Advice for a newbie please

Hi all,
After some advice please.
My set up is Rena 450 with Fluval FX5 and FX6 filter's. 2x Av4 air pump 2x 300w heaters. 1" black sand,terracotta pipes with slate boards on top and large pieces of bogwood.
Ten days ago I purchased a second hand Rena which came with a Fluval FX5,I then purchased the FX6 new with all other items and set it all up. The FX5 media was in good shape so I rinsed it all and put it back in and then added Fluval biological enhancer and followed the three day course as instructed.
The pleco's that I'm after for this tank is a Mega clown,King tiger,Blue phantom and a gold nugget 177.
Could anyone advise me if they would be suitable with each other as there is plenty of hiding places and also would these be ok in the tank with the new water.
The water where we live is ph 8 and my heat is set for 27.
Any advice would be appreciated

Can't offer advice as to if the three are suitable with each other but I can say a bit about the pH.

I recently moved and my town water out of the tap is pH 8. I can tell you the pleco's wont like it that high.

What I have done is initially I got big storage tank and filled it with the town water. I added a big golf ball airstone as adding oxygen seems to filter out the chlorine after a day or two and the pH does seem to drop a little after a few days.

I threw a bag of peat in there. Not sure if it was enough to do much good but makes me feel like I am doing something.

I got a little eheim low wattage canister 2213 and lengthened the hoses to reach down into the bottom of the storage tank.

I don't what your equivalent for water softener would be where you are but in Australia I got a bag of macropore gold and put it in the canister. It deals with some of the nasties fish don't like in town water and makes it just that little bit safer.

By now the pH is down to about 7.4 which is just about tolerable for the fish. Once you add it to the fish tank in a water change and it gets in around the driftwood and indian almond leaves etc it will drop that pH a bit more.

So its not such a shock when add that higher pH water, I buffer it with a bit of pH down. It won't stay down and will rise a little later on but its ok for the fish when you first add it in and time in the tank will combat that rise with the driftwood.

Now I have myself a little rain water tank and I mix half rainwater in my storage and half town water. I don't need to add any buffer any more at all.

You could also use reverse osmosis water to dilute the town water but I had 17 fish tanks so it would have been running non stop to make enough RO water for all of those.

Can't advise.. experience with the plecs you mentioned, Zero,
When is someone going to make a compatibility graph for L#'s ?
Would be an invaluable tool

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/fwsubwebindex/loriccompfaqs.htm

Mooo said:

Can't advise.. experience with the plecs you mentioned, Zero,
When is someone going to make a compatibility graph for L#'s ?
Would be an invaluable tool

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/fwsubwebindex/loriccompfaqs.htm

Click to expand...

That would be very useful if some one did.

I have kept or bred all of them but never in the same tank. In term of size, L177 will be the largest follows by L128, then L66, with L340 being the smallest. Offering caves in various sizes for different species is important. As for water parameters, they all tolerate a wide range of water parameters. Assuming your tank is large enough, I don't see any issue keeping them together.

Hi Thank you for your reply,
The tank is 150cm x 50 x60 cm it holds 450 litres. I'm hoping that it's going to be suitable for them,but if I have to go bigger for them I will.
I've attached some pics,I think I need to get some more plants on bogwood for them so I will get them over the weekend.