Building a house - aquarium ideas

[Formulator]

My wife and I will be building a new house in the next year and I’m just starting to dream up ideas for a BIG tank. It will be built into the wall, or perhaps an island centerpiece. One thought I had was to do do a tall tank with a small viewing portal on the second floor of the house looking down on the tank from above. I was thinking this could be accomplished by submerging the viewing glass an inch or so. That way the view is clear and not impacted by surface agitation from flow. My main concerns with this are keeping the portal glass clean and maintaining the bottom of the tank in something that tall. Also, what kind of lighting has enough penetration for a tank with 5-6 feet of depth? Is this even possible?

Feel free to tell me I am dreaming… at this point that is true, but I prefer to dream loftily in the beginning and work down from there to end up with something stunning, but realistic in the end. Any and all suggestions for a tank, or lessons learned from folks who have built tanks into their new home designs would be much appreciated! Budget is generous. This will be our ‘forever home’ and our budget for the house is about $1M (in Missouri that equates to about 3000 square feet with upper mid to high-end finishes (yes I know we are geographically fortunate when it comes to real estate ).

 

[Rjukan]

Tall tanks are a nightmare imo. I have a 24" deep tank and I couldn't imagine anything deeper than that. Just picture maintaining a tank where you can't reach the middle of the rock, let alone the bottom of the tank. It's no problem for some people, but it sounds like a real headache to me.
Definitely spend some time searching for others that have similar size tanks, and reading about their experiences.

 

[Reefering1]

If you got the cash, I say go for it. Scroll through this for inspiration, scale back as needed. As far as cleaning, once it's big enough, you just climb in to service it. Would be amazing to go diving in your house..

Monster Build - Anderson Family Reef - Concrete Aquarium 5,000 gallon DIY

Is it really going to have an 11' x 10' footprint?!?! WOW!! Designing a 10'x10'x5-7' size now... we will see how it feels but it's going to be pretty big... ;)

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Formulator]

What do you guys think about the second floor viewing portal from above? Anybody seen something like this or am I crazy?

 

[Mschmidt]

That'll be a cool tank! my dream would be a huge peninsula lit with solar tubes, but STL probably doesn't get enough daylight in the winter for that.
My opinions to the following:
cleaning the bottom: don't. get fish and conchs and stars to do it for you.
lighting: GHL is building a strip light for a customer to light a 3m deep tank.
second-floor viewing: I've wanted a glass floor over a tidepool type for a while. How cool would it be to have a ray swim under your couch?! cleaning the panel, heavy-duty magnet scraper and/or diving gear.

 

[Formulator]

cleaning the bottom: don't. get fish and conchs and stars to do it for you.

Yes, that works for the sand, but what about that pesky film algae line where the glass meets the sand and I can’t use a magnet scraper?

 

[Reefering1]

Yes, that works for the sand, but what about that pesky film algae line where the glass meets the sand and I can’t use a magnet scraper?

 

[jabberwock]

I don't like tanks built into the wall. It diminishes the views. I can see the side of my tank from the kitchen. Tank is in the living room.

I agree that deep tanks are a pain to maintain.

Instead of the upstairs viewing portal. Maybe consider a live streaming video feed that you can watch from any TV in the house (or your phone, tablet, etc.). A digital maintenance issue instead of a physical one.

 

[Formulator]

I’d hire her. Doubt my wife would agree to it

 

[Formulator]

I don't like tanks built into the wall. It diminishes the views. I can see the side of my tank from the kitchen. Tank is in the living room.

I agree that deep tanks are a pain to maintain.

Instead of the upstairs viewing portal. Maybe consider a live streaming video feed that you can watch from any TV in the house (or your phone, tablet, etc.). A digital maintenance issue instead of a physical one.

Great points and digital is a great idea. I’m leaning toward a built-in because I like the clean look, but perhaps could make it an island built in, similar to how some homes have center fireplaces between rooms.

 

[jabberwock]

Great points and digital is a great idea. I’m leaning toward a built-in because I like the clean look, but perhaps could make it an island built in, similar to how some homes have center fireplaces between rooms.

I like the idea of peninsula with the back of the tank passing through to the "fish room". Fish room should be built like a commercial kitchen with waterproof flooring and drains in the floor. Plenty of sinks and stainless steel counterspace. Probably a separate breaker panel? Consult your electrician to make sure it is safe, and somehow disconnected from the rest of the houses electrical system? Now I am thinking "back up generator".

Maybe just move to the beach?

