New to the site, wanting to set up a 520g

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CatZelda

Aquarium Advice Newbie
Joined
May 20, 2017
Messages
5
Hello, all. I just joined the site in hopes of getting some advice on setting up our old 520g aquarium. It's just been sitting in our basement for years and I wanted to do something with it. My plan was to do a lightly to moderately planted tank (sword plants, anubias, maybe some java ferns) with a white substrate/gravel and some driftwood (and maybe some rocks). I would like to stock it with a fairly large school of cardinal tetras and maybe six discus.

My questions to this are:
How expensive is it usually to heat 520 gallons to an appropriate temperature for the above fish?
I read somewhere that discus require weekly water changes of at least 50%. If I keep the tank understocked (and I intend to as it would be much easier to maintain at this size), do I really have to do that much?

Note: I don't plan to put the discus in until I've had the tank running for at least a year.
 
For heating I consider the tank to be a room heater and thus neutral (this argument continues at home....).


For discus I've only looked at these but agree it will depend on stocking, plants, etc. But I do ~30% pwc weekly normally for 150gal and for grown discus will be looking at same.
 
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