The Twin's Reef Tank

[Paul Mastin]

Reefing? Never heard of it.
My twin daughters and I were discussing hobbies that we could all do together, and one of them suggested we build a fish tank. The other wanted only colorful fish, the kind that swim in the ocean. I had heard horror stories about the difficulty of maintaining a saltwater fish tank but promised to research saltwater tanks. While conducting the promised research, we discovered the so-called "reefing" community, and decided this would be a fun and educational project to do together. Here we are six months later, with a fish tank, a stand, a pile of pipes, and a rats' nest of wires we are slowly transforming into a fish tank!

The Tank
After some reading, we opted for a 75 gallon tank. This is our first tank, and we opted for a 75 gallon tank because smaller tanks are more delicate and difficult to maintain, and larger tanks are more cumbersome and costly. This size seemed to strike the balance.

After some internet research, we decided to buy a tank from Custom Aquariums. We ordered a 48-inch long, 18-inch wide, 24-inch high tank and opted for the 1/2 inch glass on all sides. I really liked the design of Custom Aquarium's H2Overflow and their Siphon Stoppers and ordered these as well. I had initially thought I would try my hand at drilling the tank, but I decided the probability and cost of me shattering the tank far outweighed the price Custom Aquariums charged me to drill the tank at the factory. I ordered the tank in early September 2018 and received it in mid-November.

The packing and delivery was outstanding, and I'm very pleased with the tank! I had it delivered to my parents' home in Virginia, and I then shipped it to Mexico City in the same crate in which I received it. It arrived without incident!

The Stand
Naturally, a fish tank needs a stand. I initially looked at commercially-available stands, but I couldn't find one that would suffice in a style I liked. Many are constructed using particle board which melts when it gets wet. I looked at the stands Custom Aquariums sells, however, none of their designs caught my fancy. After some Google research, I found JHawkins14's stand and his outstanding Instructables page complete with SketchUp plans. My parents graciously agreed to help me construct the stand, and we started in August 2018 and finished in late December. In my next post, I'll detail the stand's construction and some of the tweaks we made while building it.

 

[hdsoftail1065]

Nice looking stand!

 

[Dub_G]

Nice looking stand and welcome to R2R. This is a great community to help you on your path. Looking forward to your build.

 

[SPR1968]

You’ve made a fine job of the stand for sure and keep the pictures coming

And welcome to R2R!

 

[Paul Mastin]

Original Plans
As mentioned before, I wasn’t able to find a commercially-available stand that met my rather specific design and functional requirements. After some extensive internet research, I located jhawkins14’s fabulous Make a Better than New Aquarium Stand on instructables.com. His instructions are very robust, and come complete with SketchUp files. I've also included my rather sub-par, relatively speaking, plans I used while constructing the stand. I did make some modifications as I went along, so none of these are likely to be final dimensions. Unfortunately, many of these are under a couple of coats of paint on the stand itself



Why I Chose this Design

1. Simple physics; fish tanks weigh a lot and the bulk of the weight is held by the four corner posts and reinforced by the panels.
2. Cabinet should withstand significant humidity changes without visually impacting the aesthetics of the cabinet. I constructed the cabinet in humid Virginia; in the two months I've had it in Mexico City, it already has contracted significantly. Once I get the tank running, I expect it to expand again given the amount of water vapor that will evaporate from the sump inside the cabinet.
3. Great aesthetics; it doesn't look like a pile of 2x4's I drywall-screwed together to make a stand.

Design Modifications

1. Added cabinet fan to promote air circulation.
2. Increased the height by about eight inches to accommodate the various pieces of equipment.
3. Added a second cabinet door. This required a lot of math.

Materials and Finishing

1. The painted surfaces of the cabinet are constructed of poplar. I sanded them using 180 grit sandpaper and primed them using Zinsser BIN, a shellac-based primer. After the primer had fully cured, I sanded the surfaces with 220 grit sandpaper. I painted the surfaces with two to three coats of Sherwin Williams’ oil-based ProClassic Alkyd Interior Enamel. The paint was challenging to find; I was in Washington D.C. at the time. Fortunately, the Warrenton branch carried the paint.
2. The top of the cabinet is walnut. I first attempted a shellac-based finish which failed miserably. On my second attempt, I used Behlen’s Rockhard Table Top Urethane Varnish in a satin finish. This worked much better, though it needed about five or six coats with light sanding sanding between each coat.

Essential Tools

1. Good measuring tape, use the same one and measure twice and cut once. I measured the hole for the cabinet fan incorrectly. Fortunately, I was able to salvage the panel and didn’t have to make a new one.
2. Planer.
3. Table saw.
4. Kreg jig for making pocket holes.
5. Good featherboard (Rockler sells a great one!)

What Would I do Differently Next Time?

