Fish room within the attached garage

[Patrick_G]

On 1/11/2022 at 8:07 PM, Beardedbillygoat1975 said:

Gdrilling tanks scares the 💩out of me. Greg Sage’s method gets more and more interesting.

I know what you mean! I would be comfortable drilling a tank up to a 40 gal, but Aqueon told me they sometimes use tempered glass on their 75s so I chickened out. 

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

It’s been awhile since I’ve updated this thread. 

My wife expressed some reservations about the amount of money the project would take as we’d need to update the garage electrical and plumbing. We therefore scaled back a bit and went back to the prior plan of using the area where the fish wall has been and creating a room around that. I really want to thank everyone for the constructive feedback. My wife called me on some of my nervousness about the build and really spurred me on that last week.  

As money was a factor we decided to go with the suggestion of using foam insulation panels for walls. I picked up 8 panels. I then grabbed some foam and zip ties as well as some thermal tape. I’ve gotten to the point where we be got a roof on that’s not secured yet and 4 walls with a door. I’ve worked out most of our electrical issues and I’ll just stick with my python for now for water changes. Here’s my original fish wall setup.

We then cleaned out the area adjacent to get ready for the racking system instillation.  

We then added the rack on the right and the one that helps form the back wall was previously part of the fish wall and has my blue dream neo and blue Hawaiian guppy tub. 

First wall In using the back of the racks as the supports for the insulation material. 
Walls were in and started to work on the roof. 

I tapped the roof together and am now working on a pvc system to support the roof so it will not sag over time. This will also allow me to create a door using thermal blankets and Mylar. 

In terms of ventilation our plan is to stage ventilation as the seasons go on. Winter it will be all closed up. Late spring early summer will open that top left corner area and depending on temps in the garage will start using a fan. Summer starts and temps are getting up into the 90s thinking I’d open the back left up and run a fan in the morning while opening the garage to allow old warm air to leave and replace it with cooler air. I have a temp controller that I could setup to control a ventilation fan as the day goes on to help with evaporative cooling.  

Tomorrow I’ll finish the roof and close up the back wall. Next wife and I are going to go crazy with organizing things got some bins and we’ll make it so it’s easy to keep it organized. 

I’m going to then set up the new tanks and transition the fish to glass tanks from the plastic tubs. Then I’ll get my breeding tanks for my guppies, platys , panda corys and get ready for spring with plans to get some more ricefish from Hawaii from a new breeder I’ve been talking with. Then I’ll get my Greg Sage order in and start doing some CARES species and green dragons. 

I did see a YT vid that Gary Lange did of his fish room think it was Dustin and he uses a cistern of 35 g trash can. He uses a pvc setup where he can drain 3 tanks at once into gutters that go into another trash can and then he pumps that out using a pond pump. This seems highly doable. I love the system Greg Sage has the only issue is without a utility sink or drain close by not sure that will work right now although why couldn’t I just put it into a trash can and use a pond pump? I’m just trying to find a way that I can do more frequent water changes easier then one tank at a time with a python. Ideally I’d be changing 25-30% 3-4 times a week. 

Should have more updates tomorrow!

[tolstoy21]

On 1/29/2022 at 3:49 AM, Beardedbillygoat1975 said:

I love the system Greg Sage has the only issue is without a utility sink or drain close by not sure that will work right now although why couldn’t I just put it into a trash can and use a pond pump?

When you say not 'close by' does that mean there is at least a sink available?  Do you have a sink somewhere in the vicinity? Where there is a will there is a way!

My sink is on the other side of my basement. I pump waste water to it automatically with a utility pump/float switch I picked up at HD. Very easy, not too expensive to setup.

I'm actually about to embark on a project like yours. I laid out a little chunk of change for the original 'fish wall' setup, even while going as minimal and cost effective as I could. I've come close to recouping those costs, but since I didn't keep very good records during the first two years, I can't be sure if I broke even or not.

For my next phase, I'm just going to go slow. I plan on only using money earned from selling fish.  At this point, if this part of the hobby can't sustain itself, then I'm not doing it right and probably shouldn't go any further in terms of personal expenditure. But this means expansion will be on the slow side. In the end, I'll just have an enclosed space similar in size to yours, with a work area outside it to do boxing and shipping.

