Psylant

Do you worry when you walk outside to your car in a parking lot? You're probably exposed to more danger there, than at your aquarium... unless you run an abundance of UV over a reef.

Extreme case of mouth rot?

I'd say you're fine. Temperature increases are far more damaging than cooling most of the time.

The lights are decently bright, but there's a lot of excess nutrients because it's unplanted, and tons of silicates from my pool filter sand substrate. There are also many quite large fish, notably a 15" Mbu puffer fed mostly mussels. The water tests perfectly fine, it's just unsightly on the glass. Normally the chocolate pleco keeps the decor pretty clean, but I have to divide the tank until I can sell my last large cichlid, which prevents him from getting on the side with the puffer right now. I don't think I could do anything to help the situation other than removing the PFS or placing a ton of silicate absorbing resin in my sump. Either way I'm not overly concerned about it

I got the Magnavore last night in the mail. I have nothing to compare it to but some of the smaller Mag Floats, but this thing is amazing. I was able to clean my whole tank (8' x 3.5' x 2.5') in less than 5 minutes. This was taking me well over 40 minutes previously. I hadn't cleaned the glass in over a month, and had thick brown algae everywhere. ONE pass and it was spotless. Couldn't be happier.

I've gone through 6 heaters in 3 years. 3 300W Visitherms, I believe they're called, 2 250W Jagers, and a 1000W titanium heater. They all suck. Pick your poison.

I'd agree with Jayba.

Plants are anubias - nothing touched them all summer in a 180 gal stock trough. I have 4 of your bifasciatum in here - planning to end up with 1 or 2 as they grow out. Also have a few Aureum, Meeki, and Nics. The wild male sailfin mollies i put in as dithers are by far the most aggressive fish in the tank.

That's awesome! I didn't know they were mine. Looks like they went to a good home. I think I remember you now. You mentioned something about having swordtails dithers or something like that?

Looks good. Those plants probably won't last long though... I had a 180g that I swapped for a 450g and even that wasn't big enough. Once something pairs off you better have a backup plan! They're definitely fun fish to own

I would like to try an open top tank someday, but I'm too scared. When I took my fish out of my 90g to dirt it, they lived in a very large Rubbermaid tub for about 4-5 hours. It had an airstone, AC110 hooked onto the side, tons of plants, etc. and I had 2 Siamese Algae Eaters jump out and a couple Rainbowfish too. Luckily I found them in time and they're fine, but I ended up putting saran wrap over the tub.

I've recently (about a month) popped a calamistratum in my tank. Nice plant, has put out new leaves, haven't had problems. I'm running CO2 and ferts. I've heard that they like to float but this was a smaller plant so I had no trouble getting it deep enough to stay down.

Thanks for your input. I won't be running ferts or CO2 but one of my tanks is dirted. I also want to try some in my 450g with DIY LED lights, and only PFS for substrate. I was thinking I might try to dirt a terracotta pot and then cap it with PFS and grow it that way. Not sure if it will work but I bought 5 bulbs for $20 which is less than what one would cost if I bought it in a LFS or within Canada... So we'll see how it works!

Bow Valley Aquatics in SE Calgary will cut custom lids for you quite cheaply. He cut lids for my 180g and 90g. Warning: He'll usually only accept cash.

Seems like they're regarded as pretty easy from everything I read. I ordered some online. I hope they don't freeze!

I would say they are about equal, I placed a 2 x 4 between the 2 halves and they both picked it off the ground about and 1" away.

I'm surprised! Thanks for checking for me. I appreciate it. I think I'm going to pony up and get the Magnavore. It's expensive but they're supposed to be extremely, extremely conservatively suggested in terms of glass thickness. I should write them a letter saying to do some sort of test like you did, with their competition, to show how much better they are (if they are, at all? lol).

Does anyone have experience with either of these Crinums? in your experience, easy or hard? I'm looking to add a large showpiece plant or two in a couple tanks and these caught my fancy.

Pictures of progress made thus far.

http://imgur.com/a/uUBgC

and more recently

http://imgur.com/a/VQq2s

Do you find that there's a considerable difference between the MagFloat and the Great White? I would assume so since you're selling the MagFloat? haha

Both are BNIB, haven't really compared strength. Maybe I'll test them through a chunk of wood and let you know.

No worries if you weren't planning to use them right away. I might place an order tomorrow for something. I'm really tired of using those scrubbers with 2 foot long arms and tend to have my tank look like crap because I dread cleaning the glass. It's almost opaque right now in a lot of places haha.

