South America Project Update

Some good progress happening now. 

Oh, this is the project I was talking about before so it's a 4 x 2 x 2 foot aquarium.  The main viewing tank holds 395 l and the sump adds approx. 100 l to the system when operational (approx. 30 l filter section, 60 l refugium, and 10 l return).  Plumbing and flood tests have been extensively done and it's all greased up and ready.  You can see my DIY rainbar to the top right on the tank pic.

Deciding on the fish took a while but I'm going with:
17 lemon tetra
17 green fire tetra
17 super blue emperor tetra
9 apistogramma agassizii
1 l397 pleco (if I can get hold of one)
1 l204 flash pleco

AqAdvisor puts that at 88% stock and here puts it at 34%.  I'll wait to see how it looks when the fish are in there.  If I can add more I'll increase the shoals.

Hopefully my plants will arrive on time by Wednesday at the latest.  Regularly spraying to keep things wet at the moment.  The plants will be:
Bacopa Australis (10 - 30cm middle stem plant)
Heteranthera zosterifolia (30 - 50 cm background stem plant)
Alternanthera reineckii Mini  (5 - 10 cm foreground  stem plant)
Littorella uniflora (3 - 5 cm carpet stolon plant)
Echinodorus quadricostatus (15 - 20 cm middle rosulate plant)
Vesicularia ferriei (3-5 cm long moss for wood)
Potamogeton gayi (10 -30 cm background stem plant)
Echinodorus fancy twist (30 - 50 cm background rosulate)
Echinodorus grisebachii (5 - 10 cm foreground rosulate)

Under 2 - 3 mm black sand I've got tetra complete substrate.  Normally I'd go tropica but it'd cost too much for this size aquarium.  Hopefully the tetra will turn out well.  The plants will be under a 4ft Fluval Fresh & Plant 2.0 light which has great PAR ratings.  I'll be using a pressurised CO2 system which is next on my to do list to setup.   For additional fertilisers I'll be mixing my own micro and macro solutions.

I had to google green fire tetra. Lovely looking fish.
The emperors - do you mean Inpaichthys kerri?


I agree, it is going to look amazing 

They are gorgeous. I've only ever seen the standard kerri emperors in the flesh but those super blues look stunning.

Plants all arrived today.  Happily planted them all where I wanted them.  Manually filled the display some so as not to disturb the substrate.  Filled the sump to fill the tank.  All going great with the display tank half full and then a ninja iceberg struck. 

The polystyrene I was using to keep the mound shape in the corner decided that it wanted to go travelling.  Tipped over the hardscape, knocked over the rock, gave me the petro-chemical equivalent of the V's and off it went.  Cue me wildly trying to send the polystyrene back but I may as well have been herding cats.  Threw it out. 

Looked around for quick fix alternatives and came across a large lava rock so put it in the corner and furiously tried to make a hill around it with the black sand.  So much for undisturbed substrate.  And to add to the mayhem the previously planted vegetation decided to celebrate the freedom of the polystyrene by holding an impromptu pool party. 

Repositioning the wood was like playing Jenga after downing a bottle of vodka in deep fog.  Some how I overcame the problem of needing to grow a third arm and hand to hold down the wood, and to pick up and position the large piece of dragon stone.  Then it was blind replanting.

Finished filling the tank, walked away and came back an hour later.  The *%$"%££% hardscape on the left was better placed than when I planned it.   http://www.hodderscape.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/chaos-theory.gif

Here's some photo's of the mess:

Love your wood... errr... that sounds terrible. I'm a big admirer of your driftwood!

@marquismirage Oh, been there, done that and glad it's not just me. Also I love the descriptions
Have you checked, can the CO2 reg be fitted in reverse? It would almost certainly not allow flow if it were. If it is dead and you can't get it replaced have a go at a DIY yeast in the interim, you will probably find you have all the bits you need already. It isn't as good as pressurised but it can be controlled if you need and with multiple fermentation bottles can produce a good flow of CO2. The sump will fight against you getting the CO2 levels up as they can tend to produce a lot of aeration, however I saw a lot of submerged media in your earlier pictures but it didn't look like any wet/dry so you may get away with it.
Best of luck and keep up with the entertaining posts

Very exciting. 
I'm looking forward to seeing lots of pictures when you get the fish.

They are beautiful fish with lovely markings. 

Those agassizii tefe are absolutely beautiful. I'm a big dwarf cichlid fan, I currently keep rams as I have a 64 litre but that will change when I eventually get round to upgrading my tank.

Ill be interested to find out how the multiple pairs get on in your tank.

Looking forward to your tank pics