280g Inwall

[Delphinus]

This is easily the slowest tank build in the history of Canreef. Tank was built by Interamerican/Bow Valley ... in 2005. I started on a tank stand at the time, then decided on a different design, .. then we had a kid, and in the inevitable life-gets-turned-upside-down, the process got derailed and the tank sat on my basement floor for a very long time before I got back on the horse.

Anyhow, the specs:

280g 72x30x30
Eurobraced
1/2" Starphire/Low-Iron glass on front and sides
3/4" bottom pane, 5/8" rear pane
Front pane is tempered.

Overflow is a standard corner overflow, in the left rear corner, 2-2" bulkheads. Although it wasn't the original intention, this will work well for a Herbie style overflow.

My sump will be a 100g UFA livestock watering tub... Planning on using this mostly just because I happen to have one, and I might as well do something with it. (It was my "backup plan" in case a tank got dropped when we moved into our current house.) It won't work great for baffles because it's oval in shape, but I'm hoping to avoid needing baffles by going Herbie on the overflow anyhow.

Here are pictures of the progress so far.

November 2007 - Stand more or less built, so time to put the tank on the stand.



Not having a clue what I'm doing, mostly I go by trial and error. At this point, I decided to check the level of the tank on the stand in its final location, and I found that I had lost my level. So, I did what any self-respecting aquarist would do: I filled the tank with water.

Then I measured the water level on the corners and found that the left side was down a solid 1/2" from the right. The stand itself is perfectly square, it's the basement floor that is out that much. So I emptied the tank, shimmed the stand, and refilled. So far, seems to be holding, and seems to be level.

I'm not sure I'd recommend doing this. I wanted the stand to be more or less transportable, in the event I ever move again or decide to sell the tank. But the other way would have been to build the stand as a wall and have it levelled right at the get-go. There are probably better advantages to doing it this way over how I did it, but c'est la vie, it is what it is.

[Der_Iron_Chef]

Woot! Looks familiar, Tony. I look forward to following alone and then admiring it all in person one day

[Der_Iron_Chef]

Umm. I don't think I ALONE will be following ALONG. He he. Oops.

[Delphinus]

The first thing that struck me (you can't really see this in the photo) was that I had to have the furnace and HRV ductwork redone. There were three enormous pipes overhead that were going to interfere with the canopy and wall, so I called the place that installed the HRV and asked what options I had.

One pipe was HRV and two were furnace outlets. It turned out that the furnace outputs could be combined into one stepped up pipe. As it turns out, the HRV had been installed incorrectly when it was first installed (two years ago) so when they came by to give me an estimate, they noticed this, and told me that it was incorrect and they wanted to fix it free of charge. I was pretty happy with that. I had no idea it was incorrect, but I am happier with the way things are now because the pipework is far less intrusive around the furnace area now.

I don't really have any "before" pictures but I will show a picture of the piping in my next post.

I used "Air Pro Heating" for my HRV and these guys are top-notch. They were recommended to me by another Canreefer (Monza, we don't see him online too much anymore, bummer - great guy). They did an analysis based on how much air turnover and how much floor space and air volume I had, to rectify the problem of excessive humidity based on the tanks. Anyhow, anyone in Calgary considering a tank room, or even building a new house - I very highly recommend talking to these guys about an HRV.

[Delphinus]

Anyhow, more pictures!

Next up was to build some wall framing and hang a door for access into the tank room.

Seems that maybe not going about things the easiest way, but, I want walls to be flush, or near to flush with the tank, as opposed to having the walls a 2x4 thickess out from the tank.

Also, I wanted to avoid the usual "picture frame" look to a typical inwall tank because my favourite tanks are those that can be looked at from multiple angles. Ideally, if I had had the space, I would have made three sides viewable, but unfortunately I just don't have enough space to pull it off ... so the end result is the best compromise I could do, a "front and right-hand side viewable" tank.





As you can see, I haven't bothered draining the tank yet from my "verify the tank is level" step. That's some skanky water now, but I'm leaving it for now because I'll use it to test my plumbing when I have that ready (hopefully soon). Seems to me there's no need to waste 280g of water in the meantime.

Here's a close up of the furnace piping. "If I knew then what I know now", I'd have sprung for 9' ceilings in the basement. With 8', there are definitely a lot of low spots to work around due to things like this.

[Delphinus]

Currently, I'm at a bit of a standstill because the joists have more flex to them than I anticipated. I only have 1/2" of clearance between the framing and the top of the tank, and it appears that if someone walking in the living room directly above, hits the "sweet spot", there is about 1/2" of flex in the whole joists. This means the framing actually can contact the tank. Not good.

I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to solve this. The drywall should take out some of the flex but I'm not sure I want to rely on the drywall to prevent my tank becoming a "load bearing wall."

I might try some cross-bracing, or, I might end up putting a corner post on the right. This second option should work well but it would involve some creativity on the finish to keep it looking good. My main hope is to avoid it looking like an afterthought (even if it IS an afterthought).

[Myka]

Bummer...not picturing what is happening though...

[Pan]

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Currently, I'm at a bit of a standstill because the joists have more flex to them than I anticipated. I only have 1/2" of clearance between the framing and the top of the tank, and it appears that if someone walking in the living room directly above, hits the "sweet spot", there is about 1/2" of flex in the whole joists. This means the framing actually can contact the tank. Not good.

I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to solve this. The drywall should take out some of the flex but I'm not sure I want to rely on the drywall to prevent my tank becoming a "load bearing wall."

I might try some cross-bracing, or, I might end up putting a corner post on the right. This second option should work well but it would involve some creativity on the finish to keep it looking good. My main hope is to avoid it looking like an afterthought (even if it IS an afterthought).

Put a big red X on the Sweet spot and make everyone who enters your abode sign a disclaimer form. Sheesh some people make things so difficult.

[wickedfrags]

Hey Tony,

Looks great so far - and ya that is taking your time. One thing I woud recommend is not using that rubbermaid container as a sump. I did this myself initially and was ultimately not pleased with it. Pick-up a used sump, or ever make one yourself either with a new stock tank or a used tank. Dave

[Skimmerking]

looks goof there Tony. I like the way that you framed in the tank.