PlanetCatfish.com

Hi all,
Its time to understand the Krazy part of KrazyGeoff

I need to increase the capacity of the fish room.

The plan is in 3 parts:
Part 1: Pick up and move 15 tanks and stands into a new stand configuration which is orientated 90 degrees to the current configuration. Building this exactly where the existing stands are, without loosing a single drop of water, or any fish!. Approx. 1550 litres of water, and 600+ fish, and what seems to be an endless array of power cords.

Part 2: Pick up and move last tank approx. 250 litres of water. Insert 2 new stands which each have space for 2 x 2000x600x450 tanks, Place this tank into the new stand.

Part 3: Insert new tanks, 1 x 2000x600x450 and 2 x 995x600x450 (995 because If I make them both 1000 then because of glass width, they may not fit....Final size to be determined on completion of the stands), decorate, and populate.

This will give me an additional space for another 2 metres of tanks in the future, and free up a couple of the existing tanks..

If anyone is interested I will continue with the thread.

Cheers

Geoff

I am definitely interested to hear how this all goes and maybe offer some advice along the way, would be great to see photo's etc.

It won't be easy, I have moved loads of tanks over the last 30+ years and each one is a pain, but moving all of those at the same time will be a mamouth task.

I am interested also! I love when big projects get done on here in case ever one day I am lucky enough to have so many fish and power cords I want to know how to do it right.

Excellent....
Just a note though. I did a similar thing last year, but on a slightly lesser scale, and lost about 1,000 BN/L144 fry, so I have learn't some things since then. It will take me a couple of hours to draw up the floor plans, so I may not get that posted for another 24 hours.

Also I use white "power boards" for my lights and black ones for the components that are powered up all the time. A power board is a device that has either 4 or 6 electrical outlets on it in case "power board" does not translate well.

I do not use a central filtration unit, at this time, but almost put one in with this change.

There are 78 electrical outlets that are powered on all the time (not all used) and 10 for the lights. Floor plans to follow.

I hope to have the move completed in 10 hours, and will be working on my own for part 1, because physically moving the "glass" is the easy bit.

Geoff

Well that didn't take long at all.

Here is the start point. The stands are labeled A, B, C, D, E, F, G
And the tanks are labeled with lower case letters and numbers to represent the number of that type of tank on a stand.

The tank "Blue 1" holds my L239 and this tank will be moved only once, because they don't like being moved.

Here is the end point. Interim plans will follow along with the step by step instructions.

Cheers

Geoff

Getting interesting already.

Are you serious about 10 hours? I know how time flies when I am doing similar things.

I can't wait to see how you manage it.

and lost about 1,000 BN/L144 fry,

that's terrible, sorry to hear that.


ten hours? i thought it would take like all day, 24 hrs! But per your sketch you're just moving the south end of the room around. Side to side to up and down. So then your plan is to put more tanks on the south east corner? Am I reading it right. Incredible.

78 electrical outlets ((bow)) ((drool))

Sounds awesome! Yes, photos please!
I will never get to experience what you are getting to do. My girlfriend would kill me in my sleep long before I get to that point. Ad yet I keep making steps in that direction.
Good Luck!

First a wee tank discussion:
These will be mentioned later as a class of tank.
The tanks marked as "b" are all breeders. They are a standard 610x305x305 (24x12x12)
The tanks marked as "g", "c" and "blue" are the grow out tanks in my aquaria page
The tank marked "s" is the sell out tank in my aquaria page
The tanks marked as "p" are the panaque tanks in my aquaria page.

The 200ltr water store lives in the North East corner of the fish room on the above plans, contains heating and circulation.

Risks
Standard risks of Glass, Water and Electricity don't really require discussion.

Specific risks:
Power outage; A power outage is a great concern. Not because the fish room has no natural light, but because this will affect my ability to pump water to and from the water storage tank, which is the time saving part of the process. I have mitigated this risk by having a generator on stand by, that I can have on site in 60 minutes. If my contact is unavailable then I can purchase a generator and have this on site in about 40 minutes.

