Peninsula tank recommendations/guidance

[rygh]

+1 on a bit more shallow tank, no longer than your arm.
Obvious one is so you can reach things inside.
You can clean the front glass without a long handle scraper. Big difference.
Lighting seems more uniform. The taller you get, the less light that hits the bottom. Less need for lenses.
But not too shallow. Fish need room, so not like a frag tank.

Long tanks can be a pain for getting the flow right.
Peninusula tanks are probably even worse, since you can only have powerheads on one end.

Wider is great. Diffraction makes your tank look a lot thinner with water in it.

So: maybe 48 x 36 x 22

 

[rygh]

I am also a fan of a thin, maybe 1.5" Eurobracing on the top, not rimless.
Reduces the need for really thick glass.
Interestingly, reduces splash and water spills a bit also.
Still easy enough to get your arm in.

 

[H2OPlayar]

@H2OPlayar those are very interesting. I will say the idea of having hundreds of gallons of water weight sitting on a couple leg supports gives me concern for my floor, but the idea of magnetized plywood attachments I like. That's actually what was going to be the front of the stand I was planning to get made 10yrs ago before I left the hobby. Pricey though, geez.

You can always put a 1/2" piece of plywood under the whole thing and get covers that are that much taller. Also, I think when you price out other options, you will see this is not far from what CDA charges. I have felt the 8020 stands in person without a tank on them and they don't have the shear strength/racking strength that welded steel does. I would have a hard time sleeping at night with that Red Sea stand the way it is stock without additional gussets for racking strength.

As for dimensions, I find plenty of flow at the end of my 54" tank, with all of the powerheads on the plumbed side. If I had infinite space in the room, I would try to extend length as long as possible up to 72" or so. Width would be 36" for extra space on the scape and access from both sides, and I might go as tall as 36" high with the new LED's being as powerful as they are and being fine with LPS growing on the sides. Mine is 54" long x 30" wide x 24" tall for reference.

Edit: my tank dimensions, not like it's in my living room

 

[richiev]

I am also a fan of a thin, maybe 1.5" Eurobracing on the top, not rimless.
Reduces the need for really thick glass.
Interestingly, reduces splash and water spills a bit also.
Still easy enough to get your arm in.

What's your reasoning on the thick glass? Weight? My vision is rimless, but I might be able to get used to try idea of the brace.

My 100g long was acrylic and eurobraced. That one I got from someone throwing it away, and it too had a bunch of scratches, so maybe that is what made me averse to the brace style.

I guess the other option I could consider is acrylic, but I don't think I could do that again.

 

[rygh]

What's your reasoning on the thick glass? Weight? My vision is rimless, but I might be able to get used to try idea of the brace.

My 100g long was acrylic and eurobraced. That one I got from someone throwing it away, and it too had a bunch of scratches, so maybe that is what made me averse to the brace style.

I guess the other option I could consider is acrylic, but I don't think I could do that again.

Weight and a slight visibility difference mostly.
Depends on the quality of the glass. Low iron vs standard.

I love/hate acrylic. But with the hassle of cleaning it, I will never do that again.

 

[Kensington Reefer]

Earthquakes....
The torque on a glass tank would surely cause failure
Yes, they do scratch
But an acrylic tank will fare better during such an event.

I have witnessed the sudden failure of a tank of size.....it is truly a shock to one’s constitution
I don’t wish it on anybody

 

[rygh]

Earthquakes....
The torque on a glass tank would surely cause failure
Yes, they do scratch
But an acrylic tank will fare better during such an event.

I have witnessed the sudden failure of a tank of size.....it is truly a shock to one’s constitution
I don’t wish it on anybody

Yep, tons of great reasons to go acrylic.
But every time I clean Coraline off the plastic display tank, using a plastic scraper, I swear never again....

Unless I can build some sort of automatic cleaner.
(I actually have 3 designs in mind, but nothing I am excited enough to build)

 

[richiev]

I went into Neptune this weekend, looked at tanks, and even had a nice chance to meet @robert4025 . The good news, as always Neptune is wonderful, and I went home with a couple "why not" $9 frags. The bad news, after looking at the tanks I'm pretty confident the 60x24+ peninsula vision I was starting to build up is a no go.

We do have the space where it could fit, but it'd be a major commitment to our living room and house style to get it. The big peninsula they have in the show room is incredible (I think 60x30), but that size is massive in person. It's way bigger than just walking off the equivalent space in my house.

