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Anyone want to help me redo my fish room

DaveS

By DaveS,
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DaveS Oracle Reefer

DaveS

As some of you may know, I inherited my system when I bought the house. It's a nice system but as I've gotten more and more into the hobby I'm starting to feel it's limitations. After more than a year of flip flopping, I have finally made the decision to switch out my acrylic tank for glass. In talking things over with various people who's input I value, I've come to a new decision point in this process- why go half a$$ed if I can go whole a$$ed!

 

Instead of just swapping out the tank and leaving things at that, I'm considering making more upgrades while I'm at it. Options include:

 

-rebuilding the stand to allow more space (larger sump) underneath

-lowering the tank by a few inches so it's not such a death defying feat working in the tank (the stand is 50" high which means the top of the tank that I have to climb over is almost 8' above the ground).

-redoing the wall after lowering the tank since it's an in-wall tank.

-building more shelves in the fish room to accommodate other things like water storage, more tanks, etc. (I'm already outgrowing the current rack with my frag tank).

-moving some plumbing for the house around in the room to get it out of the way for the more important fish stuff. :)

-whatever else I can get talked into by my fellow reef addicts.

 

Before I do take the plunge I wanted to ask for help. Most of what I"m looking to do isn't super difficult. It's more than I can do personally but not beyond the expertise of what I have seen others accomplish here at WAMAS. If I have to find a general contractor and spend a ton of money on construction than this may not be an option. However if anyone with some expertise is willing to lend a hand, maybe at a reasonable price, I might be able to make these upgrades happen.

 

So I guess what I'm asking is- would anyone with some good construction experience be willing to help me take on this project? I don't think this will be much crazier than many of the build threads here or on RC. I don't even need to upgrade the foundation or bulkhead the house like Dandy. :eek: In general I think I would need help with the following skill sets:

 

1) Know how to build a sturdy stand for a 210G+ tank (doesn't need to be pretty just sturdy as it will be behind a wall).

2) If it gets lowered, ability to re-frame a non-load bearing wall where the tank is.

3) Some carpentry and electrical work to move stuff around the fish room and get it out of the way

4) Decent drywall skills

5) Ability to do trim and moulding work around the front side of the in-wall tank

 

I'm more worried about someone who can help tackle 1-3 as I know of possible options for 4-5. I'm not looking to start immediately and the timing is flexible. What I probably need to do first is just figure out the things I want done- decisions which will depend heavily on what kind of help I have.

 

I can offer beer, frags and a great sense of accomplishment along with bragging rights when we are done. If you are a professional at any of this stuff, we can also talk money. I am willing to pay a professional to exercise their trade. I just want to be careful that I don't open myself up to any yahoo with a saw-z-all looking to make a buck. I hope that makes sense. :biggrin:

 

So who's interested in joining me on this adventure?

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MisterTang Grandmaster Reefer

MisterTang

I know Mark (CHUBAKAH) does electrical work for folks in the club, and he definitely knows what he's talking about.

 

I've seen your setup, and it is pretty cool, so I guess my suggestions would be geek-centric - design an automatic water-change system, do some underwater webcams, additional automation/monitoring etc.

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CHUBAKAH Grandmaster Reefer

CHUBAKAH

Dave,

I can handle any of the tasks you have, and have the tools and skills to complete them. I am also a licensed general contractor if any permits would need to be pulled. Shoot me a PM if you like, and we'll set up a time where I can come by and shoot you a price on all of it.

 

I currently have three projects set for after the first with WAMAS members, however none have committed to an exact time yet.

 

Mark

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vaironman Grandmaster Reefer

vaironman

I've been over to Dave's place and completely understand why he would like to expand his tank room. Little space left in the back and climbing up a ladder top of the tank. This was about 1.5 years ago before he seriously venture in more SPS.

 

Endorsing Mark as he is good guy and had helped complete redo the electrical wiring for my basement large tanks (2 of them) setup. You're more than welcome to come over and look at them.

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paenian Tang

paenian

I'd like to help - used to be a roofer (paying my way through college) and love to DIY stuff. I'm newer to the reef than either of your other volunteers, and therefore more than willing to work whilst absorbing knowledge.

 

 

As for lowering the tank, what's the old stand made of? Old tank's the same size? If it's wood, it's probably overbuilt, and easy enough to slice off a bit & rebuild. Do you do maintenance from the front or back? Building a nice platform behind the tank might be a better option - far less work, and you can put some storage underneath.

 

 

From building & rebuilding my own tank/stand, always mock up a prototype and then try to do maintenance on it - the easier maintenance is, the more often it will be performed. Automating it is even better, but do look out for redundancy and manual backups.

 

Paul

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Brian Ward Oracle Reefer

Brian Ward

(edited)

Dave,

I'm willing to help in trade for SCUBA certs! I have decent carpentry skills and pretty good electrical skills. I think my plumbing skills for what you are trying to do are more than adequate. I'm on a break from school at the moment so I actually have a little free time!

