PlanetCatfish.com

In the process of designing my first 'rack' of tanks for keeping a few small cory's and plecs. A couple of questions for those who have practical experiance...

Is an 8" (200mm) clearance from tank top to bottom of shelf above going to be enough 'working room' ?

Im a tallish guy (6'2") what is the highest I should consider having the top tank shelf at ?

Im thinking of making the smaller tanks on the rack 18"w x 18"d x 8"h sacrificing water volume for substrate area, I figure 1" of substrate (sand) 1" for plumbing leaves 6" of water (this was recommended to me by a fellow running a similar rack design for common ancistrus) anyone had any experiance with such shallow tanks ? anything I should be aware of in a shallow tank? I hopeing to hold 4-5 corys in a tank this size, or a pair of small (< 5") plecos.

Many thanks for any advice anyone can give.

The tank size you're considering makes about 11 US gal, or 42 liters. That's, I think, fine for Cory's, but I would consider it on the small side for a 5" pleco, at least if you're looking to breed rather than just keep them. It's probably a good idea to extend one direction a little bit, say 24" or 27" instead of 18" on the "front". [I'm assuming your shelfs are 18" deep, which is why you'd come up with the square design.

I'm sure you can keep them on the smaller volume, but it's always better to have spare volume.

The other thought on a 5" pleco in shallow water is that it can hardly sit on the side glass without either touching the bottom or being above water.

I think 8" space between tanks is plenty, especially if your tanks are that shallow (no need for long handled nets for instance).

--
Mats

Fuglydragon,
Are you thinking about a two or three shelf rack? I have a three shelf rack and the top shelf is not the problem; it is actually the bottom shelf. I never see anything in those tanks. I thought I took this into account designing the rack and placed the bottom shelf 10 inches off the ground. I am also tall though (6'4") and have come to hate the bottom shelf. I have 8.5 inches between each shelf and would consider that a minimum. 9-10 inches of working space would make me happier. The lip of the tanks on the top shelf is 5'6" from the ground and I have no problem working on them. What I hope to eventually do is place the stand on bricks to raise it another 6 inches. Then I will have two custom tanks made for the top shelf that are 48 in by 16 by 8 high. This would be great loricariinae/cory tanks and would only raise the height to the top tank's lip to 5'8" (current tanks are all 12 in high).
-Shane

I agree with Shane!

I got a 4 shelf rack (exactly like the things in the LFS) and catching fish from the lowest tank involves me crawling around on all fours, and banging my head against the second-level tank......

the topmost tank opens at 2 meters, but that's where all those plastic kitchen "whatchamacallit-stairthingies" come in.
very easy to reach, and I prefer standing up straight when catching fish to crawling on the floor.

with waterchanges it's also better, the upper tanks go fast when I hang the hose, the lowest tank goes slooooowwww....because the bucket is almost as high as the tank.

If I ever set up a new shelf; I'd go for 3 instead of 4, and raise the lowest level, till it's at least 1 foot above the floor (bottomlevel lowest tank).

Well I'm 5'6" and I hate my bottom tanks too

Thanks guys, thats exactly what I was after, never occured to me that the bottom tank could be a concern but of course its going to be. Back to the drawing board as far as rack dimensions go.

Im planning for a 4 level rack with 36"x18"8" (200mm) high tanks divided in two with internal dividers giving me 8 tanks. I need room for a sump under each rack and again the comments above make me think putting the sump on the floor isnt going to help with any syphoning that needs doing, so I'd better have that raised a few inches too.

Its going in a Garage with plenty of wall space, and I agree a kitchen step ladder thingamajic is preferable to rolling around on the floor.

Thanks all I really appreciate the input.