As another positive though, seeing the CDA steel stands in person was great. There's a CDA stand + tank at Neptune that looked wonderful, and the huge amount of space you get in that stand was surprising. I didn't think about the fact that it being steel means you don't have a bunch of internal wood supports in the way. The wood work the did on it also looked great.

I feel like a 48x24, like a red sea reefer 500 isn't that different than the Reefer 170 I have, even though the volume is larger. It might be a reasonable middle ground. However again, the Reefer stands are definitely not passing the visual test from my better half. I've been told "it looks like a refrigerator", which I have a hard time arguing with.

So now I'm in a predicament.

I did just find a waterbox 5526 display on clearance, but without plumbing or sump. I could always try and get that plus a nice stand?

 

[Kensington Reefer]

This photo is from the “end” of a 66”x24”x30”h

 

[richiev]

I'm about to pull the trigger on this CDA tank that is on special. 48x24x20. Steel stand. External overflow. Eurobraced. I'm expecting I'll ask for them to plywood wrap, which will cost extra. This is almost the exact setup I had in my cart with them, in my "try and decide this week" list. I just wouldn't of eurobraced, but :shrug:.

IN-STOCK: 105g. Peninsula Starphire Eurobraced Tank w/Steel Stand

Tank Size: 48.5 x 24.5 x 21 (LxWxH) Layout: Peninsula Glass: 1/2" Starphire with diamond-polished edges Overflow: 16" Modular Marine, with (2) 3/4" return holes Bracing: Double overlapping brace with sleek smoked-glass top layer bracing Stand 36" tall steel stand with plywood top deck. Steel...

cdaquarium.com

Any thoughts before I pull the trigger?

CC @H2OPlayar who led me to look at CDA.

 

[H2OPlayar]

I'm about to pull the trigger on this CDA tank that is on special. 48x24x20. Steel stand. External overflow. Eurobraced. I'm expecting I'll ask for them to plywood wrap, which will cost extra. This is almost the exact setup I had in my cart with them, in my "try and decide this week" list. I just wouldn't of eurobraced, but ‍.

IN-STOCK: 105g. Peninsula Starphire Eurobraced Tank w/Steel Stand

Tank Size: 48.5 x 24.5 x 21 (LxWxH) Layout: Peninsula Glass: 1/2" Starphire with diamond-polished edges Overflow: 16" Modular Marine, with (2) 3/4" return holes Bracing: Double overlapping brace with sleek smoked-glass top layer bracing Stand 36" tall steel stand with plywood top deck. Steel...

cdaquarium.com

Any thoughts before I pull the trigger?

CC @H2OPlayar who led me to look at CDA.

Looks like what I got and am happy with. Nice pick

 

[richiev]

Alright, as noted by me creating the SCA thread I got cold feet. Once I saw how much getting the plywood wrap on the steel stand was going to be, and then realized it didn't come with a sump or plumbing, and that it didn't have the other stuff, and once I corrected that it was going to be $5k I decided more research was needed.

I can get a Reefer 500 for around $3k with all the stuff, so I really feel like quadruple checking I (we) hate the Reefer stands as much as we do. I could just put a new chair or a bookshelf in front of one side of the stand to cancel it out for instance. 48in is easier to minimize than the 60 I'd originally been thinking.

That being said, I still like the CDA tanks for my setup. Particularly the external overflow would fit well I think. I'm also coming around on eurobracing, after starting to think more about what's going to happen when the next earthquake happens.

Stand wise, I'm going to keep looking. The CDA stands are just so expensive, even though they seem great. It's just hard when my stand back in Chicago I made myself out of nice wood and it just cost me time and a bit of wood. A lot of time, but it makes it hard to imagine spending $2500 on a stand. Who knows though.

My current research is on extruded aluminum, T slot stands. I actually had been thinking of making an extruded aluminum stand for a 5.5 gallon tank recently, and I didn't realize other people did that. @grizfyrfyter's comment that his stand is AL in the other thread got me looking into it.

I really like the idea of an AL stand wrapped in wood. Strong, minimal bracing, engineered precision, ability to leverage the slots on the inside to hang things or create shelves, extremely customizability, and I could change the style in the future if I really wanted to. It'd also make me closer to channeling @thesassyindian which is a positive.