~Brian

 

edit: oh, and if you haven't seen Justin (ctenophore)'s tank, then you should definitely check it out as you plan your upgrade. Starfire glass front, fiberglass for the rest. Makes the tank nice and light while still giving you the great glass on the display side.

Edited by Brian Ward
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DaveS Oracle Reefer

DaveS

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Automatic water change- I'd love to do that but I'm on septic so pumping over 20G a week of saltwater probably won't be good for the septic tank or leech field. That and I don't think I will be physically expanding the room (just making better use of the space) so lots of water holding tanks may not be an option. But I will keep the idea in the back of my head.

 

 

This is great! I seem to have some combination of pros and DIY guys to work with. Let me process this info for a bit and come up with a plan. If anyone else wants to help out, please let me know.

 

I didn't get into it but in addition to actual construction, there would also be other stuff like:

 

-breakdown/move of existing 210 tank

-bringing in the new tank (probably need 6+ guys just for that)

-set up of new tank

 

As you can guess this won't be a 1 day thing and there is plenty places for non-construction types to join in on the fun. The whole thing will probably be a fairly long process with much of the work done on weekends. What better way to spend the long cold winter weekends than working on fish stuff right? :)

 

If you guys are coming over for the benefit on Jan 10th, maybe by then I'll have plan in place to go over with everyone.

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ROBZ Hatchling

ROBZ

Automatic water change- I'd love to do that but I'm on septic so pumping over 20G a week of saltwater probably won't be good for the septic tank or leech field. That and I don't think I will be physically expanding the room (just making better use of the space) so lots of water holding tanks may not be an option. But I will keep the idea in the back of my head.

 

 

This is great! I seem to have some combination of pros and DIY guys to work with. Let me process this info for a bit and come up with a plan. If anyone else wants to help out, please let me know.

 

I didn't get into it but in addition to actual construction, there would also be other stuff like:

 

-breakdown/move of existing 210 tank

-bringing in the new tank (probably need 6+ guys just for that)

-set up of new tank

 

As you can guess this won't be a 1 day thing and there is plenty places for non-construction types to join in on the fun. The whole thing will probably be a fairly long process with much of the work done on weekends. What better way to spend the long cold winter weekends than working on fish stuff right? :)

 

If you guys are coming over for the benefit on Jan 10th, maybe by then I'll have plan in place to go over with everyone.

 

Dave, I love to help you out and give you ideas on your new project gimme a shout ;)

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Kevin Garrison Grandmaster Reefer

Kevin Garrison

I'm in, you learn a lot owning a house, I've got decent skills in carpentry, plumbing and electric (Mark however is the expert there). Just let me know the where's and when's. I will have to make a trip down to Danville, as most of my tools are still down in the basement at the house. Haven't had need for them in a rental home, so I left them in storage.

 

Don't expect pay, but donations of frags and/or scuba classes are always appreciated. The barter system, it still works and it's one of the best systems going.

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phisigs79 Oracle Reefer

phisigs79

ill clean the new tank out with brillo pads and bleach :clap:

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davelin315 Neptune Reefer

davelin315

Hey Dave, I can offer to help but not sure when I'd be able to help you... summer would be the most likely scenario and it would all be at night as I'm in the middle of many projects myself. It's really not that tough to do the things you mentioned, just time consuming if you haven't done them yourself. There's mpre than one way to skin a cat (we'll change that to something more reef appropriate like RTN a LE SPS :biggrin: ) but it can all be done by your lonesome if you have the time and patience. I did nearly everything myself and even though not everything is perfect and I'm not done, I've got a tank room with it's own electrical supply and an in-wall tank that accomplished what I wanted it to.

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  • 1 month later...
DaveS Oracle Reefer

DaveS

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Hey guys,

 

So this thing is moving along. I spent most of last weekend getting things ready for the tank break down. I got stock tanks all set up and ready to go- Thanks Jtro!

 

I plan to break down the display tank this weekend. Since I got lots of great offers for help I just wanted to see who can make it this weekend. It's pretty much a matter of moving the water, corals and other inhabitants from the 210 tank into two 100G stock tanks. Once that's done we'll just moving the plumbing and lights from the tank and connect it to the stock tanks. I got hoses and pumps to transfer the water and buckets for the corals so the heaviest lifting should be for the live rock and beer...

 

I got one thing with the family in the morning so we'll start at Noon. I probably only need 2 maybe 3 people to help. Who's in?

 

Also Sunday will probably be demo day. I'll take apart the current stand and clear out other things from the fish room to get it ready for the renovation that will happen the next weekend. I could probably use 1-2 people to make thing go faster and more fun. If you can make Sunday, please let me know.

 

Thanks everyone!

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