Medical condition: I have a condition called "Delayed Pressure Urticaria". Basically I have a 5 - 6 hour window before I will start exhibiting symptoms. If I stop working then I won't be able to start working again. I have thick leather gloves that should delay the symptoms in my fingertips and some great pain killers for any other issues!
Here is a link which describes the condition really well: http://www.nature.com/jidsp/journal/v6/ ... 0045a.html

Breakage:
Have to mention it, even though it's really just one of the horrible thoughts that go around your head.. ... .... .....
If I break a "b" tank then the LFS should be able to deliver me a new one, otherwise I can go and pick one up in about 20 minutes.
If I break a "g" tank then technically I have a spare, as I am running one with minimal fish quantities just to keep the filters "alive".
If I break one of the others then the fish will go into the spare "g" tank, and I will invent some new swear words, then possibly move fish to water store, add filtration unit here and source another tank.

Plan for the day
The day will start at 6:00am. At this time the fish room will be under blue light (sunrise) conditions.
I will start by feeding the 3 indoor cats , and the 1 semi wild one that lives under the deck. She is lovely until you try and pick her up. She turned up about 16 months ago and doesn't want to leave, so I guess she is ours!
A splash of breakfast and a few moments with nicotine and caffeine to run through everything once again.
Then regular maintenance on the display tanks in the lounge, and the large tank in the garage, that is part of "part 2".
It should be about 8:00am at this stage.
More nicotine, caffeine and anti-histamines and a final run through the mental checks required, all tools prepared and in the right positions.........

Plan for the shift:
The actual jigsaw puzzle that is the shift will follow in another update, but here is the concept of dealing with each class of tank.

"b" tanks have gravel and minimal plants etc. The theory here is to remove 1/3 of the water, like it was a water change, and then replace this when they are in their final positions, not really keen on water mixing between tanks.
Fish and 1/3 (approx.) of the water will be put into Poly Bins and stored.
Gravel etc will be removed along with the remaining water.
Tank moved, gravel etc put back in, fish added, filters and heaters back on line, done.

"g" tanks can mix water. These tanks will be moved in pairs so....... Pump water to 200ltr water store (this was emptied by the maintenance on other tanks at the start of the day). Catch fish to a Poly Bin, move tank, pump water into this tank from the water store while other tank in pair is pumping water into the water store, add fish, move second tank etc.

There will be down time while the 2nd tank in the pair is filling, this time is used to disassemble the stand that those tanks came from and reassemble in new position, redo wiring, make lighting attachments etc etc.

"p" tanks are similar to "g" tanks except there is gravel to be removed before the tanks can be moved.

Filters is what got me last time, I took too long and enough of the bacteria died so that the existing bacteria could not cope with the bio load, and 3 days later all the "g" tanks crashed. So this time the filters will get hung onto other tanks of the same class while the water is being pumped around the room.

Now I must cook dinner, more later.

Geoff

andywoolloo wrote:
But per your sketch you're just moving the south end of the room around. Side to side to up and down. So then your plan is to put more tanks on the south east corner? Am I reading it right. Incredible.

78 electrical outlets ((bow)) ((drool))

Yes you are reading it right Andy

78 electrical outlets does make one quite nervious though, especially when the house is plunged into darkness in the middle of the day. Was a faulty light that time....

Also I need to do power out tests every couple of weeks, just to make sure everything comes back on, if there is a power cut.
I woke up at 2:00am the other day and the alarm clock was flashing, there had been a power cut! I went down stairs and half of the filters on the breeder tanks had not come back on. Not sure why I woke up, but all was well at the end of the day. My L204 tank has temperature alarms....

Fred T. Washington wrote:Sounds awesome! Yes, photos please!
I will never get to experience what you are getting to do. My girlfriend would kill me in my sleep long before I get to that point. Ad yet I keep making steps in that direction.
Good Luck!

