New Concrete Tank Build - planning and research stage

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Way to go, a future fish house disguised as a garage.
So when the second tank goes in you can just park in the street again.
Cause lets face it stocking and maintaining this tank or 2 a new car is just out of the question.
 
Way to go, a future fish house disguised as a garage.
So when the second tank goes in you can just park in the street again.
Cause lets face it stocking and maintaining this tank or 2 a new car is just out of the question.

True, there's never enough money....
 
I might be looking at something sort of like this in that lately I have been looking at putting up ether a steel arch garage like building or a steel pole back barn in the back yard to house my train set. But no mater which type of building I look at they all need a cement base pored for them. So lately I was thinking if they are going to have to come in and dump cement if I go though with this idea some time in the future. Than why not build some wooden forms for a large cement tank and have the cement truck fill that up with cement along with the rest of the building's base. I'm even working on ideas on Google sketch up.
 
Just a couple side notes.

Calling concrete "cement" is lile calling cake "flour". Cement is an ingredient in a concrete mix.

You get two guarantees with concrete:
It's gonna crack!
Nobody is gonna steal it!
 
Just a couple side notes.

Calling concrete "cement" is lile calling cake "flour". Cement is an ingredient in a concrete mix.

You get two guarantees with concrete:
It's gonna crack!
Nobody is gonna steal it!

LOL. I know water can be held in concrete tanks. It's been done before and I'm going to give it a shot. From what I have seen in other large concrete builds is the large tank is actually a couple smaller tanks just overfilled to make one large tank. For example the base of most larger builds is a concrete tub with a few dividers. Water can be lowered to below the glass viewing panel and there would still be 2 or even 3 feet more water in the tubs. That way the fish wont have to be moved for maintenance. Just lower the water and a glass/acrylic panel can be replaced if needed. Each tub can be drained individually for crack repair and so on.
I plan to have a 6 foot deep tank. The bottom two feet will be a concrete tub and the top 4 feet will be a 8X4 sheets of acrylic. I'm leaning towards two 8X4 acrylic panels on the long part of the L and one 8X4 sheet on the short side. The corner will have a 3 foot wall going from the front corner to the back corner of the tank. That way I can drain one side of the L and the other side will still have three feet of water for the fish. I might even go with a 4 foot wall cutting the L tank in half if I lower the water level to 4 feet.

Anyway this is still just a dream, but the planning is fun :)
 
nice thread... have you thought of cinder blocks? ive been looking into other options besides wood framed ones.. and the local lfs has a nice sw ray pond that is cinder blocks. no viewing glass though but its short enough you dont need one.
 
Cement in away is easier in that you build wooden forms to hold it in and have it pored along at the same time as the concert slab when you build the building.
 
Cement in away is easier in that you build wooden forms to hold it in and have it pored along at the same time as the concert slab when you build the building.

I think I'm going to do mine in two parts. Step one will be the garage. Step two will be the tank. That way I can remove it if I wanted or needed if I sell the place.
 
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