300ish Gallon plywood - First attempt

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
In other news. I fired off an email to the Insul-X company. I'm really leaning towards the rubber based paint.

The epoxy will seal better but if it were to flex at all it would crack it. Which kinda scares me.
 
Nice work so far,

Subscribed, watching and taking notes, Starting mine in January as soon as I paint a house and move in.

Bear
 
Ok picked up 4 sheets of 3/4" 7 ply cabinet grade Birch plywood today. If I can get a hand I'll start cutting the tank tonight otherwise I'll just countinue work on the sump.

Pics later tonight if I get anything done. It's 45 degrees in the shop. Kinda slows me down. Started a fire. Hopefully it cuts the chill a bit.
 
Sorry for the non update last night. It was/is brutal cold in the shop. Warming it up now.

But I had no help last night and swinging around a sheet of 3/4" plywood isn't easy and I didn't want to hit the '29 we have stored in there. That would be bad.

My helper gets done with his college classes early today so should be able to get somewhere today.
 
Doing a bit more on the stand while waiting my assistant.

Front trim in place.
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Doors need another coat of paint before they are good to go but should be on soon. Painting all the door hinges and hardware black as an accent color.

The paint looks plain gray in the shop but when I brought the stand upstairs it is about 1-2 shades off my walls which is weird as they are a blue/gray base.
 
Ok. Tank construction has begun.

Once I got some help things progressed along pretty quickly.

Here is the tank assembled. Upside down
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Kinda hard to tell in this picture but most of the screw hole are predrilled and countersunk.
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Better picture of my holes. They are 2 inches on center which is probably overboard but I really don't want this to come apart at all. Adds up to like 104 screws securing the base piece to the 4 sides.
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Also probably overboard but I'm still using the box of 2 1/2" screws I bought. So thats about 1 3/4" into the side pieces.
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I need to make a trip to the hardware store again. I stupidly drilled to high on the side board and hit on of my screws which snapped off my drill bit. I don't seem to have any that will fit in the #8 countersink holder so I need another.

But that concludes this update. Might get a bit more done tonight but not much. Going to a friends for a pizza and beer in an hour or two.
 
Got a new drill bit and finished drilling, countersinking, and screwing all the holes on this thing minus the top which is still in question.

I had 2 blow outs. Not bad for over 250 holes. They are both near the top of the tank and will be filled in the 2 part epoxy and sanded flat before it gets painted and water proofed.

As far as waterproofing goes. I just ordered 1 gallon of Black - Rubber based pool paint from my local ace hardware for 40 bucks. Any other color was 5 dollars more but I wanted the black though so worked out nicely. The pro paint shop in town has the same product but sells it for 65 a gallon and would charge me 30-40 dollars shipping on any special orders. No such fee from Ace. Gotta love that.

It should be here Thursday which gives me lots of time to finish out my sump and get it ready for the test waterproofing and fill.
 
Muni;3674357; said:
As far as waterproofing goes. I just ordered 1 gallon of Black - Rubber based pool paint from my local ace hardware for 40 bucks.
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Thanks for all of the updates.

Regarding a post you made further up, did the company tell you the epoxy could crack during flexing? All of the solvent-based epoxy paints I am familiar with are remarkably flexible. Some of the new waterborne types like for garage floors are pretty brittle, however. They are really a totally different formulation from what I understand.

Regardless, I think I speak for a lot of people here when I say I'm really looking forward to hearing about how this 1K Rubber Pool Paint works. $40 per gallon and no shipping is CHEAP.

Ask the company when you hear from them what mil thickness they would recommend for sealing plywood.
 
I have been reading your updates. I find it very interesting. I was thinking of building my own tank out of lexan. Keep up the good work. I'm looking forward to reading more about your tank.
 
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