Hi Fred; you could always try not to sleep
It works much better if you can convince her that she will always know where you are
Having said that I do 90 minutes of maintenance at least 6 days a week, and if I ever want to go on holiday for more than 2 nights, I need to get in a professional to take care of things for me

Some photos.
I have gone for the practical / industrial look. The new stands will all be powder coated, and at least one of the tanks will be inspired by Haavard's tanks, however what mine looks like in real life will be quite different to how it looks in my mind.

Geoff

Photos

First is as you enter the room. My girlfriend says that it looks quite tidy now... But it is just the calm before the storm. Next if you glance to you right If you stand at the water store an look back down the room you see this: You are actually looking at the back of the tanks closest, and the front of the tanks along the far wall. The back of the tanks are wrapped in insulation (which is why they look like black rubbish bags )
Also while that looks like a metal garage door in the distance it is actually an extrordinary amount of insulation which is being held in place by a garage door

More pics:
Kind of self describing really

wow, that's a lot of stuff going on in there. Cool! Do you sell a lot of fish, or are you breeding?

your cats are cool! And the Delayed Pressure Urticaria sounds awful, I am so sorry you have to deal with that.

andywoolloo wrote:wow, that's a lot of stuff going on in there. Cool! Do you sell a lot of fish, or are you breeding?

your cats are cool! And the Delayed Pressure Urticaria sounds awful, I am so sorry you have to deal with that.

Thanks; however one can't dwell on the bad stuff . I have a house, a job, and a fantastic addiction (plec's).
I sell enough BN/L144 to take care of my consumables, and when the move is finished enough space to breed German blue rams, and platys, whilst I collect more fancy plec's and try to breed them also.

Now back to the move.......

OK,
I hope this makes sense....

The move; step by step.
Part 1, phase 1
b1 and b2 to temp stand
Reconfigure A to take "g" type tanks
g1 and g2 to A stand
reconstruct F to H
g3 and g4 to H (hopefully these can slide from stand to stand, with minimal need to remove water?)
reconstruct G to I
g3 and g4 to I (hopefully these can slide from stand to stand, with minimal need to remove water?)
reconstruct 1/2 of H to bottom of Z
p2 to Z
reconstruct other 1/2 of H to J
b5 and b6 to J
reconstruct 1/2 of C to top 1/2 of Z
p1 to top 1/2 of Z

end of Part 1, phase 1
The key to this phase is not to build the Z stand too early, otherwise I am stuck!
Geoff

SHAME ON YOU!
One of my pet peeves is people that load up their garage with so much stuff they can't fit a car into it. I suppose I could let it slide on this ONE occasion since it is totally awesome stuff.
It must not get too cold there to do that in your garage. No shot of that room surviving an Iowa winter.

Fred T. Washington wrote:SHAME ON YOU!
One of my pet peeves is people that load up their garage with so much stuff they can't fit a car into it. I suppose I could let it slide on this ONE occasion since it is totally awesome stuff.
It must not get too cold there to do that in your garage. No shot of that room surviving an Iowa winter.

Part of the cause was that the cats kept running under the car when trying to get in / out of the garage, and it made the girlfriend just too nervous. I couldn't let that "empty room" go to waste.
Wouldn't want to compete with an Iwoa winter, however the three sides that are not the door, have houses on the other side (Internal garage in a block of town houses) so it keeps about 24 degrees C in our winter, unless I leave the extraction fan off.
Outside temp if really unlucky is 2-5 degrees C, but usually not much under 9.

