hi im in the process of planning my first plywood build. i would like to make it 2'x6' x6' tall. this comes out to about 540 gallons and will fit good where i want to put it. for the front and back i would need to seam together plywood pieces to get 6' tall. I want to use three pieces that would each be 2' tall. then i would put a 16" viewing window in each of the three panels on just the front side. i would seam the pieces together with probably 4x4s on the inside that way i could screw the plywood to them and they would also serve as a rest for the top two windows. then epoxy and silicon the whole inside of course. does this seem like a good idea? (as far as being structurally sound) if not what could i do to make it work? any help would be nice. thanks!
help with plywood build 540 gallon
- Thread starter tjschultz
- Start date
Too many seams, and I think it's too high for the footprint. If this is your first build, you might want to consider a more traditional size.
disregarding the seams and sealing of the tank, do you think that the plywood and 4x4 structure would physically be able to hold up to the pressure of the water. i would think so because if it were to bow it would have to bend all the plywood, the two 4x4 supports, and the supports across the top.
If you want to look at it that way I guess that the wood would hold the pressure of the water. I just think the overall idea is a bad one. But, that's my opinion and please feel free to prove me wrong. My wife takes great pleasure in it.
BadOleRoss;4334464; said:
Agreeable 110%, Ross. My sentiments exactly. Something like a 4 ft long x 3 ft wide (front to back) x 24 inches tall = out to be around 230 US Gallons. Sound more plausible and sensible to me. The tank you're contemplating on building will be close to 538 US Gallons. Not to mention with a tank that tall, the entire tank possibly will require structural framing on the outside so all of the wall pannels don't fatigue and blow out, causing a massive mess and water damage to your floor. Hence a greater material cost for wood supplies alone.
If this tank is going to be 6' high, the viewing glass is going to be monsterously thick and severly heavy. Not to mention the cost for the glass alone.
My DIY build for my 12 x 4 x 4 volume build was going to cost me $3,500.00 for a 11' X 3' sheet of glass 2.0" thick. WOW! What an eye opener, Ross?
The way you plan to place the seams doesn't sit well w/me either. I've never built a tank that tall(an probably never will get the chance to), but IF I were to try, i think it would be safer, to only have one seam going vertically down the middle to give you two 6'hx3'w viewing windows, like this:
thanks guys. t i think i do agree with you all that the design and price tag of this tank is probably too much for me. i think i may just go with a more normal size and build it 2x2x8. i think that comes to about 240 gallons and would be less than half the price of my first idea
I feel like weve talked another one off the ledge! 2x2x8 is a great size for a build. If you go to the link at the bottom of this post you can follow that link to the build I recently finished. It was about 2.5x2.5x7.5...pretty close. You might want to also look through the DIY build sticky at the top of this section, lots of good reading and info there.
Sticking w/standard sizes for wood will make things so much easier in the long run. 8x2x2 is a good choice, unless you have room for an extra wide footprint, in which case a 8x4 floor would be great in allowing you to keep some of the big'ish fish out there comfortably. Also you can consider taking apart glass tanks to use as the front window for your DIY. Search craigslist for cracked tanks or even glass table tops.