LOW BUDGET VS HIGH BUDGETWILL IT MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE

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i think so far on the left side we are now at  240 euros for the glass and the light i think   on the right we are at 70 euros for the glass  and the light but it's not necessarily a big   price difference between these two substrates  so just to make sure that both tanks get an   equal amount of plants i just spent a few minutes  kind of dividing everything up into good portions welcome to a new video everybody hope you're  doing well super excited today we're going to get   started with the new twinscape experiment so far  we've done co2 versus no co2 and aquasoil vs dirt   so this will be the third experiment low budget  versus high budget and i'm really excited about   it so we're going to be setting up two tanks again  but one tank is going to have very cheap equipment   and one tank is going to have very expensive  equipment and these two empty tanks are the same   tanks that we've used with the previous experiment  and we're going to be using them again today and   they're actually perfect for this experiment  because there's a bit of a quality and a price   difference as well which we'll talk about in a  minute we're not going to use the lights though   these lights are the chihiros a2 series actually  really good light very affordable as well but   they're a bit of a mid-range so they're not  super expensive but not super cheap either   so we're gonna be using some different lights  today so to get started i'm gonna take both   tanks out of the shelf i'm gonna set up at  the table there's so much going on here with   all these bars and it's hard to work with so  i'm just going to take these two tanks out   move them to the table then we can get started so let's get straight into it let's talk about  these two tanks so these are the two tanks that   we've used for the previous experiments as well  but there's actually a bit of a quality difference   between the two so that's why they are actually  perfect for this experiment now you already might   see it the glass from this tank is a little bit  more blueish and i think the glass from this   tank is a little bit more greenish that's going  to be our low budget tank and this one's going   to be our high budget or our fancy tank so this  aquarium is a 36p that i bought from green aqua   i think it was two years ago or something so this  is the home brand green aqua optic white aquarium   i think this one cost me about 40 euros and this  one on the left this is from a brand called ILA   i think this one was 70 euros so this glass is a  little bit more clear it's a little bit thicker   as well i think this is maybe five millimeters and  this is four millimeter glass and yeah if we take   a closer look at the the edges and the silicone  work this tank is just a bit more high quality   so that's a good starting point for a low budget  versus high budget so cheap tank expensive tank so I've just installed the  light on the high budget tank   but the camera is not really  enjoying it excuse the flickering   this is the skylight aqi 40 i think? I will put  all the the names and the numbers on the screen   but i'm not really enjoying this flickering so i  think for the purpose of this video, just for the   making of i'm going to switch to a different light  that doesn't flicker because it's going to be   very annoying so during the setup we will use this  chihiros light just because it doesn't flicker and   then once we're done setting up these two tanks  we're gonna move them back to the shelf and then   we'll swap for the skylight so this is the light  that we're gonna be using for this experiment   this light is 170 euros so that's a very expensive  light especially for a 20 liter tank but it's   perfect for the experiment so let's now move on to  the budget tank so for the budget light i have the   twinstar 30b this light is 30 euros so we have 170  versus 30. so this is going to be very interesting   so the twinstar 30b is the same light that i've  used recently on the no filter guppy aquascape   which we have right here i've set this aquarium  up i think it was three weeks ago now and it's   doing really well so this is the exact same light  that we're gonna be using for our budget tank okay so that's the twinstar 30b installed that's  our budget light i quite like it i mean for a   30 euro light it's proper bright actually i'm  just gonna quickly turn on the skylight again   just to have them side by side and then we  can see the actual visual difference and the   the difference between the intensity perfect i've managed the skylight to stop  flickering it was only on 85% so now i switch it   to 100% intensity and it's not flickering anymore  so it's perfect so now we can have them both side   by side and yeah i think it's a bit hard to see  on camera but there's definitely a difference in   intensity the skylight is obviously a lot brighter  but i mean the difference is not that big but yeah   it's hard to see the intensity with the naked eye  i guess i think so far on the left side we are now   at 240 euros for the glass and the light i think  on the right we are at 70 euros for the glass   and the light of course that's a big difference  but there's also a difference in quality i mean   this light is very sturdy it looks nice i like  it this light is also nice but it's a little bit   yeah it's a little bit flimsy and everything you  know so of course there's a difference in quality   um yeah we have to find out if that makes a  big difference in the way they grow plants   that's the whole point of this experiment all  right then we're moving on to the substrate   this is actually going to be exactly  the same as the previous experiment   so in the high budget tank we're going to be  using aquasoil this is neo soil from aquario full   of nutrients i love this stuff i use it in all my  aquascapes and in the low budget tank we're going   to be using pond soil capped with gravel so this  is what i used in the previous experiment as well   but i've learned from my mistakes