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Unread 02/01/2015, 10:52 PM   #1
Socaltoaz
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1000 Gallon Build- Here we go- Lots of Pictures

Back in July of 2013, I posted on this site to get some advice on a large fish tank that I wanted to put into our new upcoming home. I want to thank many of you that chimed in with great advice. Its taken a bit longer than I expected but we are well under way and I wanted to finally post progress pictures of our new home that will contain a roughly 1000 gallon salt water tank system. The original thread can be referenced here:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh....php?t=2313593

I wanted to start this thread new with pictures that I have managed to take so far and continue to update this thread as work progresses.

I used to keep salt water tanks back in the college days and really enjoyed the hobby. Time, constant moving from apartment to apartment and obviously budget really limited what I was able to do.

Now that Im a bit older, a bit wiser and have a few more dollars in the pocket this is going to be an all out build. The budget was supposed to be reasonable but I will tell you that the budget has completely been blown between the planning, plumping equipment, and all the other ancillary costs associated with building a large tank. Im fortunate in that my wife has put no restrictions on me for this build. We are going to try to do it right and not cut corners anywhere.

In the house we have a Great Room concept where the kitchen, family room and the bar area are all one long room. The large space (about 60 feet long by 25 feet wide) is separated by changes in ceiling height between the family room and kitchen.

A large two way fireplace was supposed to separate the family room and the bar. Well, as I was reviewing the construction plans I realized that instead of a fireplace separating the family room and bar, what a great location for a large fish tank. So after consulting with the architect and builder, this is exactly what we did.

Originally I was going to run the fish room where all the filtration was going to go in a extra auxiliary room in my office. But after planning and consulting, we realized that the room was just going to be too small so we decided to move the fish room into the garage by building a 3x20 foot room at the back of the garage. My garage is almost 30 feet in length so plenty of room to take a few feet in the back for all the equipment. This fish room is depressed by 3 inches so in case of any disasters or floods, the water will not flood the house. We also have a 10 inch drain in the fish room to take away any leaking water.

The fish room will have its own climate control- aka AC unit that is dedicated just to this room to keep the water temperature constant. All the filtration and supplies will go into this room. We will also paint the walls with a marine grade varnish that is water proof and will allow me to take a hose and hose the debris off.

We will have a built in water supply and sink to do any cleaning. The room is not deep so there will be 3 sets of doors for access to the room so that myself or any service individuals can have plenty of access to the room.

Attached is the original plan where we were going to run the equipment in the office. The second image is the schematic of where the fish room will be in relation to the garage. The distance is about 75 feet so we have some big pumps that will be pumping water back and forth.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:03 PM   #2
Socaltoaz
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Just to give some perspective on the house, this is our dream home. My wife has never wanted to build a house, whereas I have wanted to do this since I was a kid. Now that I have the means, we are building what I hope will be our last home.

Im fortunate that we were able to plan this house without too many restrictions. We set a good budget and have stuck to it which has allowed us to really do the house to our exact specifications.

Attached are some renderings of the house as well as some screen shots from our 3D model that we had to create to get approval from the home owners association.

Having issues uploading the rendering of the house- will try later. also, if anyone knows how to put the photos directly in the thread instead of uploading a thumbnail, let me know.



Now the concept of the fish tank is that we do a large tank that essentially serves as a dividing wall between the two rooms, the bar and the great room. We debated for quite a while on the size of the tank but ultimately settled on 96x48x48. When you walk into the house, the first thing you will see is the side of the fish tank so I really wanted to make it wide and not go only 36 inches deep. 4 feet high and 8 feet wide means that it will be prominent in the room and will serve as the center piece. You will be able to see it from anywhere on the first floor.

I do not want to do a reef tank and this will be strictly fish only. My wife and kids are debating as to the type of fish but Ill have live rock and fish only. Having said that, we will be doing the filtration as if this was going to be a reef tank.

Some of you may say that why not just do reef? Frankly I don't have the confidence that I can pull off a reef tank that big and I know its a ton more work than fish only. The real truth is no matter how much time you spend, how good your system is, at some point, you will have more problems with a reef tank and I don't have the heart muscle to deal with it. Even the great Chingchai from thailand has had issues with his reef.

Maybe someday in the future we might start doing more reef stuff but this will be a live rock with fish only. The type of fish to be determined.