 

[Formulator]

I like the idea of peninsula with the back of the tank passing through to the "fish room". Fish room should be built like a commercial kitchen with waterproof flooring and drains in the floor. Plenty of sinks and stainless steel counterspace. Probably a separate breaker panel? Consult your electrician to make sure it is safe, and somehow disconnected from the rest of the houses electrical system? Now I am thinking "back up generator".

Maybe just move to the beach?

Some of the land we are considering is on the very edges of St. Louis and borderline rural, so I’m contemplating a whole home generator anyways. I wish moving to the beach was an option, but alas the only ones near me are only home to mud and large mouth bass

 

[Mschmidt]

Yes, that works for the sand, but what about that pesky film algae line where the glass meets the sand and I can’t use a magnet scraper?

Have that line below the floor?

I might be the wrong person to answer that...

 

[o2manyfish]

You have some variables that need to be determined before some of these questions can be answered.

You mentioned a tank 5 or 6' tall. But what is the foot print of the tank? A 4'x4' tank that's 5' tall is probably going to be more novelty than super enjoyable. What is the room type? Where does a 5' tall tank total height end up at? Is the tank on a 2' stand or a 3.5' tall stand? Where is the top of the tank and the water surface in relation to the floor on the 2nd story? For Example - I don't think a sizeable tank is going to look good on a 2' stand - it's not going to have the elegant look I think you are expecting. So lets say at a minimum you should do is 30". Put a 5' tall tank on that and you are 7.5' to the top of the tank? What is the height of the ceiling in the first story? Contemporary homes in Los Angeles are being built with 10' or 12' first floor ceilings. With a 10' ceiling and at a minimum at 10" 2nd story floor height. The second story floor is 40" above the very top of the tank - not even the water level which is probably 1.5" or more lower than the 60" height. Even if you jump to a 6' tall tank your feet are 28" above the surface of the water. I would assume from the second story your porthole to the tank is going to have a viewing rail to lean and look down. The rail is going to be 5' from the surface and your head about 6'.


From 6' above a 4'x4' tank is not that impressive a view. You have to remember that from the top down view your biggest tangs are maybe 1.5" wide when mature. Your corals will look great. But also where are your corals?

A beautiful reef tank is going to have corals at all heights of the reef. So you are going to have corals starting 10' away from your top view point. You are not going to see anything but the bright primary coral colors. You won't see the differences between the tips and the branches. You won't see color shifts or rainbow tones.

And you have to account for water clarity. I don't know what your experience is with big tanks but in a large volume of water maintaining crystal clear invisible water is quite a challenge. I have a 10' long tank and even with the water looking incredibly clear with no tint (I run UV, Ozone and sometimes carbon) there is definitely an issue with looking through several feet of water.


Let's talk about the top of the tank. If you put an acrylic or glass viewing window on the top of the tank you are going to have a couple of issues - 1) Algae growing on the water side of the glass 2) Dust settling on the air side of the glass 3) Reflections on the glass from the top side. You obviously need to light the tank from above and above the water line. Which means your light has to pass thru your viewing panel. That flat surface at the top of the tank - which is getting direct light without passing thru any of the water column is going to grow algae quickly. Real quickly. In a rockin healthy reef tank that panel could get a green film every 24 hours. No kind of clean up crew is going to keep a panel at the surface of the tank clean - until someone breeds saltwater plecostomus's. You would need a magnet scrubber. And now you have to have it on some kind of a broom handle so you can reach the panel from the 2nd story above. Now on the top side of your window you will have dust settling on it every moment of the day. If you have shedding dogs or cats you will have hair settling on it. So now you need a way of wiping up and off the panel easily on a frequent basis. Remember this window is most likely out of your arms length even if lying flat on the floor - so it has to be done with extension tools. If you did all that - Now you have to deal with the light reflecting from the top surface of the viewing panel - acrylic or glass any light from above is going to create reflections that make any kind of view impossible. Any natural lighting from the 2nd story - windows or skylights - view is gone. Any ceiling or sconce lights in the room above with the viewing panel - View is gone. When we view our aquariums the light is perpindicular - to some degree - from the angle of the glass and and angle we look thru the glass. But with the light above the glass/acrylic window and you looking thru the window at the same angle the light is passing thru - reflection nightmares.

And the final nail in the coffin for a top down viewing window - the reduction of gas exchange. You're going to want a pretty big window into your tank - covering alot of the surface area - especially on a 5 or 6' deep tank - you want as much gas exhange as you can with surface agitation.