If you have plenty of wall space give some real thought before going four high. I think with three high you can reach the top tank and keep the lowest row high enough to see the fish without laying on the floor (laying on the living room floor is one thing, laying on the garage floor another).
Also, think very long and hard about a sump, which I assume is for central filtration. Unless you plan to only keep a few species that all require the exact same water chemistry and temperature you will not be happy. You will also need extra space for extra quarantine tanks as you can not use the central filtration tanks. Lastly, these systems do not work really well for breeding as you can not specifically control the temperature or water chemistry in just one tank (sensitive cory fry will not always appreciate the blasts of cold water that get their parents spawning). Finally, a sump is, in a sense, just a wasted aquarium since it takes up all the space of a tank and can not hold fish.
I am not saying centralized filtration can not be put to good use, just that in my experience most aquarists are not happy with it for long because their interests and/or needs change.
-Shane

Thanks for the tips Shane.
After much much debate and consideration I decided to go with several small racks each on its own sump rather than seperate filters / heating for each tank purely on a cost consideration. Quality equipment is expensive here in NZ my Eheim 2324 cost me around $450 USD and 'she who must be obyed' is allready making subtle comments about the price of my latest fish project.

The plan is to treat each rack as if it were just one large tank representing fish(es) from a particular river / area. Starting off with small specimens and then building larger racks as the need arises (and 'her indoors' is swayed to the fun of having a fish house). Im not so much concerned about breeding at this stage, I allready have 40 or so common ancistrus fry in my community tank that I'm struggling to get rid of, can't cath the female or male to stop the little bleeders muliplying.

Had a play around with the racks at my LFS this morning, its a small specialist shop, the guys there really know there stuff. Picked up a few useful tips like putting the lighting on a slideing curtain rail so it can be slid to the back of the tank when you need to get in there to work, and slid foward again when you are done. Actually getting my hands in the tanks helped, I'm now sure that 8" clearance will be good, they only have 5" and i could still work a syphon tube and net with ease.

Im working on a basic plan, ill post it here when its done for comment.

Cheers

In terms of heating, undertank heating for racks is, in my experience, very efficient and cheaper.

It does however mean that each row of tanks will be approx. the same temp., but in a fishroom the lower tanks are always cooler and your Xingu plecos all go in the top row.

Jools

And another reason NOT to build central filtration:
there's almost aslways 1 tank in such a rack where fish come and go; even if they're not new-comers (like Shane says, you need a separate quarantaine tank for those)

some fish just don't like to be dragged from tank to tank, and even fish that have been in your care for years can "catch a cold" (develop a disease)
If such a fish carries a nasty disease it'll spread in NO time through ALL your tanks, including the tanks with the breeding pairs and the fry-tanks

That alone should warn everyone off central filtersystems.

Well can I have another moan



in my last house I did away with my bottom row of tanks bar a 4 footer along one wall so reducing to 54 tanks of various sizes. However I had to move at short notice and because of limited new space my tanks went from numbering 54 to 36 so I had no option but to use tank space lower down, but; I am thinking of a total redesign at the lower end

Well im still umming and ahhing like an old woman (no offense to any old women reading this) This is what I have come up with so far.

A modular stackable stand that hopefully will support tanks between 12" and 18" wide. Each level will be screwed to the one below with screw plates.



Im having serious second thoughts about the 4 levels, with this design I can add remove levels as required, here is my planned rack (4 levels).



Anyone spot any glaring newbie mistakes I have missed ? Will the tanks be well enough supported on the two 3,5" wide cross beams or should I add a shelf ?

Many thanks for the comments so far and any to come.

Use bracing cross bars for any horizontal length over 3'. If you can persuade scotcat to post in here, he built my old fishroom from 2"x1" wood in a similar fashion. It had 3 rows (no sump).

Jools

Please be careful with any tank hanging over the edge. I'm a middle age lady, 5'0" tall with spinal arthritis(ankylosing spondylitis). I made the newbie rack mistake of utilizing a bottom rack at all. I was on the floor and couldn't get up! I had fun laying on the floor, watching the glass box. It was quite relaxing. I'll be moving that tank quite soon. I guess racks aren't such a good idea for me.

