How do you protect your floor by your tank?

[Crush Coral]

I am about to put down new laminate flooring in the room my 75 reef tank is in and I am trying to figure out how to protect it from spillage when I am working on it. Any ideas?

[Nina51]

how do i protect it? i say a silent prayer every day that the water stays in its intended container. every. single. drop.

[deleau]

I put old towels down when I work on it to protect my floor/stand.

As I've planned a large tank, I've tried to work out a system to have a close drain that drains to my hot water tank drain...not sure I have it all figured out since my house is on a concrete slab.

[d2mini]

I am about to put down new laminate flooring in the room my 75 reef tank is in and I am trying to figure out how to protect it from spillage when I am working on it. Any ideas?

Nothing's going to help protect it against major flooding.
Quick wipe ups of small spills, drops, etc is fine.
To help, i installed FLOR carpet tiles around my old cube. And with my current tank in the dining room, we have FLOR under the dining table which reaches to about 12" from the tank. So if my hands are wet or I pull something out of the tank i can let it drip a little on the FLOR tiles and not worry about it.

The only thing that's going to be impervious to major spills is tile or concrete.

[disc1]

My 75 sits on carpet. I got one of those clear hard plastic mats that is supposed to go behind your desk so you can roll your desk-chair around. I put that on the floor under the tank. I don't know if that was a good idea or not, but knock on wood it hasn't bit me yet and has kept more than one minor spill from getting into the carpet under the stand.

[thegrun]

I have had my tanks on hardwood floors for several years without a problem. A couple of years ago I moved a tank that had been sitting in the same spot for the previous 5 years and I was surprised how good the floor looked under the stand. I lay down towels when I'm working on the tank and that helps. I haven't had a major spill, but I've dumped over a gallon a couple of times and have been able get all the water up with towels without damage to the flooring.

[MrIcky]

Pergo laminate. God's gift to the pet owner. I just wipe stuff up fast and don't let it sit.

[Nina51]

i just put laminate down in a room addition. i have great danes and they slobber when they eat. the only thing i've found that will get the slobber up is vinegar. i use a 50/50 vinegar/water and spritz it on the spots, wipe with one of those micro fiber mits and call it swell. i tried just a damp cloth at first and that got everything up but it still left little spots where dribble had been. :)

[bundybass]

In time you will care more about your reef than your floors. I had carpet with my original setup, young kids and a dog. So carpet went! Now hard wood and trust me it will never look new, but who cares? I love my reef and could care less what the wood looks like in front of the tank. Spills and drips are going to happen. I wipe them up right away, but the salt water took the finish right off the wood. If your tank looks nice nobody will look at the floor anyway. :)

[powderhound]

If you still can, put tile down under tank and about a 1 foot perimeter around tank. Wipe the spills right up, never have to worry about it

[reefincredible]

I've installed many floors and laminate nowadays is pretty resilient. The problem comes when you leave large spills and they seep into the cracks and cause the fibers to swell. Pergo's help desk will sometimes advise consumers to use a clean towel and a hot iron to fix any swelling, but obviously you don't want large leaks.

The new Allen Roth line at Lowes is pretty good looking stuff and is more water resistant than others.

[GroktheCube]

I have PVC shower tub liner lining the inside of the stand, it'll hold a good several gallons.

The flooring in the tank's room is waterproof. It's fake wood flooring I picked up from HD, similar to this: http://www.homedepot.com/p/TrafficMaster-Allure-6-in-x-36-in-American-Walnut-Resilient-Vinyl-Plank-Flooring-24-sq-ft-case-161211/100595232#.Ui5RtsYhh8E

It actually looks pretty darn good, unless you look really close, you cannot tell that it isn't real wood, though it is slightly softer than real wood under the feet. It is water/salt/two part/kalk/paint proof. Pretty much anything that gets on it wipes up very easily, and I have yet to find anything that stains it permanently.

[davidfrances]

I am about to put down new laminate flooring in the room my 75 reef tank is in and I am trying to figure out how to protect it from spillage when I am working on it. Any ideas?

When my tanks were on wood or carpet floors (they're on stained concrete now), I cut a 3/4" thick sheet of oak plywood 1 foot longer and wider than the footprint of the tank, and edged it with a strip of 1" lathe. I sanded smooth and stained to match my stand, then protected with a couple of coats of poly. Saved my floors, and made my wife happy in the process. It even captured small spills. Cost was about a $100 all in and a few hours work. Guests always said it looked professional.

[LeslieP]

I've got shower pan liner inside my stand and you can get absorbent pads with a rubber backing to lay in front of the tank while you are working. I think I got mine at Marine Depot or maybe That Fish Place. They come in black or blue and in several sizes. Sorry I couldn't find a link.

[MondoBongo]

Major spills I have no idea, but for day to day stuff like water changes and moving corals around I lay down a big blue tarp I got from home depot, or just wipe up the drips really quickly.

[Crush Coral]

Some great ideas there!!!!! I like the vinyl flooring. Have to see how it holds up to dog claws. I wanted to put a tile section down where the tank is but the wife bucked that one. Will have to see if I can change her mind. :fun2:

Will tub liners mold to any shape and demension?

Also like the idea of a plywood piece larger than the stand. If I can not get the tile to fly I may have to jump on that idea.

thanks - any more ideas out there?

[Reefer54]

I coated the inside of my stand to hole a little over 15 gallons of water should anything flood, but my sump and tank are same size so nothing should ever flood. The floors though....I kinda hope they get ruined so my wife will let me put in the beetle kill hard wood hand scraped 9", 7", 5" width t and g i want. lol.

