displacement...

makai

Member
Thinking of setting up a 100g long (72 x 18 x 17)....
First, How much of that 100g would really be in there if i put 150-200 lbs of live rock...
I'm not the brightest tool in the shed, so i'm hoping one of y'all are......
trying to figure out wieght. I live in a 3rd floor apartment and the house was built in the early 1900's....
thank you
 

dindi

Member
The actual amount of water to me is a mystery but if the house was built in the early 1900's I would say could you could park a tank on the floor and all would be fine, hey I'm a Realtor, old is ALWAYS built better. But to be safe just get a engineer in to look. If the house has REAL wood jousts AND REAl wood flooring under whatever else is there then go for it. Dang old is always better in the house trade. JMO
 

luvnluk

Member
I am also curious about this. I have a 55 gal. with a 4 - 5" DSB and 55lbs. of LR...suffice it to say I have displaced alot of water. Is this optimal? My only filtration is LR/LS.
 

makai

Member
I'm in the same boat as you now luvnluk....
I'm figuring at least down to 45g maybe less.
hhmmmm...
I think its time to bigger.:D :D
I'm getting a little nervous about the 100g though. Mostly about the weight. The landlord or my buddy downstairs (who also has a 55 FOWLR) would be happy when a 1500lb fish tank falls through the floor. oops...:mad: :eek:
 

ponzspyder

New Member
Water weighs somewhere around 8.5lbs/gal, so a 100gal tank would weigh 850lbs with just the water ( not including the tank itself ).
I am no engineer but from my understanding, as far as the rock and sand goes, it wont reduce your weight, it ADDS to it since the rock and sand have a higher density than water ( otherwise they wouldn’t float :) So I would agree with what Juddster said...
your looking at that weighing a minimum of 1000 to 1300 pounds
and its probably on the higher end of that scale.
 
I think the 1000 - 1300 lb minimum seems accurate, and I would definitely have a professional take a look, but you'll probably be fine... just think, would the floor cave through if you had 5 - 7 people standing in the same spot? Good chance it won't, but I wouldnt chance it either. :)
 
In order to find out how much water you actually have in your tank after adding live rock you need to determine the average specific weight of the live rock in your tank. I don't think vendors usually have this info so determining the amount of water displaced by the rock is difficult. Experimentally you can fill a 5 gallon bucket, or any size bucket for that matter, full to the top with water. Add live rock to the bucket so the water overflows over the top. Take out the live rock and measure how much water is left. The difference is the amount of water the rock displaces. Further more if you know you added 30 lbs of rock and 2 gallons overflowed....well there's your specific weight. 30/2 = 15 lbs/gal. If all your rock is similar you can take this figure to determine how much water displacement you have with any amount of rock.
I think the easiest way to determine the weight of your aquarium is to just be conservative. I'd add the weight of the water plus the weight of the sand, rock, tank, and stand. Your final figure will be a little more than what it actually weighs but that's always a good factor of safety. Plus, unless you're accurately weighing the rock each time you add it and keeping records, you're pretty much guesstimating the amount of rock you have anyways.
At 20 degree's celsius, the specific weight of pure water is 8.33 lbs/gal. Multiply that figure by how many gallons you have and then multiply that by the specific gravity of your water.
Example:
55 gallons of water with a specific gravity of 1.024 will weigh:
55 x 8.33 x 1.024 = 469 lbs
Hope this helps!:D
 

terrence

Member
jaegermeister nailed it!!!!!
Her's another thought in regards to being in an apartment. Do you have "Liability Insurance"????
Any damage caused by your tank, overflow, etc. is your responsibility!!! Your downstairs neighbors and owner can hold you liable for the repairs, including relocating the tenants while their apt. is being fixed, and of course the replacement of ALL personal property one might damage!!!
I'm not trying to be a 'downer'.....but keep this in mind!!!
 
Top