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My 55g Mbuna tank project

109K views 225 replies 72 participants last post by  ilm121209 
#1 ·
Figured I would start this post so I can keep track/show progress each step along the way on this project.

First off it's funny how things can snowball so much. Because I have been out of Aquariums/keeping fish for over 15 yrs and just a few weeks ago decided to get back into it. I planned on getting just a 10g tank with some community fish to sit on top of the entertainment center. And some how that turned into a 55g mbuna tank that I am building the stand, canopy, 3D background as well as other things for myself. Guess you can tell I am the type of person that can get hooked on/obsessed with something pretty quickly :lol: Anyway on to the project....

Started out with a 55g tank I found on Craigslist. I paid $60 for the 55G and a 20g "long" tank both from the same seller. I plan to use the 20g long tank as a temp/hospital tank. The only problem with the 55g was that for whatever reason the previous owner decided to remove the center support brace. He obviously was not a very handy type of person because it looked like he removed the brace with an axe :eek:

Starting out...


So I had to remove the factory top trim and order a new trim for it. Removing it wasn't all that hard, just more of a pain in the rear because it takes awhile to cut all the silicone that holds it on the tank. I used a 4.5" paint scraper and worked it all along the outside & inside of the trim to finally get it to come off. Then I had the LFS order me a new top trim which only cost $15. They could only get me the black trim but that's not a problem because I will be building an all wood canopy so the trim will not even be visible...



Now I have started on my 3D background for the tank. After spending some time trying to decide what shape of rocks I want to make it look like and what design I wanted, I came up with something a bit different than I have seen so far. Since the tank is 13" wide I didn't want to do a background that sticks out too far into the tank where I would lose 1/3 the water volume for the fish to swim in. So what I decided on was this. I bought 6 sheets of 3/4" styrofoam and have siliconed together 3 sheets to make the thickness 2.250" at the thickest part as seen here......



Then for the design I am doing it so there are two (maybe even three) "openings" in the background. The reason for this is it will leave more room for the fish to swim, pluse it will actually give the illusion of depth in the tank to make it seem bigger. Because in the two/three openings that I leave between the "rocks" of the background I plan to airbrush the back of the tank where the glass shows with a shaded light to dark blue and then mount two 20" Cold Cathode light bars behind the tank. What that will do is give the inside of the tank the appearance of being in an underwater cave, and the two/three openings with the airbrushed blue shades and the blue Cold Cathode lights reflecting behind the opening will make it look like you can see out of the cave out into deeper "open water" of the lake.

This is a picture I was looking at online which gave me the idea to try it this way. So this will give you a basic idea of what I'm going for...



My background will be about 6 pieces on the back, then I will have some small pieces on the side to hide the intake and return tubes for the Rena xP3 filter and powerhead.

So I started out tonight shaping the first of the pieces. I found a single hand hacksaw, a small drywall scraper, and a round reamer made from a section of a fishing rod with some sanding grit epoxied to it made for the perfect tools for shaping my rocks.

The start of roughing in the edges of the first two pieces that will form the first "cave opening"....





And the first three pieces roughed in and mocked up in the tank so I can see what more shaping I need to do on this half of the background....



As you can see from this picture doing it this way I think will still give me a nice 3D look and will not take up all that much room inside the tank which was one of my main goals with this.

That's as far as I got this weekend, will post more updates as I get farther along. Hope you all enjoy and feel free to comment or make any suggestions, I am always open to suggestions and ideas I may not have thought of yet.

 
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#127 ·
Hello to everyone, it's been awhile since I was on here. You guys probably all thought I had given up on this build or that I was dead :lol: Actually just the old story of life getting in the way of projects is all that happened. The extra "fun money" dried up for a while and I had to put the aquarium build on hold for a few months over the summer while I did some other things. But now that business has picked back up and I have a bit more money to put towards the aquarium build again the project is back on now.

