I picked up a 20g long a few weeks ago in the Petco $1/gallon sale, and I'm planning on setting it up as a
FOWLR tank. First, I need to build a stand for it to fit a specific location in the office. For speed of construction and strength, trusty 2x4's were used.
This is one end piece assembled and pieces for the other end ready to go:
Attaching the two back lengths:
The completed frame; the lack of lower front length is intentional so that we can fit stuff under the stand:
Putting the frame in to the office to make sure I measured everything correctly. Not sure why the top piece seems like it's bowing in the photo as it sure doesn't when you look at it in person, especially given it's screwed down along the front length. And this is why there's no lower front length - we don't really have anywhere else for these in our little room:
At this point, my helpful assistant decided to make his presence known. For the most part, he's merely intrigued by my 55g
FW tank without ever trying to climb inside (though you're only in trouble if you get caught, right...?):
I keep telling him curiosity killed the cat, but he doesn't seem to believe me... Anyways, I figured the extra 8lbs or so would help test the joints of the frame (well, aside from all 240lbs of me having already comfortably sat on it!)
It certainly seems strong enough, and fits perfectly in the space required. I intentionally made the stand deeper than needed so I have 4-5" behind the stand where I *could* place a power strip and such, but I'm a little wary about doing that in case water does spill out the back. I could also route the cables down along a cable tidy behind one of the rear legs?
Tomorrow I'll work on filling in the holes from driving the screws in and sanding everything down ready to stain. For now, I'm not planning on any panels on the back or sides - they're not going to be seen, and is a lot of work for minimal gain. I can always add them at a later date. So long as I can sand down the 2x4 legs smooth enough and slowly stain/sand/stain/repeat I'm hoping it gives a decent enough finish.
The humidity is nuts outside right now here in St Louis, but isn't too bad down in the basement. Hopefully these few coats of stain take okay, as last summer I really hard a hard time when my workshop was out in a garage.
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