New Paludarium

[Fishnuts]

Ok ladies and gents after a 4 year hiatus in my fish love I am finally getting back fully into the swing of things and have decided I want to start a paludarium in addition to the current planted tank I have. I am custom making everything to save $$$ in this setup and I want something big enough to really make a true ecosystem in my home (gotta love being a single guy with a big house

Anyway my question is first about the tank. I will be building it out of acrylic a custom fab deal to go on a blank wall in my living room. The dimensions I have decided on for the tank will be 36H x 22W x 60L. The total tank volume (if filled with water) would be 206 Gallons which would require 1/2" or thicker acrylic if filled completely with water. The intention is not to have it filled completely with water though, just up to about 15 inches up on the tank which would give me approx (not including land areas sealed up) 86 gals water displacement. In a 15H x 22W x 60L tank (water area) the recommended acrylic thickness is 3/8" . Would I be safe using this thickness since the water level would not rise above the 15" mark? I don't ever intend to fill the whole thing with water!!!!

Thanks in advance guys, I will post many a pic when the project starts! I have waited 4 years to start this thing and now it's time!

 

[William]

I say just go with the full half inch or thicker, anyways.


You may not want to fill it up now, but who knows how you'll feel six months from now? a year? ect ect.


Another reason that I would go for the full half inch is because its better to make it a little stronger, than it is to end up with water all over your floor in the morning when you wake up. You know?


You can never overbuild something, however it is dangerously easy to underbuild.

 

[Sati]

I agree with William on that. Better safe than sorry. And you BETTER post pics!

 

[Bearfan]

I agree fully, build for the future if you're going to take the time to build it.

 

[dogartist]

You say you got a big house ....

Can't wait to see how it turns out..I like the ideal

 

[Sati]

Plus the thing is, even if you don't want to completely fill it with water. You may want to sell it one day and that person may want to fill it with water so it'd sell better if it was built Ford tough... or something

 

[Fishnuts]

Thanks for the input all, I knew this would be the place to ask the question! I guess I will save my pennies and buy the 1/2" acrylic to make the tank. Unfortunately places like Home Depot only carry 1/4" so I'll have to use a local vendor to source the 1/2" stuff which means more $$$.

 

[Bearfan]

I'm willing to bet with a little bit of searching you can find a manufacturer and save some cash.

 

[ferret]

Hey, I'm in the state, when you do it, let me know ;P I wanna see, cause I've wanted one everytime I see one. Maybe when I have a house. To go with the other 1000+ gallon tanks and pipedreams for my basement

 

[Mr Burns]

if you don't alreay know it, make absolutely certain that you are using CAST CELL acrylic! i would say that 1/2" would be fine if you plan on only having under the bottom 18 inches of the tank filled. however, if you have any thoughts of reselling or changing to a completely filled tank in the future, i would strongly suggest 3/4"+ cast acrylic. i know that's going to be expensive as hell, but you're going to have a tank that is 60" long and 36" high! that leaves A LOT of room for the acrylic to bow out. and the thickness of the acrylic is based on the height of a tank, not it's actual volume. be sure to brace the corners also...better safe than leaving yourself or a future buyer really really sorry, wet, freaked out, and depressed b/c you just wasted some big $$$ on 1/2" only to have it structurally fail.

i'm going to start building my tank in the next few months, so i should be taking a lot of pictures of the project too! that is, unless i get really excited and caught up in what i'm doing....

 

[Fishnuts]

Well heck Mr. Burns after reading your post I went and did a little more research on the subject of acrylic aquariums. Seems most manufacturers won't exceed the 30" height at all except for Tenecor which will make some huge beasts at about 1300 gal and 60" High (Bear in mind the acrylic on that looked to be at least 2" thick). So maybe I should stick with a 30" max height on the tank for the reasons you listed....

 

[madasafish]

Well, Fishnuts, the others beat me to it.

But I will say good luck, and look at as many pictures as you can of paludariums. They can be absolutely phenominal if constructed thoughtfully. Here's a stunner that somebody posted a pic of a few months back. Still have the picture as a file on my desktop and open it occasionally to drool (see picture title).

Of course, I've no doubt that you will do a phenominal job--sounds like your life's been leading up to this, and I feel like mine is too... 10 years down the line, I think!

 

[madasafish]

P.S. Any idea yet of the creatures you'll be stocking the tank with? Turtles? Frogs? Foureyes? Tree frogs? Lizards? Other amphibians? Obviously some fish...

If you think you can find a responsible breeder/seller, consider the beautiful tree frogs of madagascar--mantellas and others. They are so vibrantly colored... Like the poison dart frogs, but not poisonous! Only problem with tree frogs and lizards is that they muck up the glass, if you know what I mean...

My paludiarium will include Mantellas if I can find a responsible breeder 10 yrs down the line...

 

[ferret]

I absolutely love that picture.

 

[Fishnuts]

That is definitely a gorgeous setup! I am very very impressed. Are there any more pics of this setup? Maybe some write-up on construction for ideas?

The one that got me started on this idea again was here:

More on the setup is at http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/46g.htm