When I finally decided to pull the trigger on finishing the basement into my man cave, the one must-have feature was a large aquarium. Planning and research began, much of it here on MonsterFishKeepers. You folks have some great ideas and I took many of them during the build.
The tank has been up and running for over a year now, and so far has worked out better than I'd hoped (fingers crossed). I wanted to post a build thread on what was done including anything I would have done differently.
Having kept a couple salt water tanks in the living room, and having eventually knocked over a bucket during water change and trying to get that out of the carpet, this new tank would need to have a dedicated maintenance room with a drain so I could kick over all the buckets I want . I also had found that I would often drag a chair over next to the tank for comfort, so a functional place to sit while watching the fish was also a requirement.
Having spent the majority of my youth seated at a bar in some country or another, what better place to look at the tank than from a barstool? Something I had much experience with. The research I did on the internet had many examples, but in those the tank was always behind the bar and too far away. I wanted my nose right up against the glass. Finally I found something that could work with a little modification:
A bit new-age for my taste, and the bar is much too low, but you get the idea.
I found a guy in the area that does architectural work and he did up some viewpoint images so I could get an idea on what would fit and basically how it would look.
So now I had the plan. It was time to stop talking and start building. Next post will get the fish room ready.
John
The tank has been up and running for over a year now, and so far has worked out better than I'd hoped (fingers crossed). I wanted to post a build thread on what was done including anything I would have done differently.
Having kept a couple salt water tanks in the living room, and having eventually knocked over a bucket during water change and trying to get that out of the carpet, this new tank would need to have a dedicated maintenance room with a drain so I could kick over all the buckets I want . I also had found that I would often drag a chair over next to the tank for comfort, so a functional place to sit while watching the fish was also a requirement.
Having spent the majority of my youth seated at a bar in some country or another, what better place to look at the tank than from a barstool? Something I had much experience with. The research I did on the internet had many examples, but in those the tank was always behind the bar and too far away. I wanted my nose right up against the glass. Finally I found something that could work with a little modification:
A bit new-age for my taste, and the bar is much too low, but you get the idea.
I found a guy in the area that does architectural work and he did up some viewpoint images so I could get an idea on what would fit and basically how it would look.
So now I had the plan. It was time to stop talking and start building. Next post will get the fish room ready.
John