Part 1, Phase 2
Now that a central area has been created for the new stand configuration this area can be filled.

reconstruct bottom of C to K
s1 to K
Reconfigure old D to new D
s1 to D
Reconstruct K to X (bottom)
g2 to X
Reconstruct A (top) to X (top)
g1 to X
b3 to X
b4 to X

Part 1, Phase 3
Now that the first of the 3 level stands has been assembled, and populated, there is an extra stand.
This will make the rest easier
Also there are options where either do this, or do that. I think that the lack of time will decide for me.
Because the "no fish area" needs to be reclaimed... If I am running behind time then I will need to clean up this area. Also the temp stand set up in phase 1 is blocking the beer fridge

Reconstruct B to W
Reconstruct A (only bottom left) to Y
b6 to W
Now I need to check that the arm on the garage door does not smash b6 when the door is activated. I need to open the door to get the stands in for part 2
If issues then resolve this by lowering the stand a couple of cm's
b5 to W
Reconstruct J to Y (top half)
g3 to Y
g4 to Y
Move I out of way (to north east)
b1 to Y
b2 to Y
Now I can get to the beer fridge!
At this time I could stop, if I run out of energy or time!
c1 to W
blue1 to W

reconstruct top half of I to top of D
deconstruct E

end up with 1.5 stands left over.
Should be able to build these around the water store and therefore put in some extra storage space. And finished!

This is rather exciting! Wish you had a video camera to do a skip-frame show of the whole thing.
By the way that DPU site mentioned potential issues with employment and hobbies, sounds like you've got those licked in a big way. My tanks are a hobby, yours is more like an adventure!

Have fun and I'll indulge in some nicotine and a bevy in your honour when it's done. Blocking the beer fridge , geez, you're brave too.

L number Banana wrote:This is rather exciting! Wish you had a video camera to do a skip-frame show of the whole thing.

Thanks L number.

Exciting yes, only 3 more sleeps to go

The only thing that makes me nervious is that I will be reducing my working space between the stands from 90 cm to 60 cm. Still a small sacriface, and I have tested working in that space. I'll get used to it.

The new stands have been ordered so there is no turning back now. I'll try and get some pics as I go.

I forgot to mention the scale on my "scetches".... Each square is 20cm x 20cm, so each stand is 80cm x 60cm

krazyGeoff wrote:

Part1Phase3.JPG

Question:
Why don`t you put the new tanks on the same wall as the big one, would give you one more 60*80 instead of a 60*60 and a bit more place for working

Btw: Very interesting As such topics allways are

Durlänger wrote:
Question:
Why don`t you put the new tanks on the same wall as the big one, would give you one more 60*80 instead of a 60*60 and a bit more place for working

Btw: Very interesting As such topics allways are

Thank you Durlänger.

I could not bring myself to do this for just another 60*80
When finished there will be two more stands added, each 200*60
One will have a 200*60*45 tank (L142) and the current 122*45*45 (L002) - Perhaps they are L002??
The other is getting 2x 100*60*45 tanks for my L204
and I will still have room for another 200*60*45

This is what the finished picture will look like, with the new stands highlighted....

78 outlets? If you use all of them and have one item that draws let's say a meager 2 amps in each fixture, that is still 156 amps! Figure the typical household electrical circuit is 15 amps, you must have an entire breaker panel solely devoted to that room . Details please at your convenience

Hi Fred,
More good luck than good management I think from my end...
Amps = Watts/Volts according to the www.

In NZ we have 240Volts, so the Amps is 1/2 for 120 Volts in the northern hemisphere?

Each power board will "trip" at 2400 Watts or 10 Amps.
Some power boards power other power boards.
There are 3 electrical outlets from the wall, and I discovered that each is on a seperate circut. Each of these is connected in turn to some other circuts (it looks like that anyway) and then in turn there are 2 RCD breakers that each seem to break out at 40 Amps.
Excluding the heaters and lights, most devices seem to be 14 Watts or less.
I'm not an electriction, but I had one have a quick look at it and he didn't seem to think that I had done anything dangerous.

When I reassemble everything tomorrow, I will take more note of what is going where to give you a better update. And so that I know how much capacity I have for the new tanks and heaters.

Thanks

Also, 2A is quite a lot - it's 220-240W in the US (and other 110-120V countries), and 480W when the socket gives off 240V. It's very likely that a larger aquarium totally doesn't use more than 2A in the 240V areas, and about 4A in the US, but I'm sure your aquariums have more than 5 sockets connected. The biggest current draw is the heater(s) of the tank(s), next comes the lights, and then there are all sorts of small power consumers - filters, air-pumps etc, that often draw less than 0.1A.