[joshua.jebe]

i put a peice of linoleum flooring down that almost matches my pergo wood flooring and have it tucked under the wall trim where i removed the 1/4 round behind the tank i have spilled a couple times messing with the overflow box and sump but it was all i could think of at the moment when we redid our floor as you are doing

[ebond009]

Has anybody tried that new rustoleum two part waterproofer? Thinking about trying it wonder if it will let the floor breath at all...

[footballdude2k3]

I have ally tanks in my apartment on carpeting, don't really care what happens since I plan on being here until I get a house and the carpet was crap when I moved in.

[ciodavid]

how do i protect it? i say a silent prayer every day that the water stays in its intended container. every. single. drop.

2nd that^^^^. Amen.

[glstine1966]

I have several tanks on laminate flooring. I spill water all the time, sometimes quite a bit. Wipe it up with a towel after I'm done, no problem.

[d2mini]

I've installed many floors and laminate nowadays is pretty resilient. The problem comes when you leave large spills and they seep into the cracks and cause the fibers to swell. Pergo's help desk will sometimes advise consumers to use a clean towel and a hot iron to fix any swelling, but obviously you don't want large leaks.

The new Allen Roth line at Lowes is pretty good looking stuff and is more water resistant than others.

The glue-together stuff is great. Had the original Pergo Select in a bathroom. The shower got it wet all the time and it was like new 8-10 years later. Then we put Shaw laminate down in the rest of the house... the lock-together kind. Even a little dog drool would cause swells along the seams. Total junk, never again.

[Kebabian]

Coincidentally, I've been looking for something to alert me to overflows etc and stumbled across this:

http://www.plumbingsupply.com/waterwatcher.html

My thought is to connect my skimmer to this so that if it detects any water on the floor under the skimmer, it will cut the power to the skimmer and hopefully avoid major damage. Couple this with a water alarm and hopefully, disasters can be avoided and smaller spills cleaned up quickly.

[Eric45]

This hasn't been mentioned but I used an indoor/outdoor all weather carpet under the tank stand. It was there for 7 years, and plenty of spills, and when I moved the tank last year, the hard wood floor was fine. It looks a little different than the wood around it, but no discernible damage. I think the weight of the tank on the rubber-bottomed carpet effectively sealed it from water damage.

[Jwill1212]

My latest tank, has a 72"x32"x10" showerpan installed under the tank. the rest of the fishroom is tile. The tank is a flush in wall tank, with rear access thru the adjoining fishroom. The shower pan has worked out better than expected!!

[robert s b.]

You never going to protect it 100%, it's unavoidable...your floors going to get wet. Laying down towels are your best options. Laminate floors are pretty resilient, just wipe it up. Just don't let the water seep in between the seams and you should be ok.

[Crush Coral]

Thanks for all the suggestions. I am going to look into glueing the seams of the laminate flooring around the tank area only. Hopefully that will keep the seams in that area from puckering.

[r-balljunkie]

my last tank, back stateside, i had new patterned berber carpet installed where the tank was going to be set up. i purchased heavy mil plastic sheet and a cheapo area rug around 8' x 10', along with locking exercise matting.

- berber carpet
-heavy mil plastic sheeting
-exercise mat
-cheapo carpet
-tank stand

after a few years, a few tank overflows, spills etc. sold the big tank to put the house up for sale. carpet looked perfect underneath.

probably cost me a hundred bux to protect my floors, well worth it.

good luck

C

[usmc121581]

I just hope that nothing happens although it does. Because I have had issues in the past with the Sump, I installed this thick liner that builders use to place under the bathroom tiles. Its sorta like a pond liner, I placed this under the stand and folded the edges up 6 issue to create a container.

[dixiedog]

The flooring in the tank's room is waterproof. It's fake wood flooring I picked up from HD, similar to this: http://www.homedepot.com/p/TrafficMaster-Allure-6-in-x-36-in-American-Walnut-Resilient-Vinyl-Plank-Flooring-24-sq-ft-case-161211/100595232#.Ui5RtsYhh8E

It actually looks pretty darn good, unless you look really close, you cannot tell that it isn't real wood, though it is slightly softer than real wood under the feet. It is water/salt/two part/kalk/paint proof. Pretty much anything that gets on it wipes up very easily, and I have yet to find anything that stains it permanently.



That's what I used. I went with "Allure Trafficmaster Plus", which is a bit thicker and has beveled edges on the planks.

Looks great, holds up to dog claws. Laid it myself for under $2/ft.

[Machiavelli]

From my understanding, its actually a bad idea to have anything that lays flush against your wood flooring like a plastic or rubber. Water tends to get trapped under there and has a hard time evaporating and just soaks into the wood. The ideal situation is to have something that creates a small gap so that air can circulate and allow the saltwater to dry.

Perhaps not altogether practical with hundreds of pounds pressing down, but there it is.

[alf1096]

Most Laminate does not like water. Would can put things down but take you time and put towels down and go slow. This will keep floors good. IMO nothing will keep laminate from buckling if you have a major spill

[Crush Coral]

I have never used a shower pan liner. My tank is a 75. Are these moldable that it will form to the inside of my stand?

[GroktheCube]

I have never used a shower pan liner. My tank is a 75. Are these moldable that it will form to the inside of my stand?

Yep. They're a thick sheet of flexible rubber.