Michael Raffa:

I have the opportunity to build a large tank in the basement (it's a walkout with 66" door opening). The basement is finished and I was thinking about placing the tank so that it would face one of the family rooms and the remaining three side would be enclosed entirely within another room, the designated "fish room". My question for those who've done this, do you regret only having one side "visible"? Also, Any tips you learned during the installation?

Charles:

If your fish room is large enough doesn't that make it your private viewing area? You can do behind the scenes tours only if you want while you have a quiet place to do your lab (and the 'messy' work).

Biggest lesson I learned installing my 540 gal was ensuring the supports don't interfere with downdraft drains and you plan your tubing runs between tan k sump, skimmer, and chiller appropriately. Plan, plan, plan! While my house was being built I set the tank support height to what I wanted as a perfect viewing height. I gave up trying to find a powerful enough skimmer to fit in the 29" space under the tank and now have the skimmer on the built-in stand next to the aquarium plumbed to/from the sump. Make sure yo u have enough electrical connections (110 AND 220) above AND below the tank with dedicated circuits. Local disconnects are handier than running to another part of the house to access circuit breakers. Depending on the siz e of your tank, make sure you can access the inside easily. Mine is plexi an d the cutouts are barely enough to access the entire inside - my fault for going with a 36" deep tank. Don't misunderstand, I love the depth and the fish do too but everything - grippers, scrapers, etc. - have to be extra long and strong.

Having a fish room means I can leave my microscope out on the stand, have all my books within arms reach, keep my chemicals nearby, mount the RO unit on the wall, yada, yada.

Tom DeBenedictis:

I really miss not having a tank in the wall.I had built a entire sink under the tank which was great for water changes. I envy you , my tank was in a 12' long 14" deep closet.Pretty tight .As far as worrying about only having one view I think that the one sided view really adds to the "piece of the reef" perspective instead of a fishtank.

Tobie Schalkwyk:

(do you regret only having one side "visible"?)

Absolutely not. I use seperate partitions on the (out-of-sight) sides for overflows, p/hs (which also serve to keep them out of site), filters (carbon) and heaters. At the back is ample space for the light-canope, auto-topup water reservoir, a multitute of electrical wall plugs, in-the-sump skimmer and main pump. You may also use this 'fish-room' for placing your RO unit, salt-mixing bins / barrels, etc. I am utilising the back side as much as the front. Increases the visiting guests' ooh's & aah's by 100% ... and they don't mind walking to the back to see it. And best of all ... the wife has no say in this area!

Brian Ferguson:

My tank is acrylic. One benefit is that the front rim is the same depth as the wall thickness, so that there isn't exposed water under the overhanging wall. Especially important if you're getting some serious water movement, which I'm sure you will be.

One really cool benefit of this is that you can make a really deep tank, front to back, so that when you look into it from the front, you've got serious depth perspective. Just be aware that cleaning that front side can be a PIA, depending on the width of the tank.

Make sure you work via code when you cut that hole in the wall...make sure the header is the proper size and all of that, and be extra carefull if you're opening a load-bearing wall. Also, I'd change out the drywall, if that's what you've got, to greenboard or similar, for water-resistance.

The fishroom is cement/linoleum floored, which has helped now in three instances. Also, the garage was graded, so the water all runs to one corner. My sump is a large polytub. It sits next to the tank.

Humidity became an issue for me. I tried a dehumidifier, but it really didn't work very well. So I switched to a large window unit AC, and it helped greatly. I just let it run all the time, so there's air movement in the room. I would NEVER allow the air from the fishroom to be mixed with the rest of the air in the house, because of the salt in it. You don't want to get that into your air returns. I never got mold or mildew in the room, probably because I keep good air movement going, but anything metal in the room does rust over time. Also, some objects in nearby rooms are also rusting. I'm planning to put in another wall this summer, with a door, to separate the fishroom better from the surrounding rooms.

I located my chiller outside the house, and it's plumbed into one of the returns to the tank. It's alot quieter in the room now, and all of the heat is outside.

Mike Kirda stated that the humidity was the issue for the rust forming. Even more so is the salt dust in the air. Not that I do this alot, but I started tasting the dust in a few areas of my house, and noticed it was salty, which made me a little concerned. That's one serious drawback of the fans on the sump cooling method. Might want to think about this, especially in a new, non-rental house.

Some fishstores I've been to have had fresh air exchange systems installed to deal with this as well. The air exchange idea for the fishroom isn't a bad one. Winter temperatures can be dealt with. Just get some more heaters. ;-) I'd really try not to use the house heat or AC for this room anyway, unless you can prevent the air from returning to the rest of the house. In essence, make the the room operate under positive pressure, then vent this air outstide. The problem then arises that the HVAC system has to draw in makeup air from outside to replace the air that was vented. Usually this isn't an issue, since our houses are leaky.

I also discovered that the skimmer added alot of humidity to the room. I'm running about 2000 GPH through mine, with ALOT of air, and all of that air was venting back into the room. I now vent that air outside, and it helps alot.

Suggestions for your house:

Have a plastic laundry sink plumbed in, as well as a drain opening plumbed to the return pumps. That way, you can just have a ballvalve on the return pumps for waterchanges. I use a separate 100 gallon tub for fresh saltwater, so all I have to do is pump out the water from the sump, and then draw in the new water from the tub. 100 gallon waterchange in about 10 minutes, and I don't shut the system down during it.

Mount your lighting on a track overhead, so you can just roll it out of the way when working on the tank. I'll hook you up with where to get this, if you can't find it.

Make the platform that the tank sits on 6-10" larger on the three exposed sides in the back, so you've got a ledge to stand on. Plus, I'm sure you'll leave all sorts of crap on it when working around the tank. Makes a handy shelf.

Put in a dozen switches with dedicated outlets, and label them. That way, in an emergency, people can turn off lights, pumps, etc, separately.

Run your skimmer sealed. IE, allow it to draw in air from the room, or even better, from outside. Run that air to a sealed waste collector, and then vent that air outside, instead of into the room. This decreased humidity alot for me, as well as the skimmate odor.

Separate the air returns for the room from the rest of your house. Don't allow the air from the fishroom to enter into main house HVAC, if possible. Or at least minimize it, and make the room operate under positive pressure.

Mark Lanett:

Brian Ferguson wrote: In essence, make the the room operate under positive pressure, then vent this air outstide. The problem then arises that the HVAC system has to draw in makeup air from outside to replace the air that was vented. Usually this isn't an issue, since our houses are leaky.

I'd just install two fans, one drawing air in, and one venting out. This way you control source of air as well rather than assuming leakiness and drawing house air into the fishroom. In my case it will be quite necessary, because I am going to move my workbench and power tools out of the garage and into the same basement as the huge sump. So I don't want dusty air from the workshop going to the fishroom, or salty humid air from the fishroom going into the workshop. My solution will be to isolate the rooms from each other and give each room fresh air intake and effluent on (opposite) sides of the house. Leakiness would be bad.

Shane Graber:

If you pull air in from the outside without going thru some sort of filtration system, how do you deal with insecticides that the towns/cities spray during the summer to combat mosquitoes?

Mark Lanett:

Insects? Not in San Francisco. You could pull in air from wherever you want. My thinking is just that using a fan specifically to pull air in (as well as expell it) allows you to control, or filter, the source rather than relying on unknown leakage.