--
Mats

The move (Part 1)
And it is done.

There was blood, and sweat, but no tears.

So many things went wrong!
What went right was the actual physical movement of the glassware, water, and livestock.
What went wrong was just about everything else.

Where to start.........
On Friday there was a big drama at work, which meant that I was already a few hours over time before I even got home. The signs were not good, but I had to press on.

Saturday started according to plan, feeding the cats, myself, and doing the maintenance on the downstairs tanks.
After finding the planned tools, hammer, drill, wire cutters, socket set, screwdrivers and tape measure then I was under way.

The first move to the temp stand, blocking the beer fridge worked well, even though there was something I thought I had forgotten to do......
Then the first of the issues started to emerge.

The first time I did this, I just shut everything down, moved everything, and then powered everything up. Net result, a good move, but many many deaths, therefore a bad move.
This time I was going to power up every tank after its move.

The issue, that for some strange reason simply didn't occur to me as a time consumer (doh) was that in order to get power to a moved tank I would need to reclaim power from where that tank had just come from. This necessitated an un-wiring of the electricity supply that the tank had, and a temporary re-wiring where the tank now was.
This was easier said than done!

The next issue came about when the first stand was due to be moved. Somehow I had managed to store a ridiculous amount of stuff under the stands. I chose not to move this stuff from the room, or else I would not be aware that it needed to all go back somewhere. However this made navigation around the room more difficult, and meant that things needed to be moved several times. More time consumed.

When I went to take some photos, the camera battery was flat!

The sliding of the tanks between the stands worked really well, although I did need to remove the water. More time!

Then it was time to deconstruct one of the stands, and reassemble 1/2 of it for the p1 tank. Well .... that was a complete destroyer of time. The existing stand did not break apart correctly, and I could not remove the connector parts.
Pliers would do the trick.
Hmmmmm which box are they in. The tool box?
Unpacked my way to the tool box, but they were not there? Found them by the TV, with the other wire cutters, and stuff like that!

Unpacked my way back into the garage and the pliers were useless!!!

Lots of swearing out loud, to make me feel better.

I figured out that if I inserted a connector from the underside, into a point that already had a connector, then the "stuck" connector would come out, and I was underway again. I lost hours here! A few good swings of the hammer and pow - A really sharp bit of metal (about 2 feet long) came flying from somewhere, and struck me in the temple about an inch from my eye. (This is the blood bit) There was blood flowing, but not enough to stop me, because I was on a role and loosing too much time!

Needless to say bleeding, sweating profusely, and swearing quietly, I am sure the fish were in more danger of busting something from laughing too much than they were from being moved.

At this stage I was starting to have great difficulty finding my tools. I don't have a builders apron thing, so I would use something, put it down, move some things, and then not be able to find what I was using........

I started to fill up the pockets in my cargo pants with the equipment I was using, but no matter how tight I did up my belt, my pants kept slipping down.

At this point I knew that I was not going to make my time limit, and was very pleased that each tank was actually operational.

So I thought that while I have the "hood up" so to speak, then I should do a spot of cleaning. I then started to clean all the hoses for the canister filters, not the filters.

When assembling the canister filters to their new (temporary) positions the hoses are all the wrong lengths, so it was tricky to get the filters working correctly without actually cutting the hoses. This also consumed time.

At this point everything hurt. I had almost finished phase 1 and the sun was setting!

So I decided that finishing phase 1 was all I was going to get through today..........

On to tank s1, and a quick measure, because it looked a bit bigger from the new angle....... Sure enough it was about 1.5 inches too long for the stand. Crap! Loud swearing noises. Well it had to change orientation, and it had to fit in the position I had designated, it just wouldn't be at the correct height, so it was not the end of the world, but an unexpected trip up. I decided to stop at the end of phase 1, 10 hours elapsed.