If you want to compare notes, happy to do so.

I'm lucky enough to be pretty good with home-renno, plumbing, electrical, and where I need help, my father-in-law pitches in, as he's very skilled in this kind of stuff. (Outside labor is always a huge expense if you have to go that route). However, there are still easy ways to achieve results (safely) without being that good at any of these. A lot of the things I've implemented don't take a lot of know-how to do, and are easy and not super expensive to implement.

For phase 2, I'll probably do things a little more $$$ as my wife wants the setup to look nice and not look like a crazy old man's Rube-Goldeberg Fish Machine. She's a stickler on the whole 'fit-and-finish' aspect of things.  🙂

Anyway, thanks for sharing your build!

Edited January 29, 2022 by tolstoy21

[gardenman]

Combining the racks and rigid foam insulation gives you enough structural strength for a fish room and provides insulation, sound deadening, and more. The mold resistance is a nice side benefit in a highly humid atmosphere. It looks good.

[Atitagain]

Everything looking good, bet you’ve been putting in some long hours on this? The way you enclosed this is surprisingly awesome! Kept construction cost way down but gave you just what you needed.👍

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

@tolstoy21i think it’s been surprising how actually room like it is with the foam. The reflective coating on the panels has the added benefit of adding a lot of light to the space. I really think if I add one light up higher which is part of my plan it will really light up the space. 
In terms of the finances we’re probably at around $500-$600 in terms of constructing the space and the tanks so far have been less than $200. When I fully switch over to all glass tanks I’ll be in for $1k. I’m planning to start churning out ricefish for summer with one of @Dean’s Fishroommuck bucket tubs along with starting to raise up some ricefish eggs I’m getting from a breeder in Hawaii so those are probably for next summer realistically. I will now have dedicated space for churning out teacup coral/fireball platys and more tank space for blue Hawaiian Moscows and blue dream shrimp. The plecos and panda corys will have their own spaces as well. I’m hoping by next summer to be net positive in terms of cash flow from the fish room. @gardenmanthe idea was there but you certainly helped me get beyond an idea. @Atitagainit took up Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. Organizing and finishing next 2 days. So yep most of my week off. 

[tolstoy21]

On 1/29/2022 at 11:48 AM, Beardedbillygoat1975 said:

i think it’s been surprising how actually room like it is with the foam. The reflective coating on the panels has the added benefit of adding a lot of light to the space. I really think if I add one light up higher which is part of my plan it will really light up the space. 

Cool. 

I'm at this point where I can't reasonably set up any more tanks without enclosing the space so I can heat that, and not run individual tank heaters.

Maybe by the beginning of summer I'll start down the part towards rigid foam insulation for my exterior walls and then frame out the rest to give myself a small room. I think my space will be about 10x14' in the end.

My biggest challenge right now is that my basement has a lowish ceiling. So getting three shelves out of my racks is going to be either tricky, or not feasible.

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

@tolstoy21i hear you on the heating costs. I’ve lost money because the fish are not at their optimal temp range all the time. My shrimp and guppies would have produced a lot more young if I’d been able to keep it at 72 but I’ve had drops to the mid 60s. 
In terms of racks and tanks I’m sticking to 2 rows of tanks at this point I could go 3 but I’d rather scale up to that after getting the guppies and platys going.

[Patrick_G]

It looks like you’ve been busy. The cost was actually fairly low. It’ll be cool to track your expenses vs how much you bring in from selling the fish. I know that’s not really the point of the hobby but it would a great bit of data for those of us on a budget. 

[Torrey]

On 1/29/2022 at 1:49 AM, Beardedbillygoat1975 said:

Summer starts and temps are getting up into the 90s thinking I’d open the back left up and run a fan in the morning while opening the garage to allow old warm air to leave and replace it with cooler air. I have a temp controller that I could setup to control a ventilation fan as the day goes on to help with evaporative cooling.  

If you are able to use a fan to pull cool night air *into* the garage, and then use the fan to pull air out of the garage during the day (and that will pull some cooler air from the house into the garage during the day) it's a lot easier to maintain consistent temps in your foamed in fish room.

 

When I had more fosters than bedrooms, I moved my bedroom into the garage, and did similar as your fish room (added bonus: I could hear when kids opened a bedroom window, and could meet them outside to ask where they were going).

