Custom Stepdown Aquarium?

wilson_cbl · Sep 10, 2019

I can't find much information on the custom "stepdown" style aquarium. For anyone who doesn't know, this aquarium shape is essentially an "L" with the small part of the L pointing downward to create a very deep part of the aquarium, often at the end of a peninsula. The concept is intriguing to me because it creates a section of the aquarium that is quite deep and thus lower light which gives some interesting biodiversity options in the tank. Visually there are also some neat opportunities with aquascaping the "stepdown" area.

Does anyone have links to resources for this type of aquarium (where to purchase, aquascaping, flow)? Thanks in advance!

JoshH · Sep 10, 2019

wilson_cbl said:
I can't find much information on the custom "stepdown" style aquarium. For anyone who doesn't know, this aquarium shape is essentially an "L" with the small part of the L pointing downward to create a very deep part of the aquarium, often at the end of a peninsula. The concept is intriguing to me because it creates a section of the aquarium that is quite deep and thus lower light which gives some interesting biodiversity options in the tank. Visually there are also some neat opportunities with aquascaping the "stepdown" area.

Does anyone have links to resources for this type of aquarium (where to purchase, aquascaping, flow)? Thanks in advance!

So these Aquariums are typically called "Drop off" style Aquariums. Resources and information greatly depend on how big you would like your tank to be, there are a few manufacturers that make these in the 70G or less category. Anything larger and you would be going into a custom tank for which you would need to find a custom tank manufacturer and discuss with them what you would like. Fair warning, custom drop offs can be rather costly to both build and ship.

vetteguy53081 · Sep 10, 2019

I happen to own my second DROP OFF tank made of acrylic. As mentioned above, most will be custom made as this is a non rectangular Concept tank.. . . which will be a custom order in most cases.