Luckily my hands had not become swollen, the gloves were fantastic. My feet on the other hand were a different story.

Time to re think the rest of the move, now that the starting point is different, and the physical movement of the tanks is not hard.

Lessons:
Plan for every item in the room, not just tank associated items.
Measure EVERY tank, even if you think you know its dimensions.
Keep all required tools with you at all times.
Gloves are great things.
Proper footwear is good.
Smoke breaks consume a lot of time!!

Being especially good at leaving tools where I last used them, I learned to start with - at least - all required tool in duplo or better. Nets, for instance are always lost, and I seem to have a dozen, but wioll actually not be able to find more than 4.

And yes, I was once surprised a tank was 5 cm (that is 2 inches) longer than I thought . Quite a nasty surprise

Day 2

Well today is the last day available...
Treated myself to a sleep in, and was awoken with a cat standing on my chest, "yelling" at me for food.

Had a splitting headache, I think I was dehydrated from all the sweating yesterday. Note to self, consume more fluids today.

Had to re-think the rest of the move last night. The assembly and disassembly of the stands was taking a ridiculous amount of time, time I did not have! So I would take the double movement of a tank over the disassembly reassembly option.

I was very glad that I had left the tanks in an operational state after each move.

Back into it at about 9 am

All was going well, until I needed to leave the garage for a smoke break, and a drink. My partner had gone out for lunch with her girlfriends, BUT had locked me in the garage.
Crap!
I could try and drill out the lock, but the drill battery had just about run out and the spare battery was just outside the garage door (so I could find it!)
I could see the axe, but was I being over dramatic? Would I get into trouble?
Perhaps she had not locked the door out onto the deck? If I could get out the garage door, then I could make my way around the front of the apartment, go through the neighbours garden, and over the railing to get onto our deck and then hope the door was still unlocked.
Was I still swearing out loud?
I phoned her. I phoned her 5 times but she was not answering. She did call back 4 hours later...........
It was just about time for the garage door test anyway, so I built the necessary stands and did the necessary stuff to get ready for that. Then I built a path to get out of the room.
Connect some power to the garage door, and push the button. CRACK, Hmmmmm funny noise that. I think it is because the door has not been moved for over a year. The "at risk" tanks have heaps of clearance........
Push the button for up a foot or so .... Nothing wrong. Down again.... OK
Right then up once more and I'll be able to make my escape. I only need 3 feet then I can slip out.

Up comes the door and there is a sound like metal on concrete, stop the door. In the far corner of the room, in position A the stand is on a precarious angle and the water is just about to spill out of the tanks. More swearing.......

I move those tanks and then get the door up. Through the garden, over the railing and YES the door on the deck is open. Lucky.

It was pretty much plain sailing after that.

Made my way to the beer fridge. BEER...
Open the door, that sound as the seal breaks..... BEER ..... Pull the door open gently, the light comes on......... No BEER, that's what I forgot to do, buy beer!!!!!

I finished about 10 pm.

I still need to "hide" all the electrical cables, and distribute the load more evenly and put away all the storage things. We both need to do laundry, so need to make that space useable this afternoon.

At least all the lights have been strung, and the timers etc are working now.

One tank seemed to have a few BN deaths, but at this time it looks like only 10 or so, they would have only been 4 or 6 weeks old.

Also there is a magnificent new space for the new stands and tanks.

Possibly took about 20 hours all up, and actually moved 26 or so tanks by the time you count all the double handling.

There are few photos. When I find the camera I'll post up some pictures.

Cheers

Geoff

I started to fill up the pockets in my cargo pants with the equipment I was using, but no matter how tight I did up my belt, my pants kept slipping down.

You did all this dressed as a hip-hop guy? Now that's an accomplishment!

Glad to hear it went so well, laughing fish and all.
After you install the emergency exit double sided key lock on the garage door...post the pics, post the pics!

I, L Number Banana, hereby swear to never again snivel about moving one tank.