Brhino's 300g megatank

**Brhino** · 08-18-2012, 06:50 PM

I. INTRODUCTION

Welcome to the journal for my newest aquarium, a 8 foot long, 300 gallon acrylic tank. This tank will be a real adventure for me. It's bigger than all my other tanks combined and it will require extensive work before it's ready for fish. In this journal I will document my planning and work as I get the tank ready, and then once it's up and running there will be pictures and tales of the fish I stock it with!

**mommy1** · 08-18-2012, 06:56 PM

Good for you! I'm glad you decided to get the tank and am looking forward to seeing how the set-up develops.

**Brhino** · 08-18-2012, 06:57 PM

II. BACKGROUND

I have wanted a large fish tank for a while now. I like my medium sized tanks with small to medium fish, but I also wanted a chance to get into some of the larger aquarium fish - an oscar in particular. Eventually I came up with a plan to finish the basement in my house and include a fish room. I began saving for that plan but after a while it started to feel pretty unfeasible. The cost of the entire project was just so much more than what I could save month to month. So, I put that goal aside and instead just focused on getting a large fish tank. It will sit in an unfinished basement for the foreseeable future which is less than ideal but more fun than no fish tank at all!

I was planning on getting a 180 gallon (6'x2'x2') glass tank, but when I went to my LFS one day to buy fish food I ran into a 300 gallon acrylic tank. It was marked down to $600 (they would later give me another $50 off). It needed a stand, and a sump, and a lot of other work, but it was more tank for about the same amount of money that I was planning on spending on the 180 gallon.

Too many words, not enough pictures! So here's the tank in the store.

The folks here on AC were very helpful in helping me decide that its a good tank for a great price... so I bought it!

**Brhino** · 08-18-2012, 07:14 PM

III. DELIVERY

You've just bought a 8' long fish tank. Great! Now what? Now you gotta get it home.

Tank in a truck. That's my head visible behind it.

I recruited a friend and my father. Dad's got a extended cab F-150 truck. The bed's only 6' long. Put the tailgate down and you're up to 7' 8". To ensure complete coverage, I bought a sheet of 4'x8' plywood (I'm sure I'll need it for the stand anyhow) to go under the tank. I screwed 2x4s into the plywood to clamp the tank down and threw some ropes around it, and away we went!

I had calculated the weight of the empty tank at 240 pounds but it seems to be less than that. Two strong men can lift and carry it without too much difficulty. Of course, there's a difference between carrying a tank down a hallway and negotiating this:

Q: How many spiders are there in this picture? A: None. They're ALL RIGHT BEHIND YOU!

The stairs down to the basement which are followed by the need to make an immediate u-turn with a ceiling that is less than 8 feet tall. It took all three of us, with a lot of tilting and turning and pushing and sliding, but eventually we got it down the stairs, around the corner, and into the basement proper.

And there it shall sit, waiting for me, until it's all ready to go.

**PhillipOrigami** · 08-18-2012, 07:27 PM

I am excited.
Nothing short of.

8 feet! Wow! thats twice the length of my tank!(well, almost)

**Brhino** · 08-18-2012, 07:40 PM

SILLY INTERMISSION

This is a big tank. It's hard to tell from photos, but it's really big. I showed it to my wife, who was suitably impressed. She said she could fit in it, and did I want to take a photo?

She said if she dies I can have her buried in it. I told her that would be TERRIBLE for the water parameters.

**Brhino** · 08-18-2012, 08:02 PM

IV. PLANNING

Here's what needs to be done, more or less in order, before it's ready for fish:

A. Design sump/plumbing. (Don't have to build anything at this point but have to know the plan so that I can...)
B. Design the stand. (...and make sure it will accommodate the plumbing!)
C. Build the stand. (Assembly, painting, and finishing. Never done this before. Hope it turns out nice.)
D. Buff out the scratches in the acrylic.
E. Build the sump/plumbing.
F. Design the canopy.
G. Build the canopy/install the lighting.
H. Determine stocking. (be doing this all along, really)
I. Plan aquascape. (substrate, rocks/gravel, 3D background?)
I. Install plumbing.
J. Test plumbing.
K. Install aquascape.
L. Cycle tank. (will be done with media from other tanks somehow, just don't know the details yet since I don't know what I'll do for the sump)

And then we're ready for fish! I figure it'll be about six months to get all that done. It's not a real thoughtful estimate, just a rough guess. Money is usually the limiting factor for me. I've probably got about enough left in my August budget to get the stand started at least, and then we'll see how time and money goes from there.