Here are some images of when they started to break ground.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:07 PM   #3
Jreed983
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Sounds like this is certainly going to be a dream build in a dream house! Definitely following along to watch this play out. Please post lots of pics for us vicariously living thru you of the tank (and house if you don't mind).

Good luck!


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:08 PM   #4
Socaltoaz
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One of the big concerns was that we were going to route the filtration to another room far away from the tank location. My contractor was very nervous about running piping under the slab. God forbid a pipe breaks- then what? The worst thing that could happen is if a leak occurred under the slab which would result in a monster repair bill.

Solution- heavy gauge flexible piping. Today, new modern homes use a material called PEX- its flexible piping. We used this to run 6 continuous pipes with no seams, no joints, nothing but a solid pipe from the tank to the filtration room in the garage. The pipes have been sealed off, we laid the foundation on top after covering the pipes with gravel and sand per code.

The plumber pressure tested the pipes for a couple of weeks to make sure there were no leaks before the foundation was laid on top.

Attached are the pictures of the pipes before and after laying the foundation.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:10 PM   #5
Socaltoaz
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In the previous post, you see the pipes, which were covered and then rebar and concrete was laid on top. This resulted in a seamless pipe which will not leak under the house.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:11 PM   #6
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Glad to see more information on this tank.

Cant wait to see the up-to-now pictures.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:12 PM   #7
Socaltoaz
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Once the slab was poured, we made the area where the tank was going to go and the fish room lower than the rest of the house and as stated in the original post, there was a massive 10 inch drain there in case of a tank leak.

The area where the tank is going to sit was also reinforced with extra rebar and concrete so that it could support up to roughly 20,000 pounds which is more than the tank full of water will weigh.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:14 PM   #8
Socaltoaz
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jreed983 View Post
Sounds like this is certainly going to be a dream build in a dream house! Definitely following along to watch this play out. Please post lots of pics for us vicariously living thru you of the tank (and house if you don't mind).

Good luck!
Thank you. Its definitely a dream home for us.

For some reason my png files of the screen shot of the rendering of the house is not posting. If I can figure it out, ill post the rendering and the 3d model that we had to build.


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:14 PM   #9
Socaltoaz
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Quote:
Originally Posted by worm5406 View Post
Glad to see more information on this tank.

Cant wait to see the up-to-now pictures.
Now that we are well under way, Ill do my best to post as many photos as I can. Anyone know how to post photos in the thread instead of small thumbnails?


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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:17 PM   #10
Socaltoaz
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I wasnt able to post my rendering for some reason but here are some photos of the model that we had to build to submit to the home owners association.


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File Type: jpg image-9.jpg (40.2 KB, 3294 views)

Last edited by Socaltoaz; 02/01/2015 at 11:33 PM.
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Unread 02/01/2015, 11:18 PM   #11
Socaltoaz
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ill try to get better photos of the rendering of the house uploaded later.



Last edited by Socaltoaz; 02/01/2015 at 11:35 PM.
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Unread 02/02/2015, 12:26 AM   #12
Matthias7
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House looks amazing, can't wait to see the tank!


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Unread 02/02/2015, 12:51 AM   #13
Jreed983
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Looking at the model, your house will awesome when it's done. Glad you're getting to fulfill your dream with it.

As for the photo issue. The only other way I know to do it is to upload the photos to a photo storage site such as photobucket. Once uploaded you copy the IMG link and post it in your message. Once you submit the post the image will appear in your post.


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Unread 02/02/2015, 03:39 AM   #14
dave.m
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Socaltoaz
Having issues uploading the rendering of the house- will try later. also, if anyone knows how to put the photos directly in the thread instead of uploading a thumbnail, let me know.
The trick is to upload your images to an Internet photo server like Photobucket, Flickr, etc. and then link them back here to Reef Central.

Once you have uploaded your images to the image service, you will see a "Direct URL" on the server. Click to Copy this URL. In the Reef Central Editor there is a yellow icon with a mountain on it.


Click this and a dialog box opens. Paste your image's Direct URL in the box, press Enter and it is done. Your image is now linked into your RC thread.

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Unread 02/02/2015, 08:05 AM   #15
Socaltoaz
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Here are the original plans where we were going to put the filtration into the office:




But due to limited space, we ended up building a dedicated filtration room in the garage with its own climate control and recessed by some inches to control leaks and floods- just in case:





Here is the rendering of the house. In our community you need to have a physical model built as well as this rendering to get the house approved by the home owners association.




Here is a snap shot from the 3D model we had to create for the home owners:






This last photo shows the ariel view. Shows where the tank is going to be in relation to the filtration. No seams or joints under the slab. Only a single uninterrupted pipe to avoid issues.




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Unread 02/02/2015, 08:56 AM   #16
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Nice cottage!

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Unread 02/02/2015, 09:15 AM   #17
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Stickin around to watch this thread. Amazing house, and I bet the tank will be even better. Can't wait to see it


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Unread 02/02/2015, 10:45 AM   #18
woodnaquanut
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Beautiful looking little cottage!

How are you planning to balance the flow between tank and filter/fish room? The usual gravity flow from tank to sump is easily balanced because there is only one pump. Over this distance you'll have to pump both directions.


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Unread 02/02/2015, 01:14 PM   #19
Socaltoaz
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Quote:
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Beautiful looking little cottage!

How are you planning to balance the flow between tank and filter/fish room? The usual gravity flow from tank to sump is easily balanced because there is only one pump. Over this distance you'll have to pump both directions.
Thanks. Im looking forward to moving into the cottage. With regards to water flow, we have several pumps planned to shuttle water back and forth.

Here we go with the bulldozers as they start to level the pad. The total pad is about 1/2 acre flat. No neighbors behind us and a park in front of us.







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Unread 02/02/2015, 01:17 PM   #20
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As I mentioned previously, we did not want any seams in the pipes under the slab. This is one continuous piece of tubing- heavy duty- that goes from the fish tank to the fish room. We have 6 total pipes including the drain that will shuttle water in case of a leak or disaster.




After putting on the gravel and sand, the pipes are buried. Ready for the cement slab to come on top:






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Unread 02/02/2015, 01:21 PM   #21
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Rebar goes in next and then the slab is ready. We depressed the area where the tank will sit to control any potential leaks and the concrete in that area is significantly reinforced to handle all the extra weight of the tank and the water.

The fish room is also depressed. This area will be framed in to create the fish room.



These are the pipes coming out of one location in the fish room. All pressure tested and leak proof.



Ignore the funky jog in the floor- that will be a straight line. We were going to extend one part of the fish room out more due to a window in the way but decided to just make the room longer and have it only be 3 feet deep.





After the slab is poured- the kitchen is on the other side of the tank.



Close up of where the fish tank will sit:




And we have slab!!




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Unread 02/02/2015, 02:06 PM   #22
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Unread 02/02/2015, 03:28 PM   #23
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Here are some photos of the initial framing. I have to tell you that when this process of framing started last July, I had no idea that some very talented individuals could take some raw lumber, some plans and create a house from scratch. Ive seen homes framed before but the way they planned everything out so that all the pipes and walls and everything came out exactly as drawn is mind blowing.

What you see below is the view from the bar to the kitchen. as if you are standing in front of the fish tank. This way, anyone standing in the kitchen has an unobstructed view of the tank.





More walls:




This is my favorite view. This is essentially the view that someone sees when they first walk into the house. If you look to the left, you will see the depression where the fish tank sits. This is what cemented my decision to make the tank 48 inches deep. I want people to essentially see a 4 foot wall of water as they walk into the house.




Here is the entrance to the house. Double doors of wrought iron and glass.




A bit more progress being done on the framing. This was a few months back.




and here is the most recent photo of the great room. The view that you are seeing is from the kitchen. The fish tank will be in the depression in the slab and we will have 2 curved arches that take you into the bar which is on the other side of the tank.

So the bar area is connected to the family room but separate. The family room has 23 foot ceilings and the bar has essentially 14 foot ceilings. The tank as I mentioned will sit in the depression but the finished height of the tank will be 36 inches. The steel stand will be surrounded by custom built cabinetry that will complement the kitchen. The tank itself will go 48 inches high and then we have another 30 or so inches of cabinetry on top with access panels. Essentially you have a 10 foot wall of tank in front of you separating the family room from the bar area.




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Unread 02/02/2015, 03:30 PM   #24
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Here is my bar. The center column is 12 feet high with each section on the side going down by about 12 inches. As I stand behind the bar serving drinks, I will be having a great view of my tank and can also see through to the other side in case my wife in the kitchen calls.





Thats it for now. I will try to go to the house later today and get some updated photos. I spent the afternoon today designing the wine cellar.


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Unread 02/02/2015, 05:44 PM   #25
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Following....great build!


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