Last week I had a major step forward and with the help of my brother in law we brought the tank/stand/canopy upstairs into the light of day and positioned it in the room were it will call home. Currently I am getting ready to mount the filter intake tubes behind the back ground and then mount the back ground into position one final time. I'm also searching for a local place to buy the sand from (not having much luck there yet) but once the filter tubes/spraybars are mounted then I'll be hooking the filters up and starting to cycle it very soon.

Nice to finally be back on track with this project.

Quick shot of it sitting in the room now finally...



Steve
 
#128 ·
Just finished the final trimming of the background and now have the three main large back sections permanently siliconed in and curing. Tomorrow I will be installing the side panels and then placing the intake tubes for the Xp3 and Xp4 filters so that I can build covers that will concel the intake tubes from sight. Also picked up the filter materials today and ordering the rest of the ceramic rings tomorrow.

I already have the lighting system pieces all here (t5 duel light, dimable LED blue moonlights) but after doing some searching online tonight I found a smoking deal on some of the Hydor LED Spotlights. So I'm ordering four of the LED spotlights tomorrow so I can add some more dramatic lighting effects to the tank at night.

Back pieces drying....



Steve
 
#129 ·
Finished putting the side panels in late last night so now the whole background and side panels are all securely attached in the tank now. Next will be routing the dual filter intakes (one in each corner) and then concealing them from sight, then mounting the spray bars.





Steve
 
#131 ·
Thanks Iggy...i'm surprised I have had the patience to keep it going this long myself, I'm usually way to impatient lol. Just tested the LED moonlights a few mins ago, I'll post a pic shortly, but I'm still waiting for a bunch of LED spotlights from Big Al's so can't wait to get those hooked up. But it's pretty cool looking as is right now with the moonlights. Pic to follow soon.

BTW. NICE largemouth in your avatar. I'm a HUGE fly fisherman myself and my other passion is fishing all the time here in the great lakes and Northern Michigan.

Steve
 
#132 ·
Started building the panels to conceal the filter intakes today (one intake on each end of the tank). Once finished the only thing that will hang below the panels are the very end of the intake because I want it to be uncovered so I will end up painting those so they blend right in...

One panel roughed in and shaped...


Both panels with first coat of Drylok on them...


The last piece of the left cave opening now siliconed in to place...
 
#134 ·
Managed to make enough time to get both the side rock panels mounted and shaded with color today. They hide the filter intakes extremely well yet still leave opening enough to get good flow to them. Also now that all the 3D background is in the tank I installed the new top tank trim piece with a bead of silicone all the way around the top of the tank. I was struck with an idea today to add something I had not planned. Since I am doing a "cave theme" I though it might look nice to make a few small rock formations that would hang down into the tank from the top of the waterline (think stalactites here) and mount them about 1" from the front upper lip of the tank. So I made three sections out of foam and have the drylok coat curing on them right now. I'll test mount them to see if I like the idea of them once they are dry. If not then they will not be used, but we'll see tomorrow how they look.

Here are the finished filter intake panels I made....

Close up...(you can just barely see the intake grill peeking out in this side angle)



Front shot they are not visible at all

 
#135 ·
I dunno...what do you guys think?
/?
They aren't painted/shaded....but the three pieces in the front of the tank? YES or NO?

 
#139 ·
Wow. I just read this entire thread, and every bit was worth it. That is the most amazing tank build I have ever seen.

As for the extra pieces, any way you could get a full tank shot with them? I'm trying to picture it in my head. They could be awesome, or they could be distracting, you know?
 
#140 ·
Thanks guys for the compliments. Well after more thought and looking at the front pieces, I decided to ditch them. I thought it might be a neat idea at first, but after looking at them for a couple days I really found them just taking away from the overall look I was going for and they just blocked some of the other background details I worked hard to build so I scraped that idea.

But the past few days I have make some more steps forward. An order I placed last week came in which was for 2L of Matrix bio for my dual canister filters. Also got the pads and some filter floss. Some more of the lighting systems came (3 Hydor LED white spotlights and 1 Blue Hydor LED spotlight) Actually waiting for one more Blue LED spotlight that's on backorder :( And picked up two 24" Versa-top hinged glass tops today as well as 50lbs of Tan Medium sand and 50lbs of White sand from Home Depot (plan to mix tan & white together).

