Introduction

This article outlines the construction of my DIY Aquarium stand and canopy that was built in the summer of 2005. This design is extremely strong and is adaptable to any 48" to 96" long tank. It is a little over-engineered on the strength, but it's on purpose. This stand will outlast the tank that sits on it, and you will feel a lot better at night knowing your big heavy tank is not sitting on a store-bought particleboard stand. The tank pictured at left is a Hagen 90gal tank with dimensions of 48" long x 18" wide x 24" tall. This isn't a "simple" or "beginner" tank stand, this article assumes you're somewhat comfortable with wood and wood construction. This combo also looks good, so you can actually put it in a living space. There is ample storage underneath, and the canopy has excellent lighting. This article is split up into multiple sections as it has lots of photos. You can click on any photo for a larger version. If you have any questions on anything in the article, please feel free to pm me (DarkDep) or email me at darkdep@sympatico.ca.

Required Tools, Materials, and Skills This stand requires an amount of woodworking ability, but a lot of the more advanced stuff (such as routing the doors) can be eliminated or simplified. For the stand, