apartment tank

[LeslieS]

OK, This is just something that I am considering for the FUTURE.

I live in an apartment and plan to stay here for a very long time. There is fish tank related stuff taking up about a 6x8 square which is a lot to us apartment dwellers. This does not include the 20 gallon plastic bins that are stored under my day bed. My goal is:

Use less square footage for fish junk
Eliminate as much flood potential as possible

My current tank is 120 gallons with a 24 gallon sump/refugium

I am considering getting one big tank and dividing it into 3 sections. One large area for display and 2 smaller areas for refugium and equipment sump.

Underneath the tank would be storage for water, unused equipment, food, salt etc...

Does anyone have a setup like this?

How would I keep the display and the sump on separate lighting schedules?
Chiller and ATO are still potential plumbing leaks. Not sure how to deal with that?

I am still a newbie, so this may be weird, or there may be a very good reason that everyone keeps their sump in the bottom. Just thinking on line....

 

[meschaefer]

Although I don't live in an apartment, I understand how precious space can be. It seems to me that with a 120 that you could find room for most things under the tank. I fit my sump, fuge and ato under my 65 gallon tank wich is only three foot long and 18 inches wide.

 

[LeslieS]

Yes, my sump and fuge fit under my tank, but these are the things that do not. :biggrin:

Small shelving unit with food, test kits, towels, etc...
5 gallon bucket of salt
5 gallon bucket of sand
5 gallon buckets for when I do a water change
extra filters, carbon, tubes, nets
and a bunch more stuff that I cannot remember right now.

 

[Manny]

what about a tall canopy with storage above:scratchch

 

[jhale]

leslie I have a tank designed (in my head) that combines the display tank and sump on the same level, one tank in essence.
my inspiration was lowering electric costs and cutting out the large return pump. If you want I can sketch it out and send it to you. it would not be cheap to build, but it would save room under the tank.

 

[LeslieS]

JH, maybe we could do a group buy

what did you do with the chiller?

 

[duke62]

hey leslie what if you put your tank on an angle in corner of room.you can put sump on bottom fuge behind main tank with all the supplies/you an even put shelves bak there.i have my 110 in corner and i put alot of equip bak there.i didnt leave enough room to get bak there i wish i would have cause i would have put a bigger fuge in for my setup.just an idea

 

[House of Laughter]

leslie,

as a former architecture student (Thanks Pratt Iinstitutue) that precious space you are referring to is negative space meaning, space that doesn't get used or is displaced because there is something else that displaces it.

For example - if you put spheres in a square container, the contanier will be "full" but you and I know that there is space to be had between those spheres. Space under the bed is one of them . . . . closet space is another that can be used and let's say RO tubing run from that closet . .

Another is vertical space. While it is often used to divide rooms, the vertical space in an apartment is often overlooked for space gaining opportunities. My brother facsinates me with his store in brooklyn and how much stuff he is able to put in there - all due to using vertical space. You'd be surprised how much you can fit into a 4x8x2' high space cabinet right next to your tank.

Good luck

House

 

[LeslieS]

4x8x2' high space cabinet right next to your tank.

I would love a 4 x 8 cabinet, but that would cover my window!!! I could fit a 3 x 8 cabinet. A cabinet plus the tank would take up 19.75 square feet of floor space and give 48 cubic feet of storage. If I double the width of my tank stand allowing room for the sump up top, the floor space is 16.5 square feet with 49.5 cubic feet of storage and I could still build a 2.5 x 2 x 8 cabinet later if I need it

Our apartment has reached a point where everytime we bring something in, we have to take something out. I tried putting something under the bed yesterday, and everytime I tried to stuff it under there, something else would end up sticking out.

I also like the idea of keeping all the water on one level in one cage. I haven't figured out the chiller part of the equation yet or the ATO. It would be ideal if a flood could only occur if the tank itself was leaking.

I didn't even think about energy savings as JH did, but that is also a good reason.

My tank is less than a year old so it will be a long time before I update, but I am already planning :biggrin:

So, If for some reason, you wanted to have your tank, refugium, and sump all on one level, how would you guys do it?

What advantages and disadvantages do you see?

 

[Quang]

Spring cleaning? I bet you half the stuff in your apartment can be discarded. My closet just threw up the other day :lol:

The idea of having your tank, refugium, and sump on one level usually has to do with aesthetics, IMO.
Our refugium aren't as sightly as our tanks. Having a huge skimmer, gushing, and whooshing in the sump visible next to the main display detracts from it. It's everyone wants to see the show but none of the back-stage stuff. What if we're to make your sumps and equipments as works of art? Thing would be different...

The only other issue is flow, there needs to be some sort of unevenness for gravity to move the water . Either way, we need pumps to move the water, weather against gravity or laterally. I just don't see pumps being out of the picture completely. There's no real way for us to control the movement of water to filtrate it.

 

[nsiegel5]

I have also been considering this to reduce the whole flood issue and thought basically making a huge nano style tank. This way I contain everything within the tank itself and don't have the possibility of flood unless I smash the whole thing...

 

[fritz]

World class aquarium on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn (top of the food chain) used to do stuff like this back in the day. In the days of wet dry filters, they built sumpless, corner overflow tanks with the set dry and skimmer inside the overflow. At the very bottom was a pump that pushed the water back out into the tank. You could do a fuge in the other overflow. I've also seen people keep their "remote" DSB in their overflow. I don't find that to be the easiest thing to replace but if you've got a 20" DSB it can be argued that you may never need to change it.

If you did a false back 120 or even "pimped" your overflows by making them fuge/dsb, you may be able to fit all of your ancillary equipment in the stand.

 

[LeslieS]

Having a huge skimmer, gushing, and whooshing in the sump visible next to the main display detracts from it.

The cabinet could be built around the unsightly areas, and the wall between the maintank and other areas could be black acrylic. You could also put the compartment behind the main tank as the fuge and set up some sort of algae arangement. It could add a sense of depth to the display. - but I like the idea to design a cool looking skimmer. Maybe we could use neon colored acrylic instead of boring clear or white.

Fritz, I didn't even think about how deep the DSB could be, but if the fuge is the same height as the main tank, that leaves a lot of depth for sand. Good idea!

 

[fritz]

Be careful when using an overflow as a fuge. If you don't plan properly you'll create a nitrate factory. It also negates the use of a gravity fed skimmer unless you're using it to grow algae.