and this time  i'm going to do it properly and also both tanks   are going to get some root tabs these are the  master line root caps yeah i'm just going to use   this because i feel like with the pond soil it's  still missing a little bit of nutrients so just to   give it a bit more balance between the two  tanks we're going to give both tanks some   some root caps now there's not necessarily a big  price difference between these two substrates   at least not for this size aquarium  i mean these are very small tanks   and the soil you can buy in three liter bags i  think it costs like 15 euros something like that   and this bag the pond soil cost me 10 euros and  then i had to buy the extra gravel which was like   2,50. so all this together is basically the exact  same price of a three liter bag of aquasoil but of   course with the pond soil you only need a little  bit of it so this bag is going to last you a very   long time so the initial investment is pretty  much the same for this size aquarium but in the   long run of course this method is a lot cheaper  i'm just going to get started with the aqua soil so i always like to first add in just a small  layer on the bottom and if i'm using root tabs   this small layer will just help to kind of keep  those root tabs in place so i'm just going to add   a small layer then take a few of these root caps  i always like to just open them up and then just   sprinkle them all over the substrate so we just  open them up sprinkle them okay so five root caps okay so that's the aqua soil done so we have a  nice a thin layer in front a little bit thicker   in the back i think that was roughly  three liters maybe a little bit less   and yeah that's why i just while i like aquasoil  you know it's just so easy to work with you just   pour it in and you're ready to get started on  your hardscape and your plants and then we're   moving on to the budget tank so we're going to use  the pond soil and the gravel and this gravel is   basically like the cheapest stuff  i could find in my local pet shop   i'm not sure if this needs to be washed or  not aquarium gravel is ready to use okay   i'm just going to open a bag maybe check a  little bit if it needs to be washed or not okay this looks good just add a little bit of  water but the water is still crystal clear so   i think we can just pour it straight in of  course you want to start with the pond soil first okay i think that's good like i said i'm still  very much an amateur when it comes to these dirted   tanks so yeah i'm always wondering if you can use  too much of this stuff you know like with aquasoil   like you can't really use too much aquasoil  there's no such thing but with this i'm not   sure so just removed some of these big particles  just to make sure that we don't get any floating   debris basically so i think we can now cover  this with our gravel and then we're all good okay that's the substrate layer done i kind of  like that they look different like the budget   aquarium really has a budget feel to it with the  gravel honestly i'm really excited about this   this experiment i really want to see what kind of  results we can get with this budget setup i mean   i'm all for budget aquariums and i think it's  all just about finding the right combination   of products and i think even with yeah with the  setup that we have going on right here and the   things i'll show you later like we can still  get some really good results next up i'm gonna   wet the substrate and just make it very moist and  then we can start planting so i'm not going to   use any hardscape this time it's basically just  going to be like a little dutch style tank so   we're going to just use plants because that's the  main reason why we're doing this right just to see   what the difference is between the plant growth  and just how well we can grow plants in a   budget setup compared to a high tech setup  basically not high tech, high budget setup this is way too much of course but these are all  the plants that i recovered from the previous   experiment basically so we have like a bunch of  ludwigia repens we have a lot of the Micranthemum   umbrosum monte carlo marsilea rotala orange  juice bucephalandra weeping moss as well so   we're going to try to use as much as possible the  rest of i'll have to just give way to some people   and then i also have a few new plants so i  recently set up another tank so we have some   some beautiful hygrophila pinnatidifa we have  some more marsilea crenata and then we have some   a little bit of lileopsis as well so i like to  use this as well instead of throwing it away so   i don't really have a plan for these tanks  but i'm going to try to make a distinctive   foreground mid-ground and background i think  that's important especially in the dutch style   but yeah we only have 22 centimeters from the  back so there's not a whole lot of room to make   a foreground to mid ground in the background  but i'm going to try my best oh and i forgot   to have this one as well i recently bought a pot  of in vitro plants but i didn't use it so i had   this plant left over i bought it for a layout  but i didn't use it because it grows quite big   but i mean in this aquarium it is suitable so we  have this plant is called nesea pedicalata species   golden something like that very difficult name  but this is a beautiful beautiful plant so we're   definitely going to use it in here so i think i  need to make like a little planting map for these   two tanks otherwise it's just going to be messy  so let me just write some things down so just to   make sure that both tanks get an equal amount of  plants i just spent a few minutes kind of dividing   everything up into good portions so we have one  tray for the high budget tank and one tray for   the low budget tank so i think that's pretty  much equal my little planting map as well so   foreground mid-ground background yeah nobody will  be able to understand those scribbles besides me   so i think we're all ready for  planting so let's cue the time lapse all right so that's the planting completed i  think it looks really good i think we