Pro's and Con's of an interconnected system

[Ike]

Hello all,

In anticipation of the arrival of a new group of plecs in the next few weeks (and to appease the Fiancee) I am getting heavy duty shelving for both sides of my garage to store boxes and things that are currently on the garage floor. of that racking I plan on stealing 1/4-1/3 of it to set up a new bigger rack and re-organizing the one I have.

I know most of you are on the metric system so I'll try to provide accurate equivalents in Liters.

Right now I have:
1x 55g (208.2L)
1x 20g Long (75.7L)
6x 10g Leaders (37.9L)
2x 2.5g (9.5L)

I'm looking to add 4x 30g Breeders (113.6L) 36"L x 18"D x 12"H

I love those dimensions and think they will work excellent for plecs due to their large surface area and will fit well in the rack due to their shorter height.

The question I pose to all of you is what are the pro's and con's of having all your tanks inter-connected for filtration?

I am considering two different set-ups:

1) Pre-drilled or drilled tanks, then plumbing them for water changes only and filtrating them with a couple sponge filters in each tank.

2) Pre-drilled or drilled tanks, then plumbing them for water changes and filtration with a heavy duty pump and using the 55g I have now as a sump and tossing a couple air-stones in each tank.

I know a fish store owner with 3 of the ladder setups and they work like a charm. I've also heard horror stories of wild caught and or new fish poisoning and wiping out an entire system... Is the ease of 1 large filter worth the risk?

Would love to hear your opinions... Thanks!

 

[Lornek8]

If breeding is a goal, the connected tanks can be limiting as all the water in each tank would be the same. Thus for spcies that have varying requirements for breeding and/or need wet/dry cycles or similar to trigger spawning, an interconnected sytem can be problematic. The biggest problem, as you've mentioned is that if you bring in wild-caught fish (especailly, but true for any that have been exposed to other fish) you run the risk of total system loss should you fail to quarantine the new fish. I like the idea of plumbing for water changes (but then you are limited to what kind of water you use in each tank unless the plumbing is for draining only) but caution needs to be taken to ensure that there are means to stop the tanks from draining completely should you forget to shut a valve or valve failure. I have a hard time envisioning an semi-automated system for water changes that would ensure you don't drain the tank dry while at the same time getting efficient removal of waste. You'd still need to vac the tanks, and with fish like plecs, often and a semi-automated water change system could lead to a semi-complacency when it comes to maintenance.

 

[bigbird]

Hello,

Benefits of having one connection to all tanks
- cost, cheaper as you have only one sump/pump
- easy of cleaning just one sump

What Speaks against
- you will be unable to control individule tanks for each fish. IE In my rack I have a Eheim 2217 for fast flowing plecs and an 2213/2215 for slow water flow for each tank.
- if one tank is diseased then the rest will follow.
- you will unable to shut off one system to control any issues

Just what I have
- I have all 3ft tanks
- I have not drilled them for sump holes
- I use 15mm pvc which I insert in top of tank, similar to the out valves of external filter, set this at 10cm from the top. I use this for only automatically filling up the water from a large 4ft tank. Also then there is no danger if a valve is not closed for water to drain the tank empty
- I still manually syphon the tank water out, so you can get all of the debris.
- I use individual external filters for each tank, same individual heaters.
- also my best tip ever is to lable each electrical cord so you know from which tank it is.

cheers jk :thumbup:

 

[Ike]

I want set-up 1) to be a scaled down version of this: 4 tanks instead of 14

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?94717-Fish-Room-and-new-setup

Thinking about it now I might not want to drill them, still pondering my options.

 

[bigbird]

my only thought are if you predrill then they might have less value if you wish to sell them later on. good luck with your rack

 

[Lornek8]

Nice setup. Though, discus pretty much all take the same water conditions unless you're dealing with the more touchy wild strains. Therefore a common water supply can be used to fill. With plecs it can be a bit more challenging unless you plan to keep all plec species in similar water conditions. This could be possible, but again if you're looking at breeding it could provide roadblocks. Personally for the size and quantities of the tanks you're talking about it seems more expense & trouble than its worth.