 

My foamed in room stayed within a few degrees, by using the fan to pull cool air in at night, and reverse the direction during the day which pulled a small amount of cooler air conditioned air from the house, under the door and into the garage.

 

If you add a small (6" square) "exhaust fan" at the bottom corner closest to the door of the house to pull cool air in during the spring/summer, and also put the same size fan at the opposite top corner, you can put both fans on a temp control to turn on (and move air) whenever it gets above a certain temp.

An inkbird or pymeter does the trick.

On 1/29/2022 at 1:49 AM, Beardedbillygoat1975 said:

Gary Lange did of his fish room think it was Dustin and he uses a cistern of 35 g trash can. He uses a pvc setup where he can drain 3 tanks at once into gutters that go into another trash can and then he pumps that out using a pond pump. This seems highly doable.

This would also prevent water from your tanks accidentally carrying invasive species into your local water supply, as long as you don't have any creeks or water ways that could be contaminated from your yard.

[tolstoy21]

On 1/10/2022 at 3:23 AM, Beardedbillygoat1975 said:

Watching the Greg Sage videos again on his diy water change system.  I’m fairly certain that a Rainbird based system is not within our grasp financially in 2022. In looking at Greg’s videos it’s all PVC based. Prices for PVC may have gone up but not that much. I’m excited to eventually go forward and start stockpiling the pvc and making the diy pieces and parts that are part of this design. 

If your water lines are pressurized in any way, I'd go with like 1/2 inch Pex over PVC. I actually prefer Pex in most scenarios, as its cheaper than schedule 40 PVC and waaaaaay easier to work with.

For a drain line to your waste water, you'd want PVC, as it allows a larger diameter. But you won't need schedule 40 for this and can go with something thinner walled.

Honestly, I see so many builds that use PVC for water-in and I never understood why. In my experience, I've always worked with copper (expensive, harder to work with, don't recommend at all) or Pex, which I love. PVC is good for waste lines, and sure it can be used for incoming water, but it's just a harder to work with, rigid, and requires solvents to glue.

In my setup, I run Pex right up to where the tank rack begins, and then step that down with a sharbite that adapts the Pex to RO tubing. From there, tapping new lines into the RO tubing is a piece of cake.  Just snip the RO tubing anywhere and insert a push-to-fit-T fitting. This way I can easily add or remove water feeds to tanks as needed. No glues, no solvents, not sawing PVC, etc. Just snip, snap and done!

For drainage, I use soft tubing, leading from the bulkheads of the tanks to a length of PVC that empties into my sump bin (aka plastic tote).

Edited January 29, 2022 by tolstoy21

[Vanish]

Sounds like I am going to have to learn about Pex 😄

[Streetwise]

Photos please!

[OnlyGenusCaps]

On 1/29/2022 at 2:08 PM, tolstoy21 said:

In my setup, I run Pex right up to where the tank rack begins, and then step that down with a sharbite that adapts the Pex to RO tubing. From there, tapping new lines into the RO tubing is a piece of cake.  Just snip the RO tubing anywhere and insert a push-to-fit-T fitting. This way I can easily add or remove water feeds to tanks as needed. No glues, no solvents, not sawing PVC, etc. Just snip, snap and done!

I'll second @Streetwise 's humble request for photos, but add that I would love an entire documenting of the system.  I have worked with Pex a very little bit, but would never have thought to use it this way.  I'd love to see a full set of photos and description from source to spill (i.e. where it exits into the tanks).  To me it sounds like you have a system that should be replicated! 

[Patrick_G]

@tolstoy21, great post 😀 and objectively good advice! We use pex type systems in the marine trades and I can confirm it’s easy to work with. I also like the idea of adapting it to RO tubing. 

[tolstoy21]

I have two different spots in my setup where Pex transitions to RO line. The one with the Y fitting goes to a tank I have upstairs as well as to my Brute can where I stage water. The other picture, where it has a 90 degree elbow is where it feeds my breeding racks.

This is the RO tubing strung above the rack and a drip emitter over a tank.

Up stream of all this, on the other side of the basement, I have a flow restrictor/pressure valve.

Where I tapped into my water supply, before my water softeners, so I can pull straight well water.

