Chadalca's guppy rack and aquarium journal

[chadalca]

Hello all, 

 

Sharing my guppy rack and current community type aquariums in photo journal format.  First… a little bit about me.

 

My name is Chad Alcares,  I'm in my late 40s and living out here in Lincoln, Nebraska with my wife of 9 years and my stepson… our cats and my fish….  I've been keeping fish with emphasis on livebearers since I was 9 or 10.  Starting with black mollies and platies in the mid 80s in England with my parents stationed there with the Air Force.   Then moving back to the states,  I had a 29 gallon and a 10 gallon growing up middle school and high school.  Have been keeping aquariums off and on since then, with more "on" time from 2006 to present, with a full push on multiple tanks beginning in late 2020.  I have a lot of experience with livebearers, mainly: mollies, guppies, platies, and less so, swordtails.  I never quite ever thought of putting multiple tanks together in a rack like system because I mostly lived in apartments, then in 2020 I went down the youtube rabbit hole for aquariums and saw lots of ideas for shelving, from DIY projects with 2x4 to high end garage racks.  What I was able to do was what I consider the person who is horrible at DIY, needs everything pre-cut or already built, and for whatever I'm putting together to not even need tools... just maybe gravity and a smack here or there.

 

New Guppy Rack for 2024

 

Plan:  Create a 10 gallon rack system using stand-alone shelving unit.  I've had good success putting together wire shelving in the past, but want something that could hold more weight and possibly more tanks short side facing out. 

 

Research: Kept looking at stronger 36 inch wide shelving units, but even with the strongest shelves, could only fit 3 10 gallons side by side… now I could get two racking systems have them side by side… but then I found a 4 tiered 48 inch wide commercial/industrial grade wired shelving unit from Menards with 800 lb capacity per shelf.  At 48 inches wide, I could fit 4 - 10 gallons short side facing out.

 

 

 

 

Build:  So, I went with that.  It was the typical wire shelving where you have the 4 poles… place clamps that come with the kit at the height you want and slide the shelves from top down until they stop at the clamps.  Tricky part was I was trying this as a one-man operation and the shelving was 6'2 and working with shelves that were significantly heavier than the ones for a normal shelving unit - in fact I gave up one night then woke up next morning to complete and honestly with clear head boom I had it built in 10 minutes.   I made sure to have at least 2 rows with 20 inches height between them.  Each notch on the poles are 1 inch, or you can do like I did too and use yard stick to make sure everything at right height.

 

 

With this rack and setup, I was able to fit 4 ten gallons on one level, and 4 ten gallons on another level.  I started with 4 - 10 gallons sitting on the bare wire.  What I noticed was there was a bit of sagging and the tanks weren't very level, but I figure this shouldn't hurt for now - my plan is next big water change, i will distribute the weight across the rack with the solution

 

 

 

But when I was about to fill the upper rack I decided I wanted something to even out the weight, so I headed to home improvement store get some pre-cut 2x4x4 pieces to place on the wire shelving to spread out the weight and place the tanks on those.  Result - much more level 10 gallon tanks.

 

 

 

 

I get air to all tanks and use Aquarium Co - Op sponge filters and Aquarium Co - op line… two aquarium co op gang valve so I could split air to 4 tanks up high, and 4 tanks down low.  Currently using Tetra 60 air pump (which has two air hose outputs) which I put on top rack on some 1x4's i didn't use for the build but prove useful.  This allows me to drop air lines and not have to make them go up into any tanks requiring those special valve thingies to stop back flow that I can't think of the name right now

 

 

splitting air to one gang valve for top rack and one gang valve for bottom rack.  And this is where I enjoy using wire shelving as I can drop the air between the wires.  And not worry about having to route it around the shelf, behind the shelf or wherever.  and the wires kind of act like a shelf for the gang valve. 

 

 

Sure I could tie it on something, use things but why do that when I could just let it hang haphazardly.   I tell myself, I'll clean up stuff in the future... right?  Going to look to upgrade to Tetra whisperer 100 though as my demand has increased with the extra tanks and total gallons over my old rack setup.  Lighting is typical LED 30-40 inch type lighting that I had left over from some of the lights I was using for the old setup.  May need a longer light as these do not span the entire 44 inches or so of tank space… only go to about 40 inches, with a couple inches missing on each tank on the ends.  Heaters, just have a couple tanks with heaters at this time.  Most of these fish are fish I've raised indoors and outdoors and have been acclimated to mid to upper 60s to low 70s indoors.  Although I did put heater on the tanks where I have actual guppy strains I want to trade/donate to the local fish stores.

 

This has been a couple weeks in the making, finally seeing the finish line.   Already reaping the benefits as catching fish and transferring to new tanks is so much faster and convenient. 

 

Before "old rack" with some of my original plans in highlighter with a stronger rack

 

 

After... Two rows of 10 gallon tanks 20 inches between shelves (18 when calculating 2x4)  with the old rack being re-used to house to 20 longs.

 

 

 

Current inhabitants in the 10 gallon rack

 

In no particular order...

 

• Red-blonde guppy breeding colony
• Blue Galaxy guppy fry
• Hawaiian Variatus Platy breeding trio
• Mutt guppy fry and juvenile tanks splitting out males and females to own tanks
• 20 longs (short term) - male guppies in one, female guppies in the other.  This will house the guppies I'm considering trading into the local fish stores.  All other guppies will live in the community aquariums in the basement living room.
• 20 longs (long term) - once mutt guppies have grown out and left - move the variatus platies to one (they don't need a heater) and maybe my black mollies to another (they will prob need a heater)

 

Future plans - waterproof tarp to hang off the back to prevent backsplash on the drywall behind.  An additional rack to the left of the 20 long that I will use probably to concentrate on breeding shrimp.  I currently pretty much have shrimp in all tanks but don't have any true shrimp breeding colonies, just some groups of shrimp that give me a few babies here and then.

 

That's it.

 

For now.

 

thank you for your time.  i'll probably add any adjustments, maybe some pics and vids of the fish and of course the current state of my community aquariums

 

Update:  Took the time today to bring down the water in the lower rack - add a couple 2x4 for leveling and stability.  feeling more confident in this now.  thanks

 

Edited Saturday at 06:00 AM by chadalca

[Chris]

Looking good! Following along.

 

Just keep an eye on the racks and make sure they aren't bowing - I've been skeptical that those wire racks would hold the weight, despite the manufacturer's max load claims.

[chadalca]

Quick 1 minute short of my guppy room setup.  Dec 2 2024

 

2 - 20 longs for the larger fish (top - males only, bottom 3 males to more females not sure how many)

4 - 10 gallons top (female guppy juvies, hawaiian variatus platies, blue galaxy guppy fry and female juveniles, young male guppies, some red blondes some mutts)

4 - 10 gallons bottom (male guppy growout, female guppy growout, small fry growout, red blonde guppy colony)

 

will fill in with more valisneria, java moss, windelov java fern, pogostemon stellatus octopus, with orders from aquariumcoop over the next few weeks weather permitting

 

 

Edited 7 hours ago by chadalca