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First of all, it would help to know the size of your joists.

If your joists are 4" x 2" criss-section beams, that 8ft aquarium might place a questionable load upon them. If your joists are 7" x 2" cross section, however, then they could support it.

The fact to remember is this. The load must be spread evenly with the aquarium situated perpendicular to the joists. The cabinet design illustrated appears to have a wide flat base in any case, which will help in spreading the load, but if you want to provide extra assistance by placing an 'oversized' flat board beneath it, all well and good.

You also need to know how many joists there are, and the spacing between them. If you have few, widely spaced joists, then a large aquarium of that kind would be risky. A greater number of more closely spaced joists would, however, take the load.

Nominal capacity of the aquarium you're looking at is 680 litres, which equals 680 Kg of weight if filled just with water. As a safety margin, with a typical freshwater substrate and decorations, multiply that figure by 1.3 to obtain 884 Kg if using principally bogwood decorations, or multiply by 1.6 if using several large rocks, giving 1,088 Kg. For a reef, you'd be looking at a safety margin defined by multiplying the nominal 680 Kg weight with water only by a factor of 3, because of all the live rock - this would mean you're looking at 2,040 Kg for a reef. That's a little over two tons. Which once set up, will be a seriously immovable object.

Strictly speaking, since I'm not a qualified civil engineer, I can't give definitive advice on the subject, but if you provde some basic figures with respect to weight, and area covered by the weight, then if you happen to know anyone with the requisite civil engineering experience, then you'll be able to obtain a safety clearance for the load. It's actually worth paying for a professional to assess the load bearing capacity of all your floors for this purpose, because that will not only tell you what your floors will take, it will allow you to decide if you CAN have this aquarium and any other future planned ones without having to worry anymore about the likely catastrophe of one taking a one-way trip to the foundations or coming through the ceiling.

Incidentally, if that fabled Lottery win comes my way, I'm having a house built specifically with the purpose of being able to support large aquaria. I'll tell the engineers that I want floors capable of taking 50 ton loads each throughout the house, even if that means having the house built like a nuclear bomb shelter out of reinforced concrete! At least then I won't have any worries about the floors not being able to take the loading!



Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Now I just had I thought! It would really be defeating my object but just out of interest! What would happen if say instead of having an 8ft tank I had two 4ft tanks ok we know it would be the same amount of water and the same amount of weight as the 8ft but would the weight be more spread out evenly making it less strain on the floorboards?

http://www.greenspersonalprinting.com/

Oh damn I knew there was a reason I could not have it lol. We had this worry with the Rio 400 coz the only place in the room that it would go means that the floorboards do not run in the same way as the tank. It is a downstairs room but there is about a 2 or 3 foot drop under the floorboards. How ever (and this is why the Rio is safe) there are two brick wall supports under the floorboards so each end of the Rio is placed on top of these walls how ever the 8 foot would have one end on a brick wall and the other end would run right past it by 3 foot. The Rio is also placed across three joists and is also placed on top of a 1/4 thick plywood board. Damn Damn Damn I don't recon I can have that tank

http://www.greenspersonalprinting.com/

Are you buying or renting? If renting, what does your lease say about aquariums? If you are buying, can you afford to repair the floor just in case? But that is a lovely tank.

What else is beneath your floor? I know that my floor rests on a cement slab... When was it built?

Ok with this said, I've heard that if you put a piece of plywood, say 1/2 inch down that is a bit bigger than the tank it helps to spread the weight out.

If it were me I'd go for it Put it on an outside wall (this is the main support), and try tohave it over support beams...Go for it, heck what do you have to lose

heidi michelle


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I see a lot of people who
Got to have a piece of me
I'd give the shirt right off my back
If I had the nerve to say
Take this job and shove it
I ain't working here no more
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"I've got a great ambition to die of exhaustion rather than boredom." Thomas Carlyle

About what weight does your floor support? Is there sufficient cross ties below it? You have to figure the weight of the tank + the weight of the water.

One gallon of water, at 20 degrees Celsius, weighs 8.33 pounds. As water heats it becomes less dense. You will only notice a difference at around 100deg F LOL. Water is also extremely lazy.