For others reference, here's some links to info on those:

* Above cool exposed AL example from Instagram (not my house style, but I dig it): https://www.instagram.com/p/Ca0EdVwPgzn/
* 48x24x36 stand kit, no wrap ($835): https://www.framingtech.com/fti-tank-stand-48x24x36
* AL stands thread
* Example AL build thread
* Another stands thread with examples of attaching wood
* T slot AL vendors thread
* BAR thread on 8020 stand last year


This is similar price to the CDA steel stand, but has the trade off of being multiple pieces and lighter at a cost of needing to put it together. I feel the slots in the AL versus being steel make the ability to self skin it easier, but I'm probably delusional on that.

However however, since the price of the CDA wrap is around $1600, it'd be a lot of fun to instead buy a bunch of woodworking tools!

 

[Vhuang168]

I will point out that the tank and stand will become a very small percentage of your cost. Spend what you can afford even if it means the tank stays empty for a little bit longer.

 

[H2OPlayar]

I will point out that the tank and stand will become a very small percentage of your cost. Spend what you can afford even if it means the tank stays empty for a little bit longer.

Agree, my tank and stand over the 3 plus years have been ~25% of the total cost of my system.

 

[rygh]

There is an alternative to the stand.
You buy a cheap ikea/whatever cabinet (or two) that looks decent and is the right size.
Then you build the inside super-strong with 2x4 / 4x4 / 2x6 / plywood as needed.
It is pretty quick to screw together some boards to make a strong stand, and there are tons on videos/articles on that out there.
What is hard is making the whole thing look nice. So you cheat on that and "skin" it with pieces of a purchased cabinet.

 

[richiev]

There is an alternative to the stand.
You buy a cheap ikea/whatever cabinet (or two) that looks decent and is the right size.
Then you build the inside super-strong with 2x4 / 4x4 / 2x6 / plywood as needed.
It is pretty quick to screw together some boards to make a strong stand, and there are tons on videos/articles on that out there.
What is hard is making the whole thing look nice. So you cheat on that and "skin" it with pieces of a purchased cabinet.

Clever!

 

[richiev]

Ok, update on this. I'm pretty confident I'm going to start ordering things this week. Plans:

* 48in x 24in x 24in (+- an inch or so on the width and height)
* I'm still waffling on rimless or eurobraced, but my default is probably rimless. I'm just a sucker for it, and this is the biggest size I could still do rimless, so I feel I might as well (of course that's also a red flag)
* External overflow, probably Modular Marine so that it's easier to clean but more importantly is designed not to overflow of the drains are closed

For the stand, I'm planning on ordering an AL frame and wrapping it. I did an Ikea trip on Saturday following people's recommendation. While there's a ton of styles out there, my wife did like the cabinets that were similar to this:

That I'm very certain I can build something similar to. Even if I just used IKEA stuff, I can buy 4 doors for the bottom and 4 doors for the top, and I should be good to go for around $200. I might go further and install actual drawers, but my default is just bolting the top section in place.

That plus some wood for the top + internal + one side should be a fun little project I can do and save a ton of cash. Later I can always upgrade it.

The other possible stand addition is adding around 10in to the length. On that I'll install a book shelf, which will also help make it look more furniture'y and less standy.

This week is finalizing design, choosing a tank provider, and placing orders. After that I'm going to start looking into equipment, starting with lighting (I'm currently thinking individual pendant lights or ap9x style fixtures).

 

[Qwiv]

If you want to build a 8020 stand or frame the cheapest place to get 8020 it tnutz.com. I have used them quite a bit. The shipping can be a bit slow, but not terrible.

 

[CaseyP]

* I'm still waffling on rimless or eurobraced, but my default is probably rimless. I'm just a sucker for it, and this is the biggest size I could still do rimless, so I feel I might as well (of course that's also a

Pro Rimless:

• Modern clean look
• No issues routing wires or hanging anything from the rim

Pro Eurobrace:

• Somewhere to set stuff on while doing maintenance. Tools, frags, feeding cups, etc. Super annoying with rimless, but this gadget helps a lot.
• Less water dripping down the outside from minor splashes or even simply touching the rim with a wet hand.
• Jumping fish protection. Not 100% but it blocks the jumpers that swim up while pressing against the glass
• Potentially thinner glass being used with eurobracing providing structural integrity

 

[SupraSaltyReefer]

Not sure if this has been mentioned yet, but I just saw this Waterbox Peninsula on clearance on their website. Might be a good option.

PENINSULA

The Waterbox vision has never wavered: Transform the Aquarium keeping experience with the PENINSULA. The PENINSULA takes the “Room Divider” to a new level with best in class features and unmatched clarity.

waterboxaquariums.com