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TODD BUILDS HIS 2500 GALLON CEMENT AQUARIUM FOR STINGRAYS IN THE BASEMENT
- Thread starter Anythingfish
- Start date
Thanks again for your advice. By the way, I looked into stainless steel rebar as you suggested. It costs 10 times more than normal rebar so although it is doable it will certainly hike up the costs. Steve
Pumpkinate, I have two options for my own monster tank: one is a 3150g tank in it's own room on ground level, the other is a 5070g tank in the basement. My father is a concrete salesman. He is looking into alternatives to stainless steel rebar. I will have an answer in a couple of weeks and I'll post it. Also, I can't help but wonder if the tanks that cracked up were SALTWATER tanks or not. Were they outdoor tanks? Moisture should be minimum inside the walls of a well construted indoor tank? I was thinking why not just paint the welded rebar cage with a good rust-resistant paint after all the welding is done? Maybe the coated stuff used for bridges would work well? Who knows, anyway I'm going to find out from the people who know.
rhinoman;749564; said:Pumpkinate, I have two options for my own monster tank: one is a 3150g tank in it's own room on ground level, the other is a 5070g tank in the basement. My father is a concrete salesman. He is looking into alternatives to stainless steel rebar. I will have an answer in a couple of weeks and I'll post it. Also, I can't help but wonder if the tanks that cracked up were SALTWATER tanks or not. Were they outdoor tanks? Moisture should be minimum inside the walls of a well construted indoor tank? I was thinking why not just paint the welded rebar cage with a good rust-resistant paint after all the welding is done? Maybe the coated stuff used for bridges would work well? Who knows, anyway I'm going to find out from the people who know.
Rhinoman, I would certainly appreciate alternatives to stainless rebar. I have heard about epoxy-coated rebar but I'm not sure how much better it is than uncoated rebar in practice. I have never had a concrete tank crack because I have never had a concrete tank! I've got a large concrete tank coming up in 6 months with a new house, and it will be freshwater. Please
post your findings!
I think the sprayed on polyurea is another excellent option for sealing the inside of the tank. From my own perspective, I am trying to keep costs down and I also like doing things myself so I am leaning towards epoxy or sanitred. But I think that if you have the money and want an essentially guaranteed seal then the professinal job would be excellent. Steve.
My father says the biggest problem with mixing concrete and metal is not resolved with stainless steel: metal and concrete expand and contract at different temperatures, it's this constant expanding and contracting at different temperatures that causes the cracks. In our case the tanks will be kept at constant temperatures and this will not occur. I don't know what happened to the aquariums in San Francisco.
anythingfish.com;748994; said:I love how well the epoxy went on, it is a two part process & works very well. I can't see any issues aty all for leakage, etc. Even though we used the snap ties we filles the holes & I made sure to coat them very well with the epoxy. I would recommend two things, use a dark color, mine is too light, & make sure when you apply the epoxy that you have the best respirator you can get & make sure you have many many fans pulling the toxins out. If you do not use a good respirator & do not vent well while applying you will die very quickly. Once again please vent & use a respirator made for the type of epoxy you are applying, not just a gas mask, it needs to remove the correct toxins.
OK, I'll make sure I won't die very quickly. I hope!
Where the PVC pipes came through the concrete did you sand the PVC then paint over the concrete-PVC boundary?
I will be using a swimming pool overflow, and want to be sure it won't leak around it, given the size of the overflow. Steve
I should have qualified this by saying that the stainless rebar that I was offered is 316 grade. That is marine grade as used fully exposed on boats. It is definitely overkill and is more expensive than lower grades of stainless. Presumably, if you can get a lower grade stainless rebar it won't be as much as 10 times more than standard rebar.Pumpkinate;749549; said:Thanks again for your advice. By the way, I looked into stainless steel rebar as you suggested. It costs 10 times more than normal rebar so although it is doable it will certainly hike up the costs. Steve
Also, stainless steel is stronger than mild steel, so if switching to stainless you could probably drop a size when ordering rebar.
Pumpkinate, just for an update: Noone I have spoken to so far believes that anything other than common carbon steel rebar is necessary for our application. The Steinhart Aquarium was built in the late 1920's a great deal has been learned about re-enforced concrete construction since than. The tanks in question were likely salt-water tanks. Salt water is very corosive. Also there's the earthquakes. Did the tanks develop small cracks that allowed salt water to creep in? That would wreak havoc on carbon steel rebar. A properly sealed carbon-steel-rebar-renforced-concrete fresh water tank located indoors should last as long as the house it sits in. Just make sure you contractors KNOW what they're doing.
If I find out anything different I'll let you know
If I find out anything different I'll let you know
Thanks for that, rhinoman
Pumpkinate;750143; said:OK, I'll make sure I won't die very quickly. I hope!
Where the PVC pipes came through the concrete did you sand the PVC then paint over the concrete-PVC boundary?
I will be using a swimming pool overflow, and want to be sure it won't leak around it, given the size of the overflow. Steve
I was worried about my penetrations & wanted to add some expandable wrap to the pipes that expands when wet, but I never did... Basically the guys who laid the cement did such a great job espically with vibrating the cement the has never been any leakage & I dont beleive there ever will be.