So kill the window idea - Let's have an open top viewing of the tank. No algae issues, dust and pet hair falls into the tank, but floats across the surface to the overflow get's caught by a filter mat or filter sock - isn't any big deal - I have 5 large tanks(2 are 4'x8'x16") that sit outside directly under the sun in Los Angeles. Leaves, bird crap, fire ash, gardeners blowing grass and dirt and dust. Dusty Santa Ana winds - And in 20 years of outside tanks never had an issue.

But the reflections from the lighting above off the surface is an issue and surface agitation is an issue.

With a tank of size like this you are going to have several means of flow in the tank. Returns, closed loops, internal pumps. The key is contol of the pumps. You want to have a means of shutting down the surface agitation so the the surface is still. With a still water surface you get a gorgeous view from above, although you may have to move yourself to avoid the direct reflection of your lights above the tank. Ambient room lighting - unless it's a clear skylight directly above the tank - won't be an issue. So you want to buy or build a controller system that allows you with the push of a button to shut off any of the pumps that causes the water on the surface to ripple. You want the return pump(s) to be variable speed. You may want 2 return pumps. One that returns water at the surface for lots of surface agitation and one that returns water directed to the bottom of the tank. When 'View Time' is initiated the return pump that returns at the surface slows way down to the point it stops agitating the water, and dependent upon the flow of the 2nd return pump you may have to slow it down some to stop reflected water movement from moving the surface.

Now this sounds like an easy task with some of the modern aquarium controllers. But be wary - you don't want a button that turns off these flow pumps that is on/off. Because if you turn it off to view and then forget and walk away - in a few hours your tank will be in a dire situation. So you want a push button that initiates a timer that shuts those pumps off for only 5,7, or 10 minutes and then automatically turns them back on. You can't have these on any kind of a controller function that has an 'OFF' mode - because OFF will mean deaths.

The other way of initiating this pump off viewing time is to use a common household motion detector for turning lights on/off. I had one mounted behind my 400g tank so that when you walked up to the tank the pumps slowed down and the surge tank turned off so the tank looked it's best. And with the motion sensors they can be set to be ON for as long as there is movement or a set period of time. Now a Motion Sensor is used to turn a light on - and we want to turn a group of pumps off - It's very easy to wire the Motion Sensor to turn ON a relay which then causes the Normally Closed poles to open up thus breaking the flow of electricity. You can trigger multiple relays easily if you have different groups of flow pumps. And with the relays using the Normally Closed poles, you can still have your pumps plugged into an aquarium controller for sequential power sequences, timers, maintenance schedules.

With a topless tank you will have evaporation issues. I live in Los Angeles where we have low humidity most of the time. For over 20 years my aquariums have had no top covering at all - (400g - 560g - 750g) and when it gets warm I use fans over the tank for evaporative cooling to keep it cool. We keep the back doors of the house open quite a bit. I have never had an issue with moisture or evaporation from the tank - But depending your climate and how tight you keep your house buttoned up you could - So account for ventilation specific to the area / room where the top porthole of the tank is - You will want air conditioned air flow and an air pickup that goes to a dehumdifier.

And for the construction of the 2nd floor above the tank and your opening thru the floor to view - this all needs to be waterproof construction materials - Drywall or a plaster surface will not last but a few months.


As for a 5' tall tank - Creating a beautiful coral reef and maintaining it is going to be a total Pain in the tush. I had a 36" tall 560 gallon tank - I hated it because except for the top 10" everything required tongs. And mounting frags with tongs 30" down or even 48" across at an angle on the back wall - is a task for those whose metabolism is that of a sloth. If you are going over 36" deep - and want to enjoy your tank for more than a month - then you should have a really good service team. With a 5' tall tank - it takes two people just to place corals in the tank. Once on top of the tank with tongs reaching into the tank - you can't see where you are trying to put something. It's a two person job.

And there are few significant other relationships that can endure 2 hours of you on a ladder with a coral on the pair of tongs - while someone you love keeps saying "A little More That Way" - And you have no idea what direction 'That Way' is.

Dave B

 

[Dburr1014]

Polo Reef

Welcome to Polo Reef!

www.poloreef.com

 

[SteveMM62Reef]

Extra Floor Support is a must. In my house, the plan was, 90 to 150 Gallon in the Living Room, with sump on a Stand, in the Basement. My Wife bought an Upright Piano, with the money I gave her for the house furniture , and put it there. She Never got lessons, so we have a large Carpet Weight.