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OrionGirl

No freelancing!
Aug 14, 2001
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Poconos
Real Name
Sheila
As most of you know, the SW tanks in my house are actually my boyfriends, and I just help out and do R&D.

He's decided to upgrade tanks. Not a bad idea, and I'm sure the fish will appreciate it. He wants to move from 65's to 120's, and will be building the stand and canopy.

So here's the question. The idea is to have one stand that has both tanks on it, and a sump between them, with about a 24 inch table top between the tanks. Total length will be 10 feet. Planning on using 2X6's for all structural areas, with a full wood bottom. He wants to have the bottom frame be just an open box of 2X6's, 10 foot front and back and about 2 foot on the sides. I think the tank would benefit from having a few cross beams somewhere around the middle, to help keep the long run straight.

Can anyone tell me if this is needed? Are the 2X6's strong enough to support the 120's? We're figuring each tank will weigh around 1400 lbs, with sand, rock and water.
 

Corax

Temporarily risen from the dead..
Nov 14, 2001
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Tough one. Technically, a 2x6 could carry that load with a fair margin for safety...... But if it were me, I'd use a 2x8 with lots of cross bracing. The reason for that is that water is not a static load, it moves, sort of. The forces a swirling tank of water puts on a rigid frame are pretty interesting to say the least. Go get a bowl of water and create a whirlpool in the middle of it with your finger, then let go of the bowl and watch how it moves. Those same forces of torque and tension are present in a fish tank. Now, will it cause a problem? Doubtful, but when dealing with that much water, do ya wanna find out the hard way? Use the 2x8s, you'll sleep better at night =)
 

Corax

Temporarily risen from the dead..
Nov 14, 2001
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Depending on the design of your table, I'd make all the vertical members 4x4 and the horizontals 2x8 with cross members of 2x4. Over-engineering does make sense sometimes. Yer talking nearly 2 tons here, maybe more eventually.

How are you jointing the members?
 

OrionGirl

No freelancing!
Aug 14, 2001
14,053
342
143
Poconos
Real Name
Sheila
I'm not sure. The design has to be something we can move--the stand that has the 65's and 50 on it right now is almost more than we can move by ourselves, especially down stairs. I'd prefer to build 3 structures, that get mounted together downstairs, but I'm not the designer!

For previous smaller tanks, we've just butted the ends together and screwed them. For the 65's, we used joist brackets, so I imagine we'd do the same for this, since it's a larger tank.

And yes, a bit more than 4000--we're putting it closer to 5000, since there will also be a 55 gallon sump and 65 gallon fuge in there somewhere as well. It will have a wood bottom--probably 3/4 plywood, and it's a concrete floor.
 

Corax

Temporarily risen from the dead..
Nov 14, 2001
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I'd do a multi-piece unit too. That's gonna be a pretty heavy stand. Joist hangers are good, that's what I was gonna suggest.
 
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