falling through my floor?
 

i am just setting up a 90gall tank and i am scared that it is going to fall through my floor. any input. i live on the 2nd floor of an old apartment and was told that the floors were made of cement. i have heard scary stories of tanks falling through what do you think my chances are?

It's funny - I've been freaking out about this since we set up our angelfish breeding rack. I've got wooden floors and there's a "sub" basement under - if you look at 4x15g, 44g and a 20g tank with my not so small self, a large king sized bed, etc - So far we're not dead... althogh one day I expect to come home and find everything sunken in ;)

I don't like to think about those scary stories... they're too scary! ;)

It would only weight about 900lbs i very seriously doubt it could go through you floor.

i am starting to feel a little better still scared though. (i always panic).:frown:

If you do have a concrete floor the compresive strength (if it passed) would be a minimum of about 3000psi. The Tensile Strength is about 8%-12% of that. The shear strength of concrete is about 5% of the compressive strength. The correlation between compressive strength and flexural, tensile, torsional, and shear strength varies with concrete ingredients and environment. So basically concrete floors should handel pretty much any tank any of us would be putting on it. In any event please consult a Structual Engineer and refer to the structual plans and the test results before doing anything that would be more than the general use for that building. I will not and can not be held accountable for any damage that happens to any structure that anyone who reads this or hears about this information may cause.

so then.... its good if it is concrete, and if it isnt. will i find out the hard way?

trix must be an engineer cuse i didnt understand a damn word he was saying other then concrete = more then goood enough....... the tank alone with out live rock and sand will weigh in at 900 lbs figure in minimum 90lbs lr 90lbs ls + water + fish + corals ( i know the last 2 dont weigh much but it will still add up even if it is only a few ounces) + stand + sump + fudge material (few more pounds of sand and lr) your are going to be looking @ roughly 1200lbs give or take a few factors..... on a concrete floor that should be nothing.... if it is a wood floor i would sudgest puting it on a weight bearing wall like an outside wall just because the floor joists are much stronger at that point as compaired to the middel of the room

Would you let 4 large grown adult men stand in the area where you'd put your tank? If you'd let the 4 250lbs men stand there then a 90 gallon tank shouldn't be a problem.

Doug

intersting article about all of this basically says "Yes, 4 250 lb men can stand in the same place at one time, even jump up and down - but having them there in the same spot for years causes a wear in the structural integrity that the floor was never designed for"

http://badmanstropicalfish.com/articles/article28.html

As I've been freaking out about this, seeing that on one side of my room I have currently 160g of water dispursed in a very, very odd way (tank stand that displaces the water upwards rather than lengthwise) and have approximately 100g sitting there plus another 60g next to it. Needless to say, it's a scary thought and I am seriously contemplating a move of some sort - however, if you look at the weight of a water bed (often 4000+ lbs) and the thought that these floors were designed for that - then there's another story entirely. And I think I like to use that to assure myself I'm not going to drown in fish poop :)

that all makes perfect sense. and i have filled and set my rock into my new tank and started my sump. cool stuff