

Someone's being a tease...

[bettabreeder]

+1

[charlie]

Good things come to those who wait 

[daworldisblack]

Lol.. let Robert do his thing! I like his step-by-step guide.. its a manual for a future project

[fischkopp]

Thank you for your comments and concerns.

I am by no means an expert nor did I engineer the metal stand. But I did some research and looked at how other people build their stands. Followed by an discussion with friends that have much more experience with this kind of work. It came down to 2x2" inch metal tubes with a certain thickness. When I got the metal quoted I found out that the next thicker material was just 10/20 bucks more in total, so I went with that. Too bad I lost my notes on that, but I believe it was 3mm.

The design of the stand is overall more sturdy due to the cross bars. Metal stands you get commercially for aquariums (LFS stand) don't have these. Also, LFS stand have the horizontal bars the same length as the tank, the vertical bars are on the outside; this meas that the weight of the aquarium is mainly held by the welding joint. Most LFS stands I have seen only welded the top edge of the square tube! In my construction, all sides are welded and the legs are "inside", reducing the stress on the welding joint.

Yes, the tank has been up for a while and I was a little worried in the beginning when we lifted the tank into place and filled it the first time. Floor and stand are holding ever since.

Pictures will come. 

[wandmangels]

Lol.. I didn't want to burst anyone's bubble but I guess this was coming lol. Its up and running and its AMAZING in person

+1

[fischkopp]

Moving

With the stand in place it was time to clean up the living room and move that tank into the spot. Did I mentioned that we moved the tank with two people into my apartment? And that the tank was probably at minus 15 deg Celsius at that point. You could watch the water condensing on the glass, making it very slippery. Somehow me manged to bring it up in one piece, but I highly recommend everyone to move big tanks in warmer months, and to get a few extra hands. So for this rather small move, but in a tight space, I called in all my fish buddies. An hour debating made let the five minute move go by quite smoothly. The biggest challenge was to lock the foam down so it wouldn't move when we push the tank in. The green painters tape that you have seen in other pics already came in handy here. I used the pink construction/isolation foam from Home Depot, they were the only ones where I found it 1/2 inch thickness. 

Then came the hour of truth, the time it took to fill the tank for the first time. Everything stayed levelled. Nothing cracked. No leaks. Yeah! Time to start the real work. I had bought some pieces of driftwood earlier, so I thought I just dump them in the tank to get them out of the way and let them release their tannis. This should become an extensive 9 month soak.

Well, I didn't anticipate that when I started the project. Shouldn't take too long to set up that tank, right? So I got myself some discus when I was at the OCA a few months earlier. A couple of nice Stendker discus that came from Discus Hans, nice guy btw. I didn't even have that 180 then, but that was ok I thought, since that tank would be to big for them anyway. So I started them of in a 15gal. This is the first time I had discus, and they were young ones, 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 inches in size. So I tried the best that I could imagine to raise them properly. I was doing 95% water changes twice a day to assure good water quality, but doing this over a three month period is quite time consuming. Besides, the fish was growing, and so was the tension. I lost 3 little guys due to stress, whereas I found that certain strains were more susceptible to stress than others. It was a relief to move the gang into the 75 gal, which meant I had to worry a little less about missing water changes. But I still tried to do 50-75% daily.

The 180 arrived Using the sump as temporary home ... ... for the discus that I had already.

[Stussi613]

Omg, I was just checking back on this thread when you posted...talk about timing.

I'm loving where this is going!

[daworldisblack]

keep it coming!

[bizfromqc]

...
So I started them of in a 15gal. This is the first time I had discus, and they were young ones, 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 inches in size. So I tried the best that I could imagine to raise them properly. I was doing 95% water changes twice a day to assure good water quality, but doing this over a three month period is quite time consuming.
...

95% WC twice a day is nutbar, how we're you accomplishing that? With 2.5-3.5" fish in a 15G that is approximately 13" high, that doesn't leave a whole lot of water, less than half an inch in the tank 

I'm assuming then that you poured water in while you were taking it out or spreading it out over the day? Can you eleborate on that?

[exv152]

Are you heating the WC water? I assume that would be the only way to do two 95% WCs per day without stressing them out. Also, what kind of feeding regimen are you doing?

[fischkopp]

Thanks for the comments!

Yes, the water change may seem excessive, but I was keeping keeping one discus per gallon, so I thought it would be just right. I drained the tank down to the bottom,  leaving just enough water to cover the fish that was laying on the side by that time. Flatfish. Then I filled it back up straight from the tap. The temperature was adjusted to be the same as the tank beforehand, maybe a tad warmer, that's fine. I was keeping them at 30 deg Celsius. I was priming the water while the tank filled up. The fish was alright with that, but they do get a little nervous when they lay flat on the side, so you want to make sure that you don't bang to much against the glass.

I tried to do 3-4 feedings per day, one big one in the morning, one after I come back from work, and one at night. During the weekends, when I was around, they also got a meal around noon. Once they moved to the 75gal sump I also used an auto feeder to feed while I am away, but I didn't want to risk this on the small tank. The water changes came usually 30 min to an hour after the the feedings to remove uneaten food and the other dirt.