Fugly dragon,
A couple suggestions:
1) As you stated, 5 levels (not 4 as you have to count the sump) is way too high. You will not see the bottom tanks nor be able to reach the top ones.
2) I would go with angle iron over wood. I had the below stand made by a welder for under US $100. Wood takes up far more space, is heavy to move, and eventually rots. The below stand is 55" high (ground to top shelf), 81" long and 12" deep. I usually load it with 6 ten gallon tanks and 4 twenty gallon "long" tanks. When empty, I can easily move it around by myself.
-Shane

Jools wrote:In terms of heating, undertank heating for racks is, in my experience, very efficient and cheaper.

It does however mean that each row of tanks will be approx. the same temp., but in a fishroom the lower tanks are always cooler and your Xingu pl*cos all go in the top row.

Jools

In designing a fish room heating comes to mind. Most often one sees either individual heaters in each tank or statements of heating the entire room. But a single heat matt that could warm multiple tanks sounds like an interesting option.

Let's say on a rack system i have a row of (10) twenty gallon tanks on their side for space. usually that would mean 10 heaters, and if i buy in bulk at 10 dollars a piece, roughly 100 bucks. Each one controllable, but its likely you'll want them to all be the same temperature.

Will a heating matt be a more affordable option?

Big question: is it stable enough to depend on? - for fry or breeders

Does it need an additional controller to be effective / safe?

Any chance of tank breakage to thermal differances in glass?

Is this something meant for aquarium or adapted from another industry?

Any recomendations for maximazing my tanks while minimizing my cost?

thanx

This is going to be a "my personal opinion post"...

Heating mats are probably a larger outlay but give you more control and I feel (no proof) that they use less juice. I also think they are more efficient in heating low water movement tanks and they ensure the bottom of the tank is warm.

For catfish folks there is the advantage also of never having to worry about heater burns on your fish.

It is more stable than in-tank heaters I think becuase you warm the whole base of the tank and the heat uniformly rises. Also, as the base of the tank is warm (the glass) that keeps the heat and, I think, contributes to less heat loss, less power consumption. If you use deep sand, this can mean the bottom of the sand gets very warm to touch; I avoided deep sand for this reason but it works well with all types of filtration.

The trouble is water changes, if you're not using a sump (and you wouldn't be as you could just heat the sump), then say you perform a water change on one tank in the row with the thermostat in it and don't do the others. Then the thermostat will react to the cooler water and heat the tank back up, it will however also heat the tanks where you didn't change the water. Solution is to change the same percentage of water in tanks running off the same mats/thermostat.

While I'm on separate thermostats, one thing I really liked is having these showing the temperature in an LCD display. The fancy one I bought ($$$) even made an audible alarm if temperature went outwith a preset range.

Didn't have any trouble with breakages, the mats I had run for 8-12 years before I trashed them when I moved house. During that time they were often moved, rewired and had plenty water spilt on them.

They were specifically for the aquarium trade, but a product range I think made cheaper by the boon in popularity of keeping terrestrial cold blooded creatures.

I used 11" wide heating mats under 15" and 18" wide tanks that were no taller than 15". If I need a hot tank (I've mentioned this before, but in the room (and I think this is typical for most fishrooms), the bottom tanks were around 76F rising upto about 80F on the top row. If I wanted hotter in a specific tank I just added an in tank heater/stat.

Jools

When you said you used 11" heat matt on 18" and slightly larger tanks does this mean 1 matt per tank?

I was hoping for one large matt for atleast 4-6 tanks arranged thin side out. What was your ratio?

I'm assuming the matt was large enough that the whole bottom of the tank was covered, so that you wouldn't have to use cardboard or anything to level it out.

Do you have a manufacturer name i could have?

How bout temp stability? Did you take that digital temp probe around and randomly check different tanks at different times to see if there was any change? (Top tanks at petstore i work at tend to be hotter, i think its from rising heat)

What controller did you use? Any special precautions or maintenance?

sorry to ask so many questions, you're the only person i've read about using heat matts on a fish room. All others were individual heaters or heating the room or central filtration.

p.s. ever thought about using kill-a-watt or any other digital power usage moniter to figure your power costs?