have a nice   colorful mix so i'll put all the plant names in  the video description but just to kind of go over   it quickly so in the foreground we have a carpet  of monte carlo and then on the sides we have some   marsilea hirsuta just behind the marsilea we  also have just a little touch of the lileopsis   and so it's going to mix in nicely all together  then behind the marsilea we have a little bit   of the hygrophila pinnatifida i've just  glued it onto this ceramic plant ring   just to hold it down and like in  a few days it will find its roots   into the substrate but it doesn't really have  any roots right now so it's really hard to   to plant it that's why i've glued it to the  ring just next to the hygrophila i've added   a little bit of um alternanthera reineckii mini  i just stole that from my red plants aquascape   and then the full middle is the in vitro plant  that i had left over the nesea pedicalata golden   then we have a little bit more of the reineckii  mini and all the way to the right i've planted one   blyxa japonica this is one of my favorite  plants i'm hoping that it will do well in here   behind the blyxa we have some the ludwigia  repens then in the middle of the background   we have the Micranthemum umbrosum and all the  way to the left we have the rotala orange juice   that's it basically so now we can move the tanks  back to the shelf fill them up with water and   then we can talk about the rest of the equipment  that we're going to be using for these two tanks okay so it's now the next day tanks are  filled up with water the water is pretty clear   and I've also already installed the  filters so the only thing left to do today   is to install the co2 system and after that we  can talk a little bit about how i'm going to   run these tanks in the next few weeks regarding  light schedules co2 schedule and fertilization   and then we can sit back relax and watch the  experiment unfold this aquarium gave me such   a headache yesterday i usually i don't really  have a lot of floaters when i when i use aquasoil   but yesterday the rotala and the ludwigia  just kept floating up was super annoying,   i was swearing so many times yesterday so now i  tied them to a rock just to keep them in place   and with the dirted tank with the gravel i didn't  have any floaters because the gravel is a lot   heavier of course yeah so far i'm enjoying the  gravel a lot more let's talk a little bit about   the filtration quickly so in the high budget  tank i'm using the same filter that i used   with the previous experiments this is the dennerle  scapers flow it's basically like a combination of   a hang on the back filter and an external filter  it's quite good this one costs about 70 80 euros   and it has a lot of space for media so it's really  good has this clear intake and outtake so it looks   very minimalistic as well and on the low budget  tank i'm just using a very simple internal filter   so yeah super simple um i think i need to replace  this one because these suction cups are not really   working anymore they keep getting loose um  yeah nothing wrong with the internal filter   i mean i think if there's one thing in  the planted tank hobby that's a little bit   people stress about too much  over its filtration i think   filtration is one thing that you can definitely  save money on so the only thing both tanks are   still missing is a co2 system now just because we  have a low budget tank that doesn't mean that we   cannot use a co2 system so i think a lot of my  viewers probably already know my diy co2 system   and yeah that's what we have right here this is my  famous diy co2 system so it's very simple i'm just   going to give you a quick explanation so a lot  of times with these diy co2 systems you will hear   people say it's very unstable and it only  lasts for maybe two three weeks or something   like that this system however is very stable  and it will last you six seven weeks easily so   it's very simple we just have a one and a half  liter bottle in here we have a mixture of sugar   and gelatin we basically boil some water with  sugar then to that we add gelatin and that mixture   sits at the bottom of the bottle then to that  we add some more water with yeast so the yeast   is then consuming the sugar and in that process it  produces co2 so it's a very simple process and it   actually produces a lot of co2 now because we've  added gelatine the sugar is basically turned into   a jelly and that makes it a little bit harder for  the yeast to consume the sugar so that's why the   process is basically prolonged so that's why these  bottles can easily last six seven weeks so we have   one and a half liter bottle i've drilled a small  hole into the cap then we have the airline hose   going into the cap and we've sealed the the cap  with some glue some silicone glue or just super   glue just make sure it's completely airtight  that's very important if it's not airtight   it will not build any pressure if we try to  squeeze this bottle it's very hard to squeeze   it so we have a good pressure in here i prepared  this one two days ago and we already have co2   bubbles coming out of the co2 diffuser so there's  a whole video about this co2 system on my channel   and of course i will leave it on top of the screen  in the video description so definitely check that   out if you have a low budget and you want to use  a co2 system i've been using these co2 systems   for a very long time before when i just started  the hobby and i still use them to this day so   they work very well for me and yeah this will be  the co2 system for the low budget tank basically and then for our high budget tank we of course  will use a proper co2 system so i have a   pressurized co2 cylinder and a co2 regulator this  is the strideways regulator looks like a really   good piece of kit this will be the first time i'm  using it so the main advantages for this over the   diy system is that with this you can exactly  control how much co2 you want it has a magnetic   valve so we can shut the co2 off at night and of  course this will last a lot longer than the diy   c2 system it is