I am planning an in-wall aquarium, and leaning towards doing in-tank filtration (matten filter specifically - but I don't want to derail the post with that detail). The back of the tank I will be doing a 3D background, and then the sides of the tank would have the matten filters.
The main viewing pane of the aquarium will be in the main living room / TV room of the basement, and my wife wants as clean of a look as possible - the "picture frame" style. She is against having doors above it for access, and since she is agreeing to the tank I'm choosing my battles wisely! The tank itself will sit in the utility room, where obviously cosmetics don't matter at all.
For the filtration it would be nice to use up the entire length of both side walls, but that would then mean from no where in the utility room would I be able to see in to the side of the tank. For feeding the fish and cleaning the tank I would exclusively be able to see in from the top of the tank.
I feel like I have seen a lot of plywood builds do an in-wall style, such that they also would only be able to see in from the top of the tank while they are cleaning / feeding.
So my question is then, is that really annoying?
The alternative would be leaving part of one side wall (or part of both side walls) open as a window, but that would decrease the filter surface area quite a bit.
The main viewing pane of the aquarium will be in the main living room / TV room of the basement, and my wife wants as clean of a look as possible - the "picture frame" style. She is against having doors above it for access, and since she is agreeing to the tank I'm choosing my battles wisely! The tank itself will sit in the utility room, where obviously cosmetics don't matter at all.
For the filtration it would be nice to use up the entire length of both side walls, but that would then mean from no where in the utility room would I be able to see in to the side of the tank. For feeding the fish and cleaning the tank I would exclusively be able to see in from the top of the tank.
I feel like I have seen a lot of plywood builds do an in-wall style, such that they also would only be able to see in from the top of the tank while they are cleaning / feeding.
So my question is then, is that really annoying?
The alternative would be leaving part of one side wall (or part of both side walls) open as a window, but that would decrease the filter surface area quite a bit.