The food itself was mainly flakes, pellets, and frozen bloodworms and brine shrimp, the latter two more as a treat. I chose not to use beef heart mixtures. Partially, because I never found the time to make it, because I was afraid of more pollution, and because it's the wrong kind of protein. I understand why others use it, but it isn't for me. I believe I went through an 5 lb bucket of flakes though in less than 9 month.

[fischkopp]

Overflow

It was late March when we had moved the 180 on the stand. During spring and summer I was occupied with other things, which left me little time to proceed on the project. The little time that I put into it, after doing the water change, was spend on planning the overflow. I wanted to make sure that it would not create any noise; the tank sits in the dining room and nothing would be more distracting than constant splurging.

So I spend some time browsing the web and quickly found out that my initial idea of using two upwards pointing elbows would not be the best idea. Many people seemed to use flavours of Durso-style overflow setups, but not everybody could eliminate the noise completely. Finally, I stumbled upon the BeanAnimal-style overflow that sounded quite promising. The key element of his approach is that one return would run at full siphon, allowing more water to fall down the sump without having any air trapped in the flow since it is the cause for splurging noise.

Since my tank was already drilled and I wasn't keen on having a coast-to-cost overflow, I adapted the beananimal overflow to my system. After much thinking I chose to have an overflow box in the top right corner of the tank. It would house the full siphon overflow as well as the open channel overflow that would take care of the excess water. On the left side I would install an elbow above the water level to act as emergency overflow. The remaining hole would be used as return.

I had never worked with acrylic before, so I went to Canus Plastics to have them build it for me. I took my time to get all measurements and box dimensions right, especially those that would impact the water level in the tank. I did not want to end up seeing the water line later on, it should disappear behind the trim. I had even build a little mock-up before handing the dimensions over to the guys at Canus. Awesome guys, they knew right away that they were building an overflow box, and they did a good job with it. I went with black, so that it would merge with the background.

I did try to keep the box as small as possible, so that it wouldn't be too intrusive. But what I missed was the fact that my tank is euro-braced, and the bracing stretches almost across he whole width of the box. This made the installation a bit difficult, and it's not really accessible anymore. I have to use chopsticks. In the future I will keep this in mind and make it a little bigger.

By the time I had this figured out and the box ready it was mid September. I also spend a lot of time in various hardware stores to find all the parts I would need for the plumbing. More on that later, but you get a glimpse of it in the last pic that shows the discus at that time. Most of them really took off in the 75gal over the summer. I also added a few Blue Diamonds to the group.

Adapting the "beananimal-style" overflow. (Ueber)Planning the overflow box. Return and emergency overflow. Overflow box, with returns. Using egg-crate to as dirt-guard. Meanwhile, the discus grew.

[fischkopp]

It takes quite some time to put up these threads. I meant to add posts for a few more things in the setup: the sump, the plumbing (automatic water change), the equipment, the controller, CO2, custom 8-channel dimmable light, ... I took plenty of pictures along the way. What can I say, life got busy, so I never found the time for it.

Meanwhile the tank was running for about two years as planted discus tank. Even though it had it's share of issues it was doing quite ok for the most part. Below are two quick shots of the tank that I have taken at different times. Unfortunately I had to take the whole system down in the summer because I moved to a new place.

The good new is: I am in the progress of setting it up again. As a different tank. But with pretty much the same equipment, maybe a bit simpler though. Stay tuned.

Full tank shots.

[sas]

That was an absolutely gorgeous tank! Wow
Can't wait to see what you do next.
Any hints on livestock?

[charlie]

I had the opportunity to see this tank in it`s former scape, both in the good times & bad times.
The bells and whistles rivals any Marine set up bar none.
Anxiously awaiting for it`s new glory.
Errol

[exv152]

I be interested in hearing what your plan is for substrate, that is, if your planning to go planted again. There are so many options now available to hobbyists in terms of nutrient rich substrates.

[bettabreeder]

Whooooooa! Stunning tank and those disuc pop! Amazing work


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Herstead]

That is a gorgeous tank!

- Jonathan

[fischkopp]

Thanks folks!

This time around the tank isn't going to be planted. So I may add some here and there. It's more of a big fish setup, and will house some of my bigger suckers and a group of geophagus.

I am using the same substrate, silica pool filter sand.

[BSmith]

I love it.  What did you do with the Discus when you moved?

[fischkopp]

Thanks! I still have most of the discus. A friend took care of them for me while I got my new place ready. They are now in my fish room swimming in an pretty unexciting, yet practical 75gal bare bottom. Eventually I like to build a setup that's geared towards breeding. But I need this big tank up and running first to free up some tank space.

[Nyx]

Wow, Robert, your tank was positively stunning, plants, fish, the whole thing! Extremely well done! 

[fischkopp]

Thanks Claude!

[ajm1961]

WHOA!
That is one stunning tank! Now I know what I want for Christmas! Well maybe next year's Christmas...

Well done Robert - thanks for sharing and please keep us updated with more photos!!

[SlyAngel]

I guess you still believe in Santa Claus my dear Andre...

Beautiful tank Robert.........very colorful....love it.