Here are a couple of shots of my fish house, and a link to my full fish house page. http://www.corycats.com/fishhouse.htm
You mention 1" layer of sand, this is in my opinion mush too deep, I only use a max of 10 mm (3/8"), any beeper and you will have compacting problems.

The room is heated by a thermostatically controlled 2kw fan heater, and to equalise the temperature I use two extra small extractor type fans, one blowing downwards from the roof apex and the other blows accross the floor creating a circulatory air flow, the temperature rang from top to bottom is 26.5ºC - 23.5º C (80º F - 74º F). With the large amount of water in the room there was a condensation problem, but this was overcome by installing another extractor fan high up in the end wall, this is controlled by a simple timer which turns the fan in for 5 minutes in every fifteen. No more condensation problems






Ian

Thanks Ian, a great site and some great descriptive pics.

In the top photo above are tanks 32 and 33 just sitting on top of the tanks underneath them ? or is there some kind of shelf I can't see ?

The rack with the 4 tanks on your right wall, whats the space between the top of each tank and the cross beam above ? And how high is that top tank ? easy to maintain / clean it ?

Cheers

That's a dream fish house!

In the top photo above are tanks 32 and 33 just sitting on top of the tanks underneath them ? or is there some kind of shelf I can't see ?

The rack with the 4 tanks on your right wall, whats the space between the top of each tank and the cross beam above ? And how high is that top tank ? easy to maintain / clean it ?

Cheers

Tanks 32 & 33 is actually one 36" x 11" x 7" tank and it sits directly on top of the three tanks below, the base was made a 1/4" longer (36 1/4") to make sure it would sit with a minimal overlap. there are pieces of 1/4" wide plastic channel in the top of the side glasses of the lover tanks to act as a cushion.

The top of the top tanks is 6 feet. If I have to do any major work in these I have a 12" step up box. The space between the frame and the top of the tank is 4" but the tanks overhang by 2" which allows easy access. The base of the lower tanks is 14" from the floor.

Ian

Well my 'plans didnt survive first contact with the enemy' as they say. Went down to local timber merchant and they had planer grade 3x2 on special just USD$2.60 / meter and they had a whole heap of real straight 4.8 meter lengths. So I figured it would be kind of stupid to go sawing them up into tiny pieces then screwing them back together. Motivated by Ian's awesome pics / room I decided to hell with my 1 stage at a time modular system and decked out the whole rear wall of my garage with a 3 bay 3 level rack.
Based on the comments of others in this thread I dropped the 4 level idea in favor of a 3 level (+ sump) rack that can hold any tank up to 18" high. Bottom level is 500mm (18") from floor. Thanks all very much for your input in this thread.

Rack is Dyna Bolted to the wall at right end and at left rear corner. I cant move it at all even swinging on it. All joints are screwed and glued.


Now who can give me tips / hints on plumbing

My basic plan is to use a header tank (50l) at top right fed from the house mains via a ball cock valve. 3/4" Outlet running to each of the 3 sumps again controlled with a ball cock. Over flow on the header and each sump via 1" PVC pipeing to a holding bucket at bottom left of stand which has an overflow to a stormwater drain that is convieniently about 3 meters from the garage door. The holding bucket is so i can check for any fish sucked up while syphoning and so i can bucket the weater out for my vege garden from time to time. Tank overflows will be 1" PVC gravity feeds to the sump(s) took me ages to find bulkheads here, finally found a place that stocks them (Water tank adaptors they are called) for USD$4.55 a much better price than I was looking at for importing some. Returns will be via 3/4" irrigation tube (flexible black stuff) branching off to 1/2" feeders into tanks. Finally a waste drain of 1" PVC will run from a small sink bench I'm installing along the bottom of 1st shelf and into the waste holding bucket (actually going to be a 55L fish bin) with a couple of open T junctions into which I can insert syphon hoses.
So any advice, comments, major screw ups any one can forsee with this basic plan ?