 

[Vuk]

Depending on how you construct the plumbing you can isolate tanks on a sumped system.
That link you sent has to be one of the worst plumbed systems I have ever seen, It is bulky, unsightly and not very practical. Drilling tanks at that low point is a big no no, if his power fails his sump will overflow, tanks will drain and will be left with a swimming pool and dead fish.

If you do decide to go with drilled tanks I suggest you use weirs instead of the linked method. They are safer,more practical and provide an excellent place to hide tumblers etc.

 

[lealea]

I was told from an old experienced pleco breeder never have connected tanks and that is how i set up all my fish room everything is seperate and it is more money and more time but I have always had great success with breeding and very low problems.

 

[lcrazy]

personal choice i spose, i have 2 x interlinked systems all up 8000ltrs, check out my breeding log, over a dozen s.p bred in these 2 systems.

Reason i chose interlinked system is a simple, Its heaps cheaper to run, isolation has never been a drama due to flow control valves.

 

[Ike]

Wow, thank you for all the responses, it's given me a lot to think about, definitely a multifaceted issue with weight on both sides. I agree it seemed a bit bulky and I don't want to plumb on the front side of the tank either... hmmm

 

[Vuk]

A lot of people also use UV to combat the chances of spreading disease if one tank cops it.
As Lcrazy said. It all comes down to personal preference but in my honest opinion no type of filter comes close to a sump.

 

[Zebra Pleco]

Prefer the centralised system myself, with gravity drained pre-drilled tanks

 

[Vuk]

Very nice setup.
Thanks for sharing.

 

[Ike]

That is a very clean looking rack! and similar to what I'm thinking of.

Gravity drained is the way to go that way the tanks never actually completely drain when the power goes out and the pump shuts off. Sand in all the tanks is interesting, and are those mini eheims inside the tanks for extra filtration?

 

[Zebra Pleco]

The whole system is powered by a 2800 litre per hour pump in the sump, this feeds the top tanks, with a tap valve half way up the hose to stop supply if doing maintence and to control flow.

The sump is supplied by RO / HMA Water controlled by a float valve, above the float valve I have an emergency overflow / waste pipe.

The sump has 4 x 500 watt heaters in there and jammed packed full of bio balls and foam.

The top tanks (2 x 2ft) both have Ehiem Aqua balls in them, and air pumps (run of car battery in case power failure). The water flows from the top tank to the middle tank by an uplift pipe, that sites about an inch from the top of tank, so if power failure the tank will not drain, I also have non return valve on the sump output, as this sits below the water line, and when power fails, the water drains down into the pump and floods the sump.

The middle tank (my zebra breeding tank) has an external Ehiem Wet and Dry filter and an internal Aquaball. Both the External Filter and the Sump Output pipes have Ehiem difusers on the end for airation purposes. Again this tank gravity feeds the lower tanks.

The bottom four tanks (1x1ft) are my fry raising tanks and all have there own sponge filter.

All tanks are lit by 1 x 4ft T8 daylight bulb (6 hours for viewing). All plants like low light and there for fry grazing and to hide.

The only downside that I do not like about this setup, is the noise. The airbubbles, the sump pump and the "gargling" of water flowing down the pipes is quite loud.

I managed to get the water noise down, by having the bottom of the tank drain points (uplifts) located deep inside the tank beneath. I am using ehiem air pumps which help (My large Air piston air pump is standy on battery incase power failure).

 

[Ike]

Thank you for such a detailed description it will be lots of help while I plan my set-up.

I love all your fail-safes, better to be prepared

 

[AusPleco]

If you dont mind me asking ZebraPleco how much did it cost to set your tanks up like that?

 

[Zebra Pleco]

Not much really, the tanks were bought from another member on here off ebay (Approx £250 for the tanks and racking). All my money went into the fish and reliable equipment.

All filters and pumps are Ehiem, which cost a bit more than average, but I love my fish, so don't mind spending money on them.

The top and middle tanks are split into 2 and contain 7 zebra pleco's each, which breed roughly 2-3 times a year. I have a 5 ft tank just to the right of this and this is my Queen Arabesque breeding tank, all fry and raised int he lower 4 chambers of the rack system.

It seems to work "touch wood", but if a failure happens or disease outbreak, I am Screwed, as its all centralised, even the 5 ft L260 tank, runs off this system now.