Costanza

I decided to turn an old room, which is partially separated from my house, into a small aquatic horticultural workshop. The room was originally built to accompany pool parties (mini-bar shutters, half bathroom, pool equipment storage, etc) as well as my washer/dryer. I assume that it was an expansion to the main house which was constructed in the 80’s; since then it has become an architectural eye-sore due to rotting wood, warped countertops, and other things of this nature. So, I hired a contractor to gut the room and remodel it according to the needs of an aqua-hobby workshop (one that could house several aquariums and accommodate my electrical needs). I will try to keep up with providing updates as it progresses; as of now, we are about halfway through the construction.

The original room (a floating wall divided it in half to accommodate the half-bath):






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3 weeks later:
floating wall removed, shelving installed, latex painted walls, mini-bar shutters have been closed-off

closed-off bar is ready to have cabinet installed and below it will be a stainless steel sink/bench

close-up of bottom row shelf w/ receptacles


Any comments and/or suggestions would be appreciated

Chuppy

Great looking room.. very large..! man i wish i had such a room/space and money for all the aquariums i want lol.... looking forward for an update

m.c.gregg

Sweet room!

GulfCoastDiscus

Hi,
If you plan to put tanks on those shelves I believe 1 gallon of water is 8 lbs. I would add more support. You can't never go wrong with more. You're more than welcome to come by and see my set up. I just finished renovating my automatic waterchange system.

Another suggestion is to paint your walls with anti-meldew paint. Add a Sink, drain, extra outlets. If you can keep all the light outlets in one circuits with a switch.

Gomer

GFI outlets.

TNguyen

Looks like a pretty sweet setup man!

I believe Noel is propagating emerse plant so the setup would be ok.

Thanh

Costanza

I kept all this in mind when I was planning the construction of the room. The shelves have been specially bracketed to the wall by using some sort of anchoring screws (I don’t know how to properly specify these bolts because I’m not verse in carpentry, but they are very long), which went into the studs behind the wall. Furthermore, I think that the studs were modified when they pulled the old wall paneling down; I remember looking at the walls before they put up the sheetrock and I noticed that the studs were given some sort of metal bracket/encasing at the points where the shelving brackets would be bolted into the wall. So I am pretty confident in their weight support as it was my main focus when the contractor drew up plans for his bid – I gave him an estimated weight load and made sure that they wouldn’t “bow.”

As far as the paint: we are using latex-based paints that are water and bacteria resistant. I also had two drains put in the floor. The sink will be a stainless steel bench that typically used in restaurant-type applications. So all in all, I’ve tried to make a room that mildew and water-resistant, climate controlled, plumbing suitable for drains/taps/sink, and electrically stable.

I am interested in learning more about the water-change systems. Perhaps I will check out your set up whenever you have free time; I’m sure I’ll need your advice with a couple issues, or at least I’ll have some questions. Thanks for the input, if you can think of anything else that I would consider I would be very grateful if you could make a post or PM me. I’ll add pictures soon that will show the sink, drains, cabinets, etc.

-Noel

plantkeeper

Ditto that! But awesome idea...

GulfCoastDiscus

Another suggestion...

If you plan for many tanks, you can drill each tank and plumb them to the sewer line to expediate draining the tank. I would also plumb a fill valve for each tank to ease the refilling of each tank.
You can also plan for an online Co2 system instead of one per tank.

Come by and see. There might be some ideas i have. Bring me some plants.lol

If I were to do it all over again there would be many changes I would do when I created my fishroom.

Dreamscaper

Makes me want to go kick out my room mate and turn the extra room into a showroom/workshop. Too bad plants dont pay half the rent though...