NEW HERE building a large tank

[Fish Kid]

HELLO! this is my first post here at aquarium advice and i look forward to becoming part of your (seemingly) already great community. i hope that me not having fish at the moment and being new to the site will not give the impression that i am new to the hobby or inexperienced. a am in fact very knolegible in the area of fish. i do however have many empty tanks as i just moved and had to get rid of my fish i do plan on filling them soon though! Sadly i have no fish at the moment... but i am working on a rather large project, making a 8x4 FOOT! tank. this tank however will not be an aquarium but a paludarium! ~part land part water~ it will consist of an oak waterfall, an small pool that goes down to another waterfall, a bit of rapids, and then finally the main pool that will have about 50 gal in it... what inspired me to do this you might ask? well on a wonderful walk along the bank of a small stream here in Ohio i noticed the wonderfully diverse population among the rapids and pools of the stream, along with the intricate root systems that many of the pool-fish lived among. i was immediately hooked and went out to buy every book on Ohio streams and the fish i could find. I was very suprised to see that unlike popular belief that the cold-water fish here are boring and dull that they are very colorful and vibrant and that there are many types of these fish. i will be working on this project for a wile and may have many questions to ask but i will to be sure to keep you all posted on anything that i do to it.

 

[Sicklid]

Sounds VERY cool, can't wait to see pics. Welcome to AA.

 

[flushingfish]

It is an unwritten law that pics must be posted especially for all unusual projects.
Welcome to AA ( the other AA)

 

[Fish Kid]

well i will be happy to post plenty of pictures as the project developes but at the moment i have a 55 gal tank and thats about all... the rest is in some notebooks and my head but i have the plexy on order (should be cut this weekend) have an "expert" welder to help build the frame for the tank to be held together.... (a friend who's in the buisness) and we've ordered the angle iron for that.... umm im about to make arrangements for the cocos panels to be shiped in from the Netherlands so im pretty much set just got to wait! ist sooo hard to do though! oh yeh THANK YOU!

 

[GlitcH]

Sounds like a fun project FK.
I, like everyone else here, can't wait to see how it progresses.

Oh, and welcome to AA!!

 

[drobertson]

Sounds like a very interesting project. PICTURES


Hello, and Welcome to AA!!!!!!

 

[redswi]

i look forward to becoming part of your (seemingly) already great community.

As a DIY'r, and a recent newbie, I can say that you found a good group of knowledgable people...past and present posts have helped me alot in my projects...we welcome you and look forward to your progress...as everyone else has said "WE LOVE PICS"

 

[DeFeKt]

so like an awesome concept..
I'm looking forward to seeing results.

My only issue is this.

have an "expert" welder to help build the frame for the tank to be held together.... (a friend who's in the buisness) and we've ordered the angle iron for that....

Being a metal engineer myself, I would strongly advise against using angle.
RHS would be a minimum spec for this size tank. Angle will twist, warp and bow. Perhaps to the point of destroying your creation.

 

[Fish Kid]

hmm idk i'll have to say something to him.... he seemed to think that it will hold great... well i will ask. hhmm well ill tell him i have a second opinion!

 

[DeFeKt]

Let me know what he says.
I'm curious as to why he suggested angle.

 

[Fish Kid]

hhmmm he says "simply because it will be good to make a tight frame on the tank" he seems to think the angle will hold fine and that there is no way it could twist with the plexy in it. says "quarter inch plexy is plenty strong to be held strait with angle on the top and bottom of the tank."

 

[Sicklid]

No way is 1/4 inch acrylic gonna hold that dimension of aquarium... Acrylic tanks half that size are made with 3/4 inch or even 1 inch. 1/4 inch glass is more like it, but I still think for an 8 foot long tank it should be 3/8 or better.

 

[DeFeKt]

hhmmm he says "simply because it will be good to make a tight frame on the tank" he seems to think the angle will hold fine and that there is no way it could twist with the plexy in it. says "quarter inch plexy is plenty strong to be held strait with angle on the top and bottom of the tank."

oh my bad, i thought you meant the stand framing for some strange reason...
Having said that I do agree with sicklids last post. The plexy will bow and stress the joins inside the angle.

 

[Sicklid]

Sorry I just realized that you did say "palludarium", not "fishtank"... That is definitely a horse of a different color if the tank is not getting filled all the way.

Even still, I worked with acrylic daily for years, and I have doubts that at 48" x 96" the plastic is strong enough. I know the prices of the materials too, and I would hate to see you have to scrap all that acrylic after you built it and filled it just to find out you need thicker material.

 

[Fish Kid]

ummm you see my setup is a very complicated one......and very odd at that there are basicly two parts to this palludarium.....
1. a 55gal fishtank that is being.....reformated..... to serve as the main pool of the tank.....
2. a 8 foot long, 2 feet tall, and 18 inch thick plexy addition.....

so the tank is not wholely 8x4 feet but a 4'x20" and a 8'x2" tank combined to make a sort of sideways L shape...... rotate that to that right 90 degrees. and thats the basic setup for my tank.... sounds weird but we got it figured out..... so i hope that answers your question....

 

[Sicklid]

OK.. So the acrylic part will not be holding water... Got it..

I STILL WANT PICS WHEN IT'S DONE!

 

[Fish Kid]

dont worrie there will be plenty... when im going though construction... not happening yet though...im sad a little behind scedual (sorry about my terrible spelling)

 

[morgan24]

It sounds like alot fun and hope it all works out in the end. have you figured out your stocking list yet?

 

[Fish Kid]

well not exactly because im going to take a risk (and please dont correct me on this i know its risky and im taking every possible step to prevent anything bad from happening) you see im going to accualy catch the fish in the local stream that goes into the Little Miami river....... with a net i know i can catch them because ive done it before (with a net) just to see the species that are in the area and to check for anything i should be concerned about (signs of pollution, parasites ext... ) but even though their rare (i've caught very few) im going to try and find some rainbow, green, and other various darters.. along with a school of mosquito minnows.... some sort of cat/sucker and possibly a soft shelled turtle.... and if i can get any impute *does anyone know about crayfish and if darters are fast enough to keep away from them?* thats basically all though. OH YES the land umm i want to have a number of assorted frogs and salamanders too....