The Display Tank

In his book Bob Fenner points out that a lot of people start this hobby on a whim without knowing what the want from it, or how to achieve it. That to me is a recipe for disaster. My desire to is have a plan before I take the plunge in order to give myself the best chance of success. Will I be able to stick to the plan entirely? Probably not, I've already changed my plan many times in the few weeks since I started researching the hobby, but with a plan I give my livestock the best chance to live and myself the best idea of what I am getting involved in.

So where do I start? I guess it's with the look. As this is an artistic centerpiece above all else I need to be able to manage the rest of the requirements and the needs of livestock within that framework. My wife came up with the idea of having the aquarium look like it's sitting on a shelf on an arched opening within the wall, the lighting fixtures would be hidden within a plant shelf above the aquarium and there would be no unsightly plumbing.

Here's a rough sketch of what she is thinking it would look like:



As you can imagine it's presenting some problems in terms of how to handle overflows, plumbing and lighting but I'll look at those in a later blog.

Having this look does give me some tank dimensions. The tank size is 72" long by 24" deep and 30" high, giving a total of 230 gallons. The model shown above was designed for a 30" high tank sitting 36" off the floor. We may drop the stand height to 30" from 36" if the plant shelf is too high.

Having got the dimensions the next decision is glass or acrylic? I know everyone has their own opinions on this but I'm leaning toward glass, with low-iron glass in the two long sides to improve the viewing clarity. Why? Well, having done a lot of reading I've decided the ease of cleaning glass, coupled with it's scratch resistance, is of more importance to me than the lighter weight of acrylic and it's better resistance to fatal damage.

So there we have it, the basis of the system, a 230 gallon, 72" x 24" x 30" glass display tank. Next up I'll be looking at livestock.

Background Reading

Having decided on what we wanted to do I decided that I'd better find out how to do it. A quick trip to Border's later and I was reading John Tullock's Saltwater Aquarium Models. I found this very informative and it helped me to solidify some of the basics of the design. From there I've branched outwards through both books and the web reading up on equipment, techniques, livestock and everything else that this very interesting but potentially very expensive and obsessive hobby has to offer. I think my wife has been a little concerned from time to time as I've done nothing but read books and peruse forums for the past 2 months. For those who are interested here is my required reading list:

Bob Fenner: The Conscientious Marine Aquarist
Michael S Paletta: The New Marine Aquarium
John Tullock: Saltwater Aquarium Models

www.wetwebmedia.com - Bob Fenner and Team, wonderful resource for aquarists and prompt responses to questions
www.reefcentral.com - Great forum full of experienced people, though often with widely varying and strong opinions

I'm currently waiting for the other book that is recommended on many sites, that being Anthony Calfo's Book of Coral Propagation. I'm looking forward to reading that too but feel that I've accumulated enough knowledge in the past couple of months to take a first shot at a design.

First Steps..

Welcome to my blog.

This is an attempt to journal every stage of my attempt to design, install and maintain a reef aquarium. My thinking is that the blog will be a place to show off my progress, to learn from my mistakes, to celebrate my successes and to record the pertinant information of reef keeping. I'm hoping that friends, family and fellow enthuisiasts will find the process interesting and educational. I am always open to comments or advice and ask that it be given freely but respectfully.

That said let me set out the background on why I'm undertaking this adventure. My wonderful wife and I are currently building a new home for our family. It is a house that we designed ourselves and to my mind will be a beautiful Tuscan style hill home. The house is full of wide open spaces and beautiful features. The one issue we had with the original architect's design was the dividing wall that provides some privacy between the foyer and the open plan great room/dining area/kitchen.

We decided that we wanted this wall to contain a centerpiece that would set the tone for the house, something visitors would see immediately they stepped through the front door. The original design called for a see through fireplace to be in this wall but we felt that while it was eyecatching it didn't really meet what we needed and didn't serve any other purpose than artisitic as the wall is too disconnected from the main living area. It didn't set the tone we wanted. We discussed putting art on the walls but wanted to have something that was artistic, visible from both sides of the wall and would bring peace and beauty to the house.

It was the idea of a reef aquarium that we came up with. It seemed the perfect solution, peaceful, artistic, educational and a perfect centerpiece. So now here I am about to embark on a journey to design and create the perfect centerpiece for our home....