Lighting so far consists of 2x double 3' 'shop lights' with old tubes that have been replaced from my display tank hanging from roof, and 3 of the energy saver light bulbs (one is visible in the photos) running along the second shelf. (20w consumption for 100w equiv light) they give a yellowish light but hopefully will be ok for working on tanks and keeping fish happy.

You're the fortunate one with the good tapwater, correct? So, you don't need an RO filter, you lucky devil! But, how's your water pressure for daily use in the house?

Water pressaure is fine ? why ?

Many in the US, as well as having poor water quality, also have poor water pressure coming out of the tap. This can make for miserable showers, dishwashing, laundry, etc. I've seen folks try to add a fish room in a home with poor water pressure, without making prior arrangements, thinking "the problem will work itself out." Let's just say, the outcome wasn't pretty. We're extremely fortunate to have great water pressure in my home. If you have good water quality and high water pressure, you've got a good thing going!

I hate to sound like a pest, but how will you manage the electricity. The amperage will add up. Will you have share the same electrical panel as the house or will you have a dedicated panel for the fishroom?

No our water pressure is great, have to turn the shower down or it hurts. Thats why Im going with a header tank, otherwise Id have to use better quality plumbing to handle the pressure.

In another stroke of sheer luck the heavy black cable you can see against the wall behind the racks is left over from an electrical powered central heating system that was installed in the garage at some time before I bought the place. I figure it will have been set up to handle a heavy load so I plan on using it.

In another stroke of good fortune I bought a practically new formica bench top and stainless steel sink bowl from the local equivalent of ebay yeaterday for a whole USD$17.50 !! 1 meter (3 feet) long all I need to do is build a cabinet to sit in on and a tap and a waste and Ill have a sink unit and work bench.

Got an eheim pump unit (compact 1000) second hand on the same site for USD$24 so that solves my pumping the waste water out to the garden problems.

Well finally after many weeks the first rack is set up, cycled and running. The BN pair have spawned allready after being in there all of 2 weeks.

For anyone interested here are a few pics...



The stand with 6 tanks running, top Leaf Litter for L10a and Sand for Crocodile Whiptail.
middle Cory tank and BN Fry tank
bottom BN Pair Tank (with net, male kicked the eggs out of cave) L144 tank.
Very Bottom Sump.


close up of leaf litter tank, has 4 L10a red lizard whiptails in it at present.


Red Lizard Whiptail at home in the Beech Leaves.


Sandy tank with breeding pair of Crocodile Whiptails female is just visible underdrift wood, male spends all day in the bamboo caves.


One of the two BN tanks both are furnished the same, L144 just visible at left, Dull Eyed Pleco hideing behind powerhead untill his tank is finished.


The Sump, water enters down 40mm waste pipe and into sump at left via spray bar, through both media baskets then is pumped back up to tanks by laguna 5 pump, small Eheim pump is for water changes, runs straight into water waste.

Next project is a 18x18x18" driftwood snag for the Dull Eyed Royal and a 36x12x18 river tank for my 2 Mangos

I love the leaf litter. Congrats on the BNs. What a labor of love to get all of that done! How was the plumbing to set up? Anything you didn't expect? Was anything easier than expected?
Amanda

Shane wrote:Fugly dragon,
A couple suggestions:
1) As you stated, 5 levels (not 4 as you have to count the sump) is way too high. You will not see the bottom tanks nor be able to reach the top ones.
2) I would go with angle iron over wood. I had the below stand made by a welder for under US $100. Wood takes up far more space, is heavy to move, and eventually rots. The below stand is 55" high (ground to top shelf), 81" long and 12" deep. I usually load it with 6 ten gallon tanks and 4 twenty gallon "long" tanks. When empty, I can easily move it around by myself.
-Shane

How does the filteration work on on these racks do you have 1 internal filter for every tank or an external filter going to eacg tank, because i would love to get a rack system up for breeding!

- Jonno