Still waiting on the other one of the Blue LED spotlights which will light up the right side panel in blue like the left one. But here is a test run with the four Cold Cathode "cave lights", twin blue LED 48" moon light bars, three LED white spot lights, and one of the Blue LED spotlights all on now. I also have a 48" T5 dual light which will mount in the canopy for times when I want to really light the whole tank up, but I personally like the more dramatic effect the spot lights give to the look.

So far I'm very pleased with the way the lighting system is coming. Now tomorrow I get to wash 100lbs of sand :oops: :D

Current state today (minus canopy because I have to do a bit of trimming on the inside back brace of it).

 
#142 ·
More progress this evening, but what a pain it was. After mounting both glass lids on top I realized that the 1" acrylic rear of the glass lids which is normally used for trimming filter intake clearance... well it just was not gonna work because my custom background I made extends 1.75" away from the back glass, which means the filter intake as well as spraybars were going to need to be routed through the glass part of the lids...uhg!

Nothing's worse than having to cut brand new glass you just bought and hope you dont crack the whole thing in two. So after a few tense moments with the glass cutter I went to work. I am very happy with the way it all came out. Rather than run the spray bar along the back like I originally planned on doing from the start of this build, I decided to run them along the sides and tuck them up into the edge of the trim so they were completely hidden from sight. This required some trimming of the upper lip of the background, as well as notching the new top trim piece I just installed, and cutting the spraybar to fit.


View from the front the spraybar is completely hidden in the upper trim piece...



Then it was simply a matter of doing the exact same thing to the left side of the tank...



And then glass all cut/trimmed and new lids mounted into place

 
#144 ·
Steve C said:
Thanks Iggy...i'm surprised I have had the patience to keep it going this long myself, I'm usually way to impatient lol. Just tested the LED moonlights a few mins ago, I'll post a pic shortly, but I'm still waiting for a bunch of LED spotlights from Big Al's so can't wait to get those hooked up. But it's pretty cool looking as is right now with the moonlights. Pic to follow soon.

BTW. NICE largemouth in your avatar. I'm a HUGE fly fisherman myself and my other passion is fishing all the time here in the great lakes and Northern Michigan.

Steve
Thanks Steve. After reading the whole thread, and seeing all the pics, I could tell you were really into fishing. Nice 'man cave'

Nice recovery on the glass tops/spray bar. Looks sweet and completely hidden.
 
#145 ·
austings said:
Looks great! What kind of filter are you using? What other plans for this tank do you have?
Pair of canister filters (XP3 & XP4). No other big plans than what I have already done, just finishing it up and some small detail work now.

Steve
 
#146 ·
When I saw you online Steve, my first thought was "You march right up to the DIY board and update your thread, Mister!" ;) Glad to see the updates! Can't wait to see it completed with fish swimming around in it, gloating over having the sweetest digs on the block. :D
 
#150 ·
very awesome a little intimidating as im about to start my background today!
PaNiK- Just have fund with it, the good thing about making your own Background is that there really is not wrong way to do it. Just start shaping the foam and see where it takes you. You'll find that you can make changes while your doing it and it will be fine. Just take your time and have some fun doing it.

Hey Steve, could you post how much it cost you for the whole setup? I'm starting a 55g tang tank soon and I WANT THIS!!!
metricliman- I Haven't sat down and added it up to an exact amount yet, but with everything so far I think I have somewhere between $800-$900 total in it. That included some stuff which isn't installed yet like the two Rena filters, the Hydor inline heater and all that stuff as well.
 
#151 ·
Painted the upper inside of the canopy white to reflect light better, and the rest of the inside flat black to keep the light from peeking through any seems where the door mounts to the canopy. Also have the dual T5 lights, two LED moon lights and the 5 LED spotlights now all in place as well.



 
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