If you'd like to come play with my hammerhead magnet and compare it to a magfloat you are more than welcome to swing by! I have a 7ft tank and half inch glass. This thing was worth every cent.

Thanks for your input. It seems the good magnet only require one pass over the algae to remove it. That's a generous offer but I'm south of Calgary and you're in the Edmonton-ish area. I literally never go up there haha

I prefer using the razor scraper wand for the odd time that glass needs cleaning, my mag floats are being used as cabinet door handles and one is sitting on my dresser as a dust collector. The water movement caused by the magnets was uprooting plants and to effectively clean, the magnets require multiple passes in the same area at different angles.

My 450g is not planted. I'm considering trying some Crinum Natans though once I sell my last cichlid. The other fish would uproot/shred anything they wanted to anyways so it won't really matter.

3/4" glass on my tank. Thanks for your offer but the Mag-Floats are junk, in my opinion. I have the next size down (rated p to 5/8" i think) and it came detached all the time on 1/2" glass. I was hoping someone had experience with one of the other brands out there, like Magnavore, or Algaefree. Those two seem to get mentioned the most. I'm leaning towards a Magnavore 6ER but they're quite pricey.

(I'm also finally making progress treating those Rainbowfish, Ron. Yay!)

I also have an Algae Free Great White. Yes, they are pricey.

Do you find that there's a considerable difference between the MagFloat and the Great White? I would assume so since you're selling the MagFloat? haha

a razor blade on a wand can work well

That does work well, but my tank is pretty big and it would take ages, plus the braces are 1'+ in size and reaching around them is a real pain in the arse.

3/4" glass on my tank. Thanks for your offer but the Mag-Floats are junk, in my opinion. I have the next size down (rated p to 5/8" i think) and it came detached all the time on 1/2" glass. I was hoping someone had experience with one of the other brands out there, like Magnavore, or Algaefree. Those two seem to get mentioned the most. I'm leaning towards a Magnavore 6ER but they're quite pricey.

(I'm also finally making progress treating those Rainbowfish, Ron. Yay!)

Does anyone here have thick glass, or acrylic tanks (say 1/2" and up) and recommend a particular algae magnet? I'm getting really tired of scrubbing with sponges and brushes.

Well, here is why I hopped on the bandwagon. I was running a total of 4 4 foot 2 lamp t5ho lamps and 5 36 inch 2 lamp t5ho 3 footers.

822 watts x10 hrs a day=8220 watts÷1000= 8.22 Kwh per day x 365 days x $.09/Kwh= $270 a year. Lamp replacements alone if done anually (which is half as often as suggested) at $25 per bulb is $450 a year. So it costs me approximately $720 a year.

It'll take me 2 years to get my investment back. I also have the ability to do sunrise, sunset, mid day sun, low light for pleco tanks and whatever else blows my hair back.

So I wouldn't call it jumping on the bandwagon, more like not missing the boat. Makes me think about my dad actually, still listening to records waiting for something with the same warmth of sound to finally make the change to. ;-)

This is exactly right. I'm not a planted guru by any means but I wouldn't hesitate to recommend LEDs to anyone. Even reefers. The technology is already at a point where the performance is = if not greater than most other traditional lighting methods, and is only going to get better, while being MUCH more efficient and far less hassle. The old lights of course are tried and true, but I don't miss seeing my power bill being 4 times higher, replacing the bulbs, or the heat they gave off!

I jumped to LEDs right away (probably too soon) mostly for the cost savings; and they didn't look very good, and certainly couldn't grow plants with the LEDs I started with (those cheapo Beamworks fixtures that were like 18W per 4'). I then built my own LED fixture for interest's sake, and to get dimming, sunrise, sunset, etc. 2 years ago. There was nothing on the market that could do this at that time for under $1000 on a large tank like mine. I also have a 7k Finnex Ray II on my 90g planted tank and it works wonderfully. It even looks nice, for those concerned about that. I also bought a couple of those LED floodlights on ebay to experiment with ($30 each for a 20W floodlight). They don't look bad at all and would certainly be great for accent lighting in a large tank, and could probably even be used as the main lighting as long as they are hung well above the tank to provide enough spread. They are VERY bright.

I decided to go the route of fibreglass cloth and quikcrete for stucco walls. Does anyone have an idea what I could use to seal this? It's about 1/2" thick now after several coats of Quickcrete.