Aquarium stand modifications?

[sir_keith]

Anyone here have thoughts about modifying aquarium stands? I've been thinking lately about replacing four of my 55 gallon tanks (with 48 x 12" footprints) with 75 gallon tanks (with 48 x 18" footprints). I have two banks fo 55's, one of which is shown below-



As you can see the tanks are on simple particle-board stands with wood veneers; they look nice and work fine if you don't get them wet, and I've had them for many years. This bank has a 40L below one 55, and two 20H's below the other 55, The other bank has two 55's on top and two 40L's below.

Looking for stands for the 75's online, I have not been able to find anything that would allow me to have tanks on the lower level; most of the stands look something like this-

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The obvious solution would be to build my own stands, and there are tons of suggestions online about how to do that-

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The problem is, all these stands look 'home-made' to me, and I have neither the tools nor the skills to do finished cabinetry work. I'm not knocking these kinds of utilitarian approaches to a fish room; I just view my 'fish room' as another 'living room,' and I like it to look nice. So there's the rub.

So what about making my existing stands 6" wider by building extensions that I could mount on the back? I'd use the same strategy as if I were building the whole stand from 2 x 4's, and the extensions would be 48 x 6" free-standing units that I could secure to the backs of my existing stands, without them being an integral part of them. The crucial factor would be to make sure that the extension and the stand were exactly the same height, but that shouldn't be a big deal. The new arrangement would look similar to my current setup, as the extensions would be behind the tanks, against the wall, largely hidden from view.

Any suggestions appreciated.

 

[DMD123]

I like the idea of bumping up to 75’s, the increased footprint and water gain are worth the upgrade. I hate the look of a 2x4, unfinished, utilitarian stand. They have their place and I have built quite a few in my day for tanks that I was flipping to sell. But I never sold one without painting, lol. Even with my recent garage rack tank set up, I did finishing touches and edge banded the plywood, sealed and painted everything and I am happy with it.

The extensions could work but that seems like a lot of precision work, making sure everything measures out correctly. I do like the fact that like you said most of that would be hidden. With that much modding, I would be pretty tempted to build/buy something else.

The current stands you have would not be too difficult to copy the design. I think if it were me, I would look into someone with a wood shop or a cabinet shop to build some nice looking ones. That is a fairly simple design, with one flaw, the way in carries the weight. Im not exactly sure the technical term but it places a lot of stress on the fasteners to carry the load or sheer weight. The design is hard not to do it that way with the double tank configuration. Is metal an option? Might have a custom welded frame, powder coated and then add plywood under the tanks...

 

[fishguy1978]

You could do a veneer on the 2x4 design so that the appearance would be a finished cabinet ish look. The up side to building your own is that you could build one stand that holds 2 75/90s side by side instead of 2 stands.
Your extension idea could work. Your floor is pretty level so shimming won't be an issue. I would lay a piece of plywood over the top once the extension is attached just as a precaution

 

[sir_keith]

...That is a fairly simple design, with one flaw, the way in carries the weight. Im not exactly sure the technical term but it places a lot of stress on the fasteners to carry the load or sheer weight...

That's very true. You may notice that the lower 'shelves' are actually sitting on the floor. They weren't originally like that: they were a few inches off the floor, but I moved them down so I could fit a 16" tall tank on the lower level, and that also solved the 'shear stress' issue. As for the upper shelves, I reinforced them with three additional 3/8" diameter stainless steel bolts on each side. That's way more than the stands had originally.

...Is metal an option? Might have a custom welded frame, powder coated and then add plywood under the tanks...

I'd love to have metal stands, which were the standard issue many years ago, but the only ones you can buy these days seem to be very flimsy bolt-together units. I do think that having them built from scratch would be pricey, even if I knew where to go for this kind of work, which I don't. This is a metal stand that I used for my 75g living room show tank for many years, until I replaced it with a nice modern stand that I got from @FishBeast. Would love to have stands like this for the fish room if I could find them.

 

[sir_keith]

You could do a veneer on the 2x4 design so that the appearance would be a finished cabinet ish look. The up side to building your own is that you could build one stand that holds 2 75/90s side by side instead of 2 stands.
Your extension idea could work. Your floor is pretty level so shimming won't be an issue. I would lay a piece of plywood over the top once the extension is attached just as a precaution

I'm not sure what kind of veneer I'd be able to do on the basic 2 x 4 stand without making it look even clunkier than before, and again, I'm no carpenter. Any ideas?

I did think about building one long stand for each bank, but that would be a bear to move, if ever need be, and potentially more difficult to level (overall the floor is pretty level, but each slate tile is irregular). And I agree with your idea of putting a plywood 'floor' under the tank, covering both the original stand and the extension.

I'm thinking that maybe the thing to do going forward would be to build one extension, and see whether it works or not; nothing to lose but a bit of time and the price of a few 2 x 4's. If it did work, I don't think it would be too difficult to hide the modifications. For example, here's one bank being set up in the fish room years ago, just after the slate tile floors were installed. You can see that the stand extension would be hidden behind the French door.



The other bank is shown here, also during the fish room reconstruction.



The little table in the corner is now gone, and there's a 125 along the wall on the left, like this-



Once again, the stand extension would not really be visible from inside the room.

Suggestions welcome!

 

[DMD123]

When I was doing the garage Dewalt racking, it required a ton of special stuff to make it work out. I dont know if you will find anything ‘on the shelf’ to do what you want... I have seen a few other garage types steel racks out there but it may not have that nice finished look you want.

A lot of potential waste could be involved making your own out of wood. Generally you would need just a bit wider than a half sheet of plywood, though with some planning it could be done without a ton of waste.

 

[fishguy1978]

I was thinking something along these lines. You could use a 1/4in thick plywood veneer and paint or stain. This one is the cichlid-forum. It's a double 55g.

https://woodworkersworkshop.com/woodworking_plan/42662

 

[sir_keith]

I was thinking something along these lines. You could use a 1/4in thick plywood veneer and paint or stain. This one is the cichlid-forum. It's a double 55g.

https://woodworkersworkshop.com/woodworking_plan/42662

That's the kind of clunky, overbuilt look I'm trying to avoid. And they'd be too wide for the available spaces.

 

[Modest_Man]

Are you wanting to stain the stand or paint the stand? My wife likes white furniture, so I face my 2x4 stands with poplar and birch plywood and paint them.

 

[sir_keith]

Are you wanting to stain the stand or paint the stand? My wife likes white furniture, so I face my 2x4 stands with poplar and birch plywood and paint them.

Probably paint. I do have a nice homemade (not by me, although I did cut it down from 60 x 24" to 60 x 18") stand in my fish room that was brown when I got it, but is now black, which I like, but no lower rack-



Do you have pics of your white ones?

 

[Modest_Man]

I do, but it is a closed face style. It's also for a 400 gallon so it has some 2x6's and more support than a smaller tank would need. Top and sides are 3/4" birch ply, front is 1" poplar. Door are poplar with 1/2" ply.

I've got ply inside on the bottom on top of the 2x4 horizontal supports so I can fit 40 breeders under the stand along with the sump. You can see some of the very basic 2x4 stand in the first photo.

You could do something pretty similar just as easily. I'd run your side 2x4's front to back vs. side to side like in mine to open the space underneath more, and you could use 1/4" ply or a veneer and trim it out to hide the edge seams. I went heavy on the ply to add stability in case of lateral movement (earthquake). The tank full weighs about 4,000lbs.