Floor Covering Under Tank

[Mizer67]

Hi All, I am soon going to be building a new house. After house comes new reef tank. The tank is going to be in the 120 to 200 gal range. The tank will be in the middle of the room set up as a "look through" into the living room. I am trying to decide on the flooring for the area. We were considering a "floating" style laminate floor (pergo or the like). My question is, will having the better part of a ton anchoring the center of the floor cause buckling problems? I have had tanks on carpet before, but never on laminate. Would tile be a better choice for the area? If laminate is okay, would a tank near the wall as opposed to in the middle be a problem? I know the ends aren't locked down to allow for expansion, will the tank ride the stretch or cause the floor to buckle? Any experience would be very helpful. The tank isn't going up immediately, so leaving bare concrete isn't an option. Thanks in advance! Ray

[Doug1]

If the tank wont be against a wall as typically set up, you should be OK with the expansion factor. The biggest issue I feel is how would the flooring stand up toi an inadvertent SW spill

[partobe]

Originally Posted by Doug1

If the tank wont be against a wall as typically set up, you should be OK with the expansion factor. The biggest issue I feel is how would the flooring stand up too an inadvertent SW spill

Tile might be a way to go even if it's just right around the tank like say a foot or so all the way around the tank. Then you could join that with matching pergo for the rest of the room.

[gwaco]

mine sits on wood flooring . had a few "spills " in the past and yes it did buckle a couple of planks . i hid them from the wife . my problem at the time was i thought it would be a "great" idea to put some shower liner underneath the tank , wrong ! the water seeped under it and caused the buckling , which i didn't even know about until i switched tanks . now i have nothing between the wood floor and the tank so any water that does happen to spill i can wipe up and have a fan blow on it .
if your going to incorporate a fish tank into new home construction why not make the area underneath a basin with a drain . sort of like a stand up shower basin with a fish tank in the middle .

[Pauli]

I vote for tile or slate on this one. If you put wood under it over time and multiple spills later the wood may start to mold, however, you could incorporate some sort of ventilation and even a drain as Gary suggested, between the base and the floor which would help to evaporate any spills. I think that this would work fine also.

Personally, I have a pergo floor in my kitchen thatt the previous owner put in and I would rather have real wood. But I like real wood!

[Mizer67]

Thanks to all for your help!

[Diving The World]

We're currently looking to buy/build a new home and I was planning tile. Just seems that it would be the easiest to clean. Along the same lines:

Anyone know of problems setting up a large tank (say 500g) on a slab foundation? The new homes we're looking at are all slab foundation. Someone mentioned that it might be thin and could crack. Any structural engineers out there? I gotta imagine it's better for tanks than a raised wood foundation.

[Mizer67]

Although our tanks are heavy (roughly 10 pounds per gallon) it is spread out if you use a flat bottom stand. For instance, I am planning something like a 120 with about 70 gallons of sump \ fuge. Figure roughly 2000 pounds. A 24 x 48 stand is 1152 sq in. This is just over 1.7 psi. Now a 120 pound woman in high heels (roughly 20 sq inches) is roughly 6 psi. A properly prepared and poured slab should easily support the pressure and the weight, but if you are concerned, have the builder beef up the area where the tank is going to go. They can put footers or thicken the slab in that area. HTH

[tashier]

Just put a concrete slab there, might be an eyesore but you won't have any problems.