Edited January 30, 2022 by tolstoy21

[tolstoy21]

I do run everything through a sediment filter and nitrate filters (my well water is very high in nitrates)

Over flows on back of tanks. These go into the waste line (PVC) that emptied into a sump/tote.

Sump pimps water across my basement, to my utility sink.

[tolstoy21]

This is my budget solenoid. This is plugged into a standard outlet timer to pump water into tanks on a schedule.

The whole kit-and-kaboodle.

I feel like I just hijacked this thread, so unless you all want more details, i'll end here.

Edited January 30, 2022 by tolstoy21

[tolstoy21]

On 1/29/2022 at 8:37 PM, tolstoy21 said:

Sump pimps water across my basement, to my utility sink.

I'm going to quote myself here, cause I find this typo hilarious!

[tolstoy21]

On 1/29/2022 at 7:32 PM, OnlyGenusCaps said:

I have worked with Pex a very little bit, but would never have thought to use it this way. 

Pex has come to replace the use of copper in water lines in homes these days, given the cost of copper, and the ease of use of Pex. The only caveat to working with Pex is that the crimp tool you need can run $50 or more bucks. But that, and an inexpensive Pex cutter are the only tools you need.

I'd imagine most new residential construction uses Pex over copper, but I could be wrong.

[Atitagain]

On 1/29/2022 at 8:55 PM, tolstoy21 said:

I'd imagine most new residential construction uses Pex over copper, but I could be wrong

IME You can almost say it’s all pex. They used to stub copper on at hook ups, where it comes out from the wall/ floor. But now it’s all pex after it comes in from outside.

im not a Plummer but I work in new residential construction every day and this is what I see.

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

@tolstoy21with info and pics like these you can hijack all the threads you want. It was A great tutorial on doing a great fish room auto water change system on a budget. I realized I never answered your question about water source. The closest tap is our 1/2 bath on the first floor. Pedestal sink with a faucet that perfectly fits the  python fitting. I’m using most of the 50’ of tubing on my python but have room to maneuver with the python still. 
I think because that’s the closest tap the use of a large trash can as a cistern for water to pretreat and oxygenate it would be great. Using a pump to move that water to tanks in the garage makes a lot of sense. I’d like to kind of adapt what MD Fishtanks does which is he uses essentially a KASA plug to turn on and off the pump which I could do as well. My wife and I were talking today about the where and how - we can get an IBC tote and use a pond pump on a KASA plug to remove water from the fishroom and then store that water for the trees and garden. I can then just get another pond pump to hook up tit he drip /spray system to push out the water to feed our plants.  

[Torrey]

On 1/29/2022 at 6:32 PM, tolstoy21 said:

I have two different spots in my setup where Pex transitions to RO line. The one with the Y fitting goes to a tank I have upstairs as well as to my Brute can where I stage water. The other picture, where it has a 90 degree elbow is where it feeds my breeding racks.

This is the RO tubing strung above the rack and a drip emitter over a tank.

Up stream of all this, on the other side of the basement, I have a flow restrictor/pressure valve.

Where I tapped into my water supply, before my water softeners, so I can pull straight well water.

How to identify authentic nerms in the wild:

They find plumbing pictures are sexy

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

Absolutely, I salivate when I see utility sinks in peoples garages! Oh and basements what I would do for a good ol’ fashioned midwestern basement! My wife joked that the only reason I wanted to move to Indianapolis was LRB (whose now moving to FLA) and a basement. She was kind of right although the the Circle City Aquarium Society and being close to Greater Chicago Cichlid Association had nothing to do with my excitement either! 

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

Today in how the fishroom build turns I got the roof supported with a pvc framework to prevent a saggy roof. We then moved on to closing up the back left corner so that I can easily access the electrical and place a vent fan in the summer as well as just open it up when and if needed. I then had a blast using the foam gun to seal up the spaces left open by my shotty craftsmanship when I cut the foam. I’ll finish closing things up tomorrow and my wife has very graciously volunteered to help me organize and put away things so that I can then start cleaning, filling and cycling tanks. 

i also bought a bunch of plants the other day at Lowe’s so the fishroom mascot is Goldy the Golden Pothos plant. 
 

And to celebrate all our hard work we had a bonfire with some safe social distanced time with neighbors and family. Oh and some homemade sourdough. 
Have fun everyone!