18' x 9' x 3.5' catfish tank build in progress.....

[necrocanis]

Oh... your into Catfish... Cool ... Had NO IDEA..

I'll try my best to keep your thread as on topic as possible,

can you show how you are interlocking the boards though

Thanks everyone for your comments. I'll try to get an upclose pic of me adding some of the boards so you can get an idea Basslover. I know you're a little slow when it comes to tank building, and catfish in general. JK I love to take pics, but the progress might be painfully slow on this one. Chompers thread on a Ozone reactor has my wheels churning for this tank.....more to come.

 

[necrocanis]

Oh... your into Catfish... Cool ... Had NO IDEA..

I'll try my best to keep your thread as on topic as possible,

can you show how you are interlocking the boards though

4241 gallons.. very nice start!

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Thanks,

I figure with wall thickness it will come out to a little under 4000 gals, but I just rounded it up a lil! lol.

 

[basslover34]

Thanks everyone for your comments. I'll try to get an upclose pic of me adding some of the boards so you can get an idea Basslover. I know you're a little slow when it comes to tank building, and catfish in general. JK I love to take pics, but the progress might be painfully slow on this one. Chompers thread on a Ozone reactor has my wheels churning for this tank.....more to come.

Yeah I've been looking at that thread as well, but as in most cases of this type of thing I prefer to sit back and see how it works for some other people first... any problems that arise will most likly have been figured out by time I get around to do something like that

 

[necrocanis]

Your pics are downloading as I type. So new pics in a few mins. I know this seems like a lot of pics for the first time posting, but it's just because I've been working on the tank and haven't bothered with posting pics til now. Bass I know what you mean I've been watching other people's tank builds for a few years now and finally have the confidence and a lil extra cash to go forward!

 

[necrocanis]

Ok here are some pics. In this series of pictures you can see how I cut the pieces of wood to be offset from each other so that they would interlock. There are at least 4-7 screws per board pressing one against the other. This has worked great so far as everything is level and squared. I drilled holes all the way through the 4"(3.5") measurement of the 2x4s. I made the holes about 2.5" deep, and screwed 3" deck screws through that board and the one beside it. Of course I have to make sure and offset the holes everytime so that I don't run into the screw in the board before it. This way I am building it one board at a time from left to right. Also I have the tank proped up on some blocks so that I can add more boards without having to pick up the tank as it's too heavy for that now.

 

[necrocanis]

Oh the middle pic above is a jig that I made to hold the boards together until glued, and screwed. I also run a bead of the subfloor adhesive between each board. That stuff will not come off. You have to break the board cause the glue will not come loose for anything. I messed up one board and didn't catch it til the next day. Well that's the last time I make that mistake. I took the screws out and tried to take the board loose. Yeah right! I ended up breaking out the sledge hammer and the board broke in half longways before the glue gave loose. I ended up having to cut threw it with a skill saw to seperate the remaining board. Lesson learned! That said it gives me more confidence in what I am doing.

 

[necrocanis]

This set of pics shows how the boards interlock. I cut the pieces to where one would connect on top of the bottom boards and the next would connect to the side of it. Hope that makes sense should with the pics. That works great front to back, but on the side I had to notch the bottom end 2x4 every 3.5" so that I could interlock them that way also. Remember every seem has subfloor adhessive and every board is connected to the one beside and below it with at least 4-7 screws at 3" a piece. There's a pic showing the end board from the inside notice how skinny it looks, and the pic of the outside bottom you'll see that the board is just notched. There's also a pic of how tight the boards fit together. Warped boards are a pain, and require extra screws to slowly straighten them out. I screw a little on each one pulling it closer and closer to the board beside it until it is flush.

 

[necrocanis]

This set has some of the two pumps I have so far. The bigger one is the one I want to connect to a Reverse UGF. I am not sure if jacuzzi pumps can run continously so that's why I want to put it on a timer for twice a day. Also I am no electrician or mathematician so can anyone tell me how many gph it should give me, and how much electricity it will consume? I think, but am not sure that the smaller one is more powerful. It weighs more lol. It's rated at 5100 gph. Got it for a steal on ebay. $100 for it shipped.

 

[necrocanis]

Finally here are some of the fish that will live in the tank once finished. They are huddled together in the corner cause I was doing a water change. Never realized the striking colors on my rtc.

 

[DolphinRyan]

Can't wait to see the finished project!