19 replies to this topic

[wigarus]

On the 23-5-11, I decided to turn our unused formal dining room into a built in fish tank room



I masked up the end of the room and installed plastic from floor to ceiling so that I could get grinding!



Marked out the wall to be cut for the new door frame and drilled the top corners so I can mark out on the other side.



I cut the wall out with a 9 inch grinder with a diamond disc and kept vacuuming all the dust after letting it settle for 20 minutes or so. It was a painful process and next time, I will probably use a 13 inch demolition wet saw.



door frame installed



tank ready to go in





stud framing and aquarium stand installed. My old man is a carpenter- joiner so gave me a hand with this.





tank in

[wigarus]

PGI frame above tank.





Plasterboard and cornice installed





filled with sand - you can see the light fitting I made with fluros, PGI and chain.



rinsing the sand







all the limestone from my previous tank - still needed more though



outlet side of tank



light plugs - the light switches are connected to these plugs so that I can attach a timer if I want.



heater and airpump power - I have a 4 outlet and a 2 outlet air pump all running 12 inch airstones which stop around 200mm from the inlet side of the tank and all of the air stones are covered with black river stones. The 4 outlet airpump is on a timer so its not on While we are sleeping as its right next to our master bedroom.



15mm PVC pipe brings fresh water in from the hose cock outside.

[wigarus]

new limestone installed - the limestone on the LH side and RH side that cover the inlet and outlet and heaters etc, have been ground relatively smooth on bricks so that they sit nice and snug against the sides of the tank. You can just see the heater from the very right bottom of the tank but yi=ou have to be in a very awkward position. also the tops of a few pieces of limestone have been cut with a diamond blade so that they sit just below the lids and just above the water line.



inlet, heater and airline side




outlet side



view from home theatre with all of todays limestone installed.


outlet side photo taken today. notice the towel rail





inlet side from a few different angles.

If you're interested in some of my other comments, check out my album www.photobucket.com/kyelsfishtank

[STEVEGREEN]

awesome mate,

love the step and filter room

cheers
Steve green

[Niz]

Very nice room conversion. Where did you source the metal door frame from?

[wigarus]

Cheers for the comments. The door frame is a split frame, so it comes in 2 halves and is designed to be screwed into stud work. You can get them from any plasterboard supplier.

The step is just left over studs. Its only temporary until i can find something 400mm wide that folds up

[spite333]

Very cool. Well done

cheers mike

[keenas]

Interested in doing more? Great job

[Bowdy]

Looks great mate well done.

[richardc4873]

Sweet! Great journal. Tank looks very impressive.

[jslayz]

Top effort wigarus!!

Clean professional finish, thanks for documenting and sharing.

Sit back and enjoy,

J

PS are those Aaron ATS speakers, nice!

[keenas]

^^ I recon they could be Yamaha speakers from their component setup...

[wigarus]

Yeah they are yamaha's. Cheers for everyones comments.

[sandgroper]

Just noticed the back edge of the tank doesn't have any support, other wise looking great. cheers steve

[ado]

Looks fantastic! Really impressive!

[Raskal]

amazing! you could do this for a living! looks brilliant

well done mate

[nvrenuf]

Looks awesome..

I reckon a finishing touch would be a frame around the giprock around tank and a shelf at bottom of tank front side with couple bar stools

[wigarus]

Yeah cheers, but to be honest, I specifically didn't want to have a frame around the tank.

No offense to anyone that does have a frame around their built in tanks, but I've always thought they looked really old fashioned.

[nvrenuf]

Yeah true never thought of that.

[Alex Hill]

I think that if the frames fit the style of the house they can look quite nice. Like these ones:






Personally I prefer the white one though.

Edited by Alex Hill, 31 January 2013 - 09:33 PM.