Pecktec: All right. Trying not to hit anybody. Hey, YouTube. This is Pecktec and I'm here at the Chicago Aquatic Experience with Josh from CustomAquariums.com.
Josh: CustomAquariums.com is a factory direct aquarium manufacturing company. What we have here is our 300 gallon, 8 feet long, 30 inch tall, 24 deep aquarium. The standing canopy is solid oak construction. We don't use any press board, no fiber board. It's all very sturdy. Everything, we have furniture grade cabinet shaft. As you can see, lots of room.
Down underneath, we have our patented-pending seamless sump filtration system, completely modular, can be hooked up any which way you want, top to bottom, left to right, front to back. L-shaped, on the roof, however you want to do it.
If you take a look here, the way the filtration works, we have options suck tubs, baffle tubs for all your media, and then you have reservoir tubs that can be drilled for evaporation. You can have reservoir tops for refugiums, quarantine tanks, breeding tanks, however you want to set it up. What we wanted to do is come up with a elegant design that was cost efficient and works well with any setup.
What we do is we have a rotomold out of high-density polyethylene, which is the same material that is used in the plastic gas cans and ocean buoys. The reason we chose that is because the HDPE material is non-porous. What that means is you won't have a chemical breakdown seeping into the material, cracking it, drying it up, turning it colors. It is UV resistant, algae and bacteria also will not stick to it so cleanup is very easy, very quick, very effortless. How it works is this model here is our quadruple sock tub. What that means is you can have a sock for every overflow in your tank. Each one of our socks with this tub will handle 1,200 gallons an hour. This tub will do 4,800 gallons an hour for those of you that want a big SPS saltwater system, or if you have a heavily stocked freshwater African cichlid tank, this is a great option.
What this also allows you to do is run a protein skimmer for those of you running marine tanks, either internal or plumbed for external. After the filtration goes through the socks, it comes down into our baffle tub which has your choice, five or six media baskets, depending on if you want wet filtration or a wet/dry system. The baffle molded in, again, nothing sticks to that material.
We cannot silicone baffles in. The silicone will literally drip down the side. We mold the baffles in, and that helps catch micro bubbles so they're not coming back into your tank as well as any deteriorates that your filter sock may have missed. The floating deteriorates will not go down through and the sinking deteriorates will not rise back up.
From there, you have your choice of keeping it simple for a smaller setup. You can put your pumps in, we have cored grommets to help reduce evaporation or if you have a bigger system, we have pilot marks already marked out. You can drill them high to connect to a reservoir tub for extra water volume. You can drill it low to connect to a water tub if you want an evaporation chamber.
Pecktec: It looks like there's pretty much limitless options.
Josh: It really is. You can plumb them back-to-back. If you have a big square tank like this, you can plumb them back-to-back just to save room, you can put them in an L-shape. It really is limitless. You can do it a mile long just for added water volume if you wanted to. Pecktec: Wow. All right. What else you got here?
Josh: What we have here, this is our patent-pending H2Overflow. Why we designed it this way is so that we wanted a minimum footprint with maximum surface skimming area. As you can see, this does not take up a lot of space in your tank. No holes drilled in the bottom, no big bulky overflow walls. You literally have a hole in the least stressful spot in the tank towards the top with 17.5 inches of surface skimming area. Your fish still have plenty of swimming room.
After that, we have our patent-pending Siphon Stopper System. What this does is it allows water to come through the channels on the top. If you're ever away on vacation and your power goes out, what this will do is as the water just barely breaks below this, air will come in and break that siphon. You won't be coming home to an empty tank and a full floor.
Last but the not least, new for this year in our product line, we have a marine-grade all aluminum anodized frame which, as far as I know right now, nobody offers in the industry, significantly stronger than the traditional plastic frame. What we've come to realize, the brace on the frame, the cross-brace, is typically the weakest point. Chemicals get in there break down the plastics, they can get dry, brittle, and crack, so we went with the all aluminum.
For this year, we are featuring a removable brace system. As long as the tank is empty, you can take the brace off, you can fit a large piece of decor in there, put the brace back on, and then fill it up. It's a great way to get those big-ticket awesome art items into your living art piece.
Pecktec: That's really smart.
Josh: Yes, it is. It is a great idea. Our glass is all raw material when we start. We do not stock any of the tanks pre-built. What we do is we start with raw sheets of glass, we score, them, we break them, and then we send them through a 12-spindle bevel machine that does polishing on all edges, so you will never have any waves or hairline fractures as you can see here. We use a proprietary 500 PSI silicone. We have the capabilities of making tanks up to 2,400 gallons anywhere from 12 feet long, down to a little 30 gallon tank, if you would like. Custom dimensions to standard dimensions, we do corner pentagons, we do octagon tanks. If you come over here, you can see we have rimless options, without the canopies, the center overflows. It's really just a fully customizable company for whatever your needs may be. We are located in Northeastern Wisconsin, Neenah, right here in the Midwest.
Currently, right now, we ship within the United States, including Alaska and Hawaii. We have not secured international shipping just because of possible damaging of the crates that the freights are very large. We do offer free shipping on all aquarium orders that are over $2,000 to the curb in front of your house.
Depending on the size of the aquarium, we have a lot of freight companies that have a hard time shipping. For a option, we can hand-deliver, we can install, we can get everything set up and running and then you are able, at that point, to fill with whatever your heart's desire. Pecktec: Thank you very much for talking to me today.
Josh: Absolutely.
