So I'm going to do a series of reviews on this tank to see if my opinions will change over time. I'm setting it up with CBS in mind which can be found in this thread:

http://www.shrimpkeepersforum.com/forum/showthread.php/5996-Serious-CBS-tank

The tank:

The specs:

Price: Roughly $180 to $210 full retail.

Review 1: After Set-up (one week running)

General Overview:

I like this tank. I love the design, the size and the fact that there seems to be a bit of thought put into the design of the tank, filter system and lights. Its not perfect by any means, but for the price I think you get a good, practical shrimp tank. If I was planning on doing an aquascape however, I would go with a better quality tank for the aesthetics. Overall I give this tank four out of five stars.

Whats good:

I really like the design of the tank. Its likely a blatant copy of the Fluval edge concept, but without the awkward enclosed top, I think its a more practical take on this concept. At 40L capacity the tank is ideal for shrimp. Not too small as to have trouble with rapid temp fluctuations, but small enough to fit on a benchtop, which is where I placed mine.

The lid is easily removed from the tank via two large semicircular holes at the front. No gaudy handles! However, this does leave an opening for your shrimp or snails to climb out, (there are also large 5-10mm gaps between the lid and the sides of the tank), but this doesn't phase me, and I may remove the lid permanently anyway depending on whether some evaporation is needed to cool the tank slightly. The black strip over the filter is a nice touch, but as its only paint, it may chip easily, especially on a lid which is going to be moved on and off the tank constantly. I've already noticed one chip in the paint which stands out as a white patch in the black when the LED lights are on. Hopefully I can repair the chip with some paint or nail polish.

The tank comes with two LED lights to a total (stated on box) 9watts and are 12V, so nice and safe around water. These have their own switch and the plug is separate from the electrical plug of the pump for the filter system. They seem bright enough to grow low and medium light plants which is what I plan to have, but time will tell.

LEDs on with camera flash off.

I really like that this tank has black silicon. It blends nicely into the background of the tank and is not at all gaudy like some silicon can be (except where excess silicon was used, see below).

The filtration system for the tank is in-built, so you do lose some space. However as a shrimp tank, this does not phase me. If I was going to create an aquascape in this tank, I would remove the filter. The filter works through a series of sections similar to a sump. The first is a mechanical filter pad combined with carbon pellets (which I removed for the shrimp). There is also another pad containing beads which i assume are for biological filtration.

I like the way this pad sits too. It sits flush against the overflow holes of the tank meaning there should be little chance of shrimp disappearing into the filter. The only drawback with this is that the pad is quite fine so can block up easily. Whilst setting up I disturbed the soil a little bit and the filter was blocked the next day, with the water level in the filter section noticeably lower than in the rest of the tank. Luckily a quick squirt with the hose cleans it up quickly. I will keep an eye on how long before it blocks up under normal conditions.

The next section is a section for a heater (I think this is a nice touch, room to hide the heater in the filter).

Then there is a coarse sponge, guessing biological filtration primarily.

Finally the pump section. (Pump not in place).

There is a lot of extra room in the filter sections to add extra media, which I will do. I would have liked to have seen some more media sold with the tank but the amount supplied is probably adequate in the vast majority of cases, and I do like to over-filter.

The setup of tank is fairly easy. I found it fairly intuitive and didn't refer to the instructions except to double check at what height the pump needed to be set. The instructions were in proper english (not poorly translated 'chinglish'). As this tank system is aimed towards the new hobbyist, a maintenance schedule is also included in the instructions, which is IMO a nice touch.

Whats Bad:

There are a few little things that bug me about this tank.

Firstly the light spill from the LEDs. Looking directly at the tank means looking directly into the side of the LEDS (see above pic). Probably an easy fix with a bit of black tape or plastic stripping glued in place, but that would probably reduce the spread of the light from the LEDs and look wrong.

Secondly the construction of the tank is poor. Whilst I can only speak from this one tank, the tank I got has misaligned glass panes and lots of excess silicon. Yes this is a cheapish tank at approx $180 retail, and so the minimalist silicon such as in ADA tanks cannot be expected, but you should expect at least nice clean joints.

Excess silicon

Note the curved edges on the silicon

Yes this glob is on the bottom of the tank where the soil will go, but for anyone wanting a bare bottomed tank, this would really frustrate. The pic below actually makes its look far better than it does in person.

Misaligned panes

Yes some of these problems can be fixed in a few minutes with a sharp razor blade, but realigning the panes would require cutting the tank apart and voided warranty. In my opinion, at this size, the misalignment of the glass panes is not serious enough to cause failure, and the tank has not dripped a drop since being set up, and can't be seen by the casual observer, but it just annoys me because I know it is there.

The positioning of some of the stickers annoyed me. There is a min. water level sticker on the front top right which I immediately moved to the side of the tank because it stood out too much. Worse was the big silver sticker on the front of the filter section, like sparkling jewellery in a jewellers window. Less is more and this sticker distracts from the shrimp.

Why this wasn't put on the back, I dont know, but thats where I moved it. Also notice, the stickers don't appear in the pic of the tank on the side of the box (the very first pic of this thread), so even the marketing department at aquamanta realises how gaudy these stickers are.

Before:

After:

The pump. I'm not sure it does 200LPH as claimed, however I might be biased as I'm more used to >1500LPH flow in my larger tanks. Perhaps its due in part to the way the pump is set up, with two 90* bends.

If I was going to have this tank for plants or fish, I would replace the pump to something with a bit more flow, but for the shrimp I think it will provide adequate circulation. My only concern is whether the pump will heat the water, in which case I'll modify the tank to use an air uplift to move water through the filter. At 3.5W heat output from the pump should be minimal, but fingers crossed. I may swap to air driven uplift anyway as I like to tinker.

Nice little tank, was it expensive?

MTS is brutal.

Great, love these reviews, I have a fluval edge and agree with your comments on accessibility. Not sure on whether there diff quality/grades of glass, but the fluval seems to scratch really easy.

Normally about $180 retail, except I got it on store credit. So for me, cheap.

Very nice review dude, I have the Fluval Edge & it's almost exactly the same filtration setup, just the tank isn't as wide & my black cherries are going crazy in there. Well done dude, can't wait for further updates. :encouragement:

Updated

Great review and nice little tank. When I had a built in filter like yours I eventually replaced the filter media included with the tank with a sponge , noodles and some filter wool to polish the water better.

Yes I will be retrofitting the filter I think. Very seriously considering changing to an air driven uplift as a first step, but I'll wait and see how it settles in.

I just added a good sponge filter as well as changing the filter media plus as the tank only held 30 litres i always did weekly water changes so the tanks WP' s remained fairly stable. I must admit though I couldn't stop the shrimp getting into the filter area despite trying all sorts of material as a filter guard so in the end I removed the integrated filter which also then gave the shrimp extra room.