20'L x 4'W x 2.5'T Metal stand?

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wcgunns

Plecostomus
MFK Member
Apr 26, 2010
343
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DFW, Texas
Needing some input on my stand build. It will be made out of 2" 14ga box tubing on 2' centers. Im planning on having the perimeter of the bottom and top of the stand welded as two rectangles and then have cross members and up rights/legs every 2'. So there will be a support running length wise down the center of the stand as well if you can picture that. It will look like a bunch of 2'x2' squares if looking from the top. I will also have 1.5" of plywood on the top. The tank will be 3' tall and it will be made of metal also. The only wood is the top of the stand. Thanks


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Sounds like a very strong stand that could support that anyday.

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I just shot you a PM with a link to a thread on a different forum that might be helpful.

My stand is 2x2 square tube @ .125" and it is handling my tank fine. My stand is 10x3x3 with supports 30" apart (your idea of every 24" is even better). My tank is 10x3x4T so including the weight of the acrylic, the stand supports about 7,600lbs.

I live in earthquake country, so I'm happy my tank has those gussets (triangle supports) for extra shear strength; not sure you would need that since you probably don't get quakes in Texas.

DSC06369.JPG

DSC06369.JPG
 
Check out the steel tube institute for specs. Any sketches of your design?
 
wcgunns said:
Needing some input on my stand build. It will be made out of 2" 14ga box tubing on 2' centers. Im planning on having the perimeter of the bottom and top of the stand welded as two rectangles and then have cross members and up rights/legs every 2'. So there will be a support running length wise down the center of the stand as well if you can picture that. It will look like a bunch of 2'x2' squares if looking from the top. I will also have 1.5" of plywood on the top. The tank will be 3' tall and it will be made of metal also. The only wood is the top of the stand. Thanks


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Click to expand...

Here's our 15' x 4' x 2' stand
IMG_05342.jpg



After powder coating
topofstand.jpg



002.jpg


We had originally purchased 2.5" tubular steel, but the tank salesman insisted that we needed 3.5" tubular steel....all for an acrylic tank. Overbuilding never hurt anything, I guess. We were also instructed to use 1.5" marine grade plywood on top of the stand.


I originally thought we would build a stand sort of like this stand for a 4,000 gallon tank
stand.jpg


Here's the thread when it was first installed as a SW tank. The tank changed hands several times and is now owned by bigrich545.
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/f...000-Gallon-tank-install-(H20-Custom-Aquatics)
 
pacu mom said:
Here's our 15' x 4' x 2' stand
IMG_05342.jpg



After powder coating
topofstand.jpg



002.jpg


We had originally purchased 2.5" tubular steel, but the tank salesman insisted that we needed 3.5" tubular steel....all for an acrylic tank. Overbuilding never hurt anything, I guess. We were also instructed to use 1.5" marine grade plywood on top of the stand.


I originally thought we would build a stand sort of like this stand for a 4,000 gallon tank
stand.jpg


Here's the thread when it was first installed as a SW tank. The tank changed hands several times and is now owned by bigrich545.
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/f...000-Gallon-tank-install-(H20-Custom-Aquatics)
Click to expand...

Wow beast off a stand
 
Not sure what you need input on, it sounds good to me! I'm not sure how thick 14ga steel is but I think you'd want around 3mm wall thickness for that design with 2' centres. A friend and I are both in the process of setting up tanks with 8x4' footprints and did our stands differently; his was all 50x50mm box with a set of legs down the middle, I used 100x50x5mm for the 4' span front-to-back.



Only thing I'd do differently next time would be using threaded adjustable feet. We just spend about an hour trying to get mine level and evenly supported with shims, the feet are far far easier, as long as you have enough to distribute the weight. Concrete floors are never perfectly level...
 
I wanted trench drains around the perimeter of our equipment room. Instead, I got a cement slab that slopes toward two floor drains. Unfortunately, the cement "expert" started the slant in the area that had to be "perfectly level". Fortunately for us, enough of the slab was level, that the beast of a stand and the tank were level in all directions. It was not a difficult task to place shims in the gaps. It sure does look scary, though.

2011-10-04002002.jpg
 
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