Ultimate Fish Room designs/locations
 

Long story short, we are thinking of purchasing a new home. If this happens I want to create a masterpiece fish room.

What I know so far is that I'll upgrade my tank from 100 gallons to probably twice or triple that size. In addition it will be an inwall design.

Basically what I'm requesting opinions on is:
1. What is your idea of a perfect fish room? Please include any details/pictures/wish list equipment.

2. If this house is purchased, there is an opportunity to have the tank on the main floor utilizing the "formal dining room". Obviously I would have the builder enclose this space with moisture resistant drywall. There is a window for ventilation and I would ask the builder to reinforce the floor. My question is should I consider this as an option? My preference is to have the tank/fish room in the basement for floor strength, heat issues, etc. however there wouldn't be any plans of finishing the basement anytime soon. My family loves my tank and I would like to display it accordingly; but they hate the occasional smells from feeding time, skimmate, etc. I would also be able to utilize the basement floor drain if it was located in the basement; not to mention I wouldn't be constantly worried about water spillage on hardwood. Suggestions?

I would suggest that the you go the living room option so that you can observe you tank all the time.
If possible, arrange so that your sump with skimmer, pumps, ro/di, refugium and other equipment is below the tank in the basement. That way you do not hear noisy pumps and all of the maintenance equipment is handy below as well.
Have the electrician wire extra heavy duty plugs in the area and the plumber plumb water and maybe a sink so your maintenance area is nice and organized. Use stainless steel nails in the area as well. Good Luck

Other than just the space that my basement fishroom provides, what I'm really happy with is the utility sink.

Like Naesco suggests, consider the tank on the main floor with basement sump. For a center build like this walk around (plus lots of other nice displays in the Waterpix forum). Still can do a in-wall upstairs against a closet for access or backing into another room (Dez's) and still have basement sump. What I did was a room divider type (picture in my signature).

im a noobie so my advice kinda sucks probably
my whole outlook on these fishies is.... put the damn thing right infront of everyone

im spending more than too much money on building/maintaining a tank and i dont understand why people put them in their basements. Mine is going to be in the main living area of the home where someone is all the time because its relaxing and beutiful. its not just a tank, its a work of art.

flaunt what you got! you ever see women getting "inner nostril job" no! they get boob jobs so everyone can see it and appreciate them. put it in your living room.

It would take 2 or 3 pages to address this fully.

So you can wall off the formal dining room to put a tank in-wall???.

Most important in my view;

Floor drain
Utility Tub
Water in and out
Additional Electrical (GFI)
Ventilation to outside

I would recommend basement sump (heat, mess, smell, aesthetics)

I will add more as time opens up.

An early congrats on the new house.
Kevin

I've had and ran a fish tank from a fish room in the basement, I would not do it again.
It can be done and done right, but one word WATER. It'll be on your main floor one day, no matter how good you are or your set up. Also lots more plumbing and pumps.

I did large scale 320 gallon display tank and yes it be easier on a smaller scale, but.... water.

I would have to disagree on this one. My basement is finished but no one really spends any time down there. I have my tank on the main floor pretty much viewable from everywhere on the main floor except the laundry room and washroom. It's even viewable from the front yard and back yard. There is no way I could have made maintenance and water changes/frags etc this simple without the basement fish room. I only have about a 4 foot by 10 foot room as my fish room but it makes everything easier. 7 minute water changes (about 40 gallons). Large sump - easy access to everything. There is no floor drain but the sump pump is in there so anything spilled of large volumes would get pumped outside. Temperature fluctuation is not much of an issue because the basement is cool. I have one pump that pretty much runs everything (skimmer, frag tank, water change tank, another 20 gallon tank, main tank and the valve is still closed off slightly). Noise of equipment is not an issue if it's in a closed basement room.

I wouldn't change anything about my set up except the fact that I should have custom ordered my tank instead of using an old used tank with scratches in it.

Hope this helps, you can check out my tank build (Mark had a link to it earlier in this thread) for all the details of the setup).

I'm with Dez on this one too. Pretty much all the same reasons.

I never said it's not a viable way of doing it and can work great for you. I stated I would not do it again. The OP asked about a master piece fish room, mine would not be on a separate floor...

Curious Dez how long have you had your multi floor set up?

Edit: Dez checked out your tank thread, nice work looks great!

Thanks to all who have replied so far.

Kevin-It's too early for congratulations as we are just starting to look around at builders, find the model we like, approach the bank, etc. You have nailed it as to what is required in that room. The utility sink is a must for me.

We are a family that uses the basement quite often in our current house (because it is developed). Eventually I would want to develop the new basement anyways; maybe putting everything in the basement would kickstart me into finishing it earlier than planned. At this point my internal common sense is telling me to lean towards everything in the basement.

Please keep any suggestions coming.

Update:

A new house it is!

I've got some very early discussions going with Kevin at Red Coral about designs for the new tank (possibly an 8' with a divider in the middle for two different views of the ocean-corals/reef safe fish and the other side for non reef safe fish and inverts) or 1 full 8' so that I can explore (guilt free) the Tang world.

I'm stoked to say the least; so many options.

I'll definetly start a tank build thread on this one; as I didn't do it on my current 100 gallon.

fish room
 

if you are worried about the hardwood in the dining room-use a tile floor that looks like hardwood-i am almost completed my fishroom in the basement and am using black granite as a border,then white/grey marble,with a black/brown marble in the center-this way if there are any spills i don't have to worry about the floor

I have decided to put this tank in the basement as an inwall and it's own dedicated fish room.

We have decided that the basement will be finished; therefore I made the decision that a basement application will work for me. I have it in my head that temperature issues will be less than on main floor applications (which may or may not be the case- but my brain has made the choice).

That was going to be one of my thoughts for you. I have mine in the basement mostly for that reason. Our basement is also developed so it only made sense. In our other house I had to run a chiller with the tank on the main floor and when we moved here it is now not required and I run 400w MH's and so on. And yes a sink is a must :mrgreen:

Well we are in the midst of building our fish room with inwall tanks(total 1000g+) and a small games room under our sundeck. This will be in an area where we go in and out quite frequently to the back yard and to sit in complete solitude. It is so cold under the deck even with the sun beating down on the deck, tank temp never gets above 78F. I couldn't see putting 450g+ on the main floor, plumbing it all to the basment in the fish room(60' away). Heat is such a big factor, insulation, humidity and so on. It would be so nice to have it on display in the living room, but prying eyes and not such a good neighbour hood has made me put it down stairs. Plus in the event of a mishap, all the water will be contained to the fishroom. A well planed setup is well worth the planning. So much time and money invested in this hobby, any and all contingencies plans must be delt with before hand. This has been 2 years in the making for us and it will not be finished till everything is perfect. The only advise i can give is, be patient, do research and make sure if you want to ever upgrade, make sure you don't have to change to much to make the upgrade work.

Update:
So I've just signed off on the house plans which gives me a large fish room in the basement complete with a window for ventilation, moving one of the teleposts so that an 8 foot tank can fit (yeehaw), utility sink with hot and cold water and a dedicated floor drain. I'll run all the GFCI wiring myself. So it appears that I've got a good headstart on my ultimate fish room.

It sure helps to have been in this hobby for almost 4 years (learning what I could have done differently, etc.); however it's been great to draw on everyone elses' experience on this site. Kudos to Canreef!

fish room
 

use hardy board instead of aqua board-better for moisture-you could also tile onto the hardy board with just a taping joint