1. I wish I had made the stand taller to accommodate all of the sump equipment and have the cabinet's interior "floor" flush with the cabinet doors. The original plans cited this issue, and I didn't account for the height of all of my equipment. An inch sounds like a lot of extra room to the furniture designer, but to the "reefer," an inch isn’t nearly enough room to maneuver the skimmer in and out of place. In the end, everything fit into place nicely, I just wish I didn't have the four inch difference between the bottom of the cabinet doors and the floor of the cabinet.
2. I didn't expect to need a chiller. My reality might be different (time will tell) and I wish my stand had the space to accommodate a dreaded chiller.

Photos!
I've attached a number of photos showing construction along the way. All in all, it was a lot of fun to build, and my parents' construction knowledge, tools, garage, and experience were invaluable throughout.



1) Construction of the base. Woo hoo! Something to show for the hours of quality time with the planer and table saw. We started with a pile of rough-sawn lumber.



2) Assembling the corner posts. This photo demonstrates the ingenious "channel" system from the original plans. The base and top are essentially two boards with half the channel routed out glued and screwed together.



3) Primer! One of the few photos showing what we spent the majority of our time doing.



4) Does it fit? After an untold number of weekends machining various pieces of wood, sanding, and priming them, we finally reached the point where we could put the various pieces together. Fortunately, my algebra wasn't too rusty as we didn't need to make too many modifications.



5) The inside photo of our assembly job. I like these two photos because they show how the panels are constructed. The horizontal trim boards that run the length of the cabinet fit into the routed channels along with the actual panel.



6) Everything still fits! I decided to add a second door at this phase. Fortunately, it didn't require too many extra pieces. We also cut two pieces to cover the unused portions of the channel in the bottom and top where the doors would go.



7) Tapered corners fit! I followed the original instructions to the letter, making adjustments (dusted off those trigonometry skills!) as necessary to account for the fact my table legs are longer than those in the original plans.



8) All four corners in place. We all breathed a sigh of relief at this point.



9) I included this picture to show the removable panels in the back and side. It also is one of the few, well-lit photos of the cabinet's back side that I have.



10) Let the painting begin! I was tied up at work and so my mom graciously took on much of the painting.



11) Cabinet doors attached.



12) ...and they even open!



13) Walnut top attached. I originally tried to use a shellac-based finish. In the end, we opted for varnish because we couldn't get the shellac to go on smoothly.



14) Decorative corbels attached! Just in time for the moving truck.

 

[Paul Mastin]

Plumbing
First and foremost, hats off to all the fantastic plumbing setups out there! I especially appreciated the fine work done by @Broadfield, which served as one of the primary sources of inspiration for my own plumbing setup.

I chose the Trigger Systems' Ruby 30 sump, primarily because it was available and fit inside the stand I was in the process of building. I wanted the plumbing setup to be able to power at least three canister-style filters and liked the variable speed feature of DC-powered water pumps. I settled on the Neptune COR20 for the return pump and purchased three Aquamaxx Fluidized GFO and Carbon Filter Media Reactors, two of the standard size and one of the smaller sizes. For the overflow, I utilized Custom Aquariums' H2Overflow and for the return, I purchased two of Custom Aquariums' Siphon Stoppers. For the drains, I used a Herbie-style overflow with a gate valve on the primary drain to allow me to control the water flow to the sump.

After a non-insignificant quantity of hours spent measuring, cutting, gluing, and when things didn't fit, remeasuring, recutting, and re-gluing, I finished my plumbing setup. To all the plumbers of the world, I have a new found respect for your craft. It is a remarkable skill!



1. Theoretically, at least according to my plans and measurements, this pile of parts will eventually carry water to and from the sump. Perhaps this was more than I bargained for? All I know is that PVC Fittings Online (https://www.pvcfittingsonline.com/) was an invaluable source for some of the more obscure PVC fittings.



2. An inch seems a lot bigger on paper than it does in real life, is all of this plumbing going to fit inside of here?



3. Voila, the finished manifold. I wish I had a picture for each joint I glued. Alas, I'm not sure anyone would want to see the 30+ joints I glued.



4. The final plumbing setup with two of the filtration canisters in place.

 

[Paul Mastin]

Whoot! Whoot! Thanks @Bulk Reef Supply for the 7,296 reefer points!!!

 

[Kmack0415]

Hey Paul, so I'm trying to figure out some specifics about the stand you built, I to found the instructable which led me to you. Since you built your stand not that long ago, and it looks like you improved on the original design, I'm hoping you might be able to help me out. So I'm a mechanic by trade, fairly handy but I don't have a lot of woodworking experience, the tank I'm attempting to build the stand for is a 4ft 120 gallon, so I'll have to change the depth of the stand but no biggie there... That being said I understand the basic plans for the stand however the one thing that has been really confusing me are the inset panels, I just don't understand how you made those work! I know the original instructable called for them to be planed then biscuited but to my untrained eye it looks like you pocket screwed everything and didn't plane the insets and used boards over your uprights for the moulding, is that correct? Also now that you have had your stand up for what looks like about a year, is there anything you wish you had done differently?