more expensive of course i think  the regulator itself is about 100 110 euros, the   CO2 cylinder this one is two kilograms is about 80  euros so we're just going to quickly set this up   so inside the regulator there's already  like a i think it's teflon a teflon ring   so we need to make sure that is in and then we  can just attach it to the co2 cylinder so we   just screw the regulator onto the co2 cylinder  basically just until we can no longer twist it   and then in the box we have this small wrench  you can just tighten it a little bit it doesn't   have to be super tight so you don't have to  use all your force to just tighten it so just that's enough and then we can attach the  bubble counter to make sure it's upright   attach our bubble counter so let me fill the bubble counter with some  water i saw at green aqua they use this special   bubble counter liquid i think i need to buy it as  well, the water always evaporates after some time   so you can never really see how many bubbles  per second you're actually injecting so i'm   not sure what that bubble counter solution is i  think it's like glycerin or something like that   yeah for now we'll just use water so  we'll close the bubble counter again and then we can attach our co2 hose which  i have already prepared so i just have   about one meter worth of clear silicon tubing  and then at the end i have a little check valve   and just after the check valve we will add the  co2 diffuser so i think there's already a check   valve in the regulator itself in here but i also  like to add another check valve just very close to   the diffuser because what happens when we shut the  co2 off the water will start flowing back into the   diffuser into the system basically so if we don't  have this check valve the water will go all the   way back all the way back to the regulator  i'm not sure if that can cause any issues   but the thing is that when then in the  morning your co2 system turns on again   and it first has to push out all the water back  through the diffuser which takes a lot of time   and a lot of pressure as well so all this  pressure is going to build up into your co2 hose   and yeah that's just not what  you want so you want to add a   check valve just very close to the diffuser  and then we just add the silicone tubing to our   bubble counter twist the cap back on  and then we're basically good to go   so this regulator already has a magnetic  valve and this one is with a usb cord   which is nice so we can just plug this  into a smart socket or an analog timer   and just put the co2 system on a timer so what  i always have is for small tanks like this i'll   have the co2 system come on one hour before the  lights come on and it will switch off one hour   before the lights go off as well so that's it  basically so it's a little bit more expensive   quite a bit more expensive actually but it's  just nice to be able to switch everything off   regulate it properly so you know for sure  that you're not going to kill your fish with   too much co2 or whatever so this is a bit of an  investment of course but like a proper regulator   will last you like a really really long time like  10 years plus easily and of course you need to get   this co2 bottle refilled but yeah those are just  small costs that just come with the hobby you know   so yeah that's our co2 system prepared let's hook  it up to the tank and then we're basically done okay so here below the shelf we have both co2  systems this is the diy co2 system and this   is the the one for the high budget tank so i've  already plugged the magnetic valve into a timer   so the only thing we need to do now is open the  fine needle valve here we go so we'll set it to   like one bubble per second it's about one bubble  per second co2 diffuser is in this it will take   a few minutes before the co2 starts coming  out here this one is already up and running   so we're all good so i'm really curious to see  how both things will develop in the next few weeks   curious to see if the high budget tank is going  to develop much better much faster and we'll see   so i think the two things that are going to have  the biggest impact on this experiment is the light   and the substrate so the light from this tank  is a lot more powerful but of course it's   actually too powerful so i have to dim it down  so probably reduce it to about 70 percent or so   and i think for now i'll keep both lights on for  eight hours that's what i usually have with all   my tanks but i think once the low budget tank  is a bit more stable i might increase the time   to about 10 hours or maybe even 12 hours and see  with the longer photo period we might be able to   catch up with the intensity from the high budget  tank now before we end the video we of course have   to take a look at the total costs so for the  high budget tank the tank itself was 72 euros   the light the skylight aqi 40 is 170 euros  the strideways pro co2 regulator is 110 euros   the co2 bottle i'm going for a 500 gram bottle is  42.50 the filter the dennerle scapers flow is 73   euros and the substrate the aquario neo soil is 17  euros which comes down to a total of 484 euros and   50 cents and then for our low budget tank so the  green aqua optic white 36p is 46 euros the twin   star b-line led light is 30 euros for the diy co2  system i just wrote down five euros the filter is   14 euros the gravel is 2,50 and the pond soil  is 10 euros which comes down to a total of 107   euros and 50 cents so almost 400 euros difference  between the two tanks of course there's always   ways to make the low budget tank even cheaper  and the high budget tank even more expensive but   i think we have a cool setup going on right now so  guys let me know in the comments what do you think   is going to happen with this experiment what  are your predictions and don't forget to smash   that like button really hope you enjoyed this  and if you're not subscribed to the channel yet   hit the subscribe button i want to thank you guys  for watching and i'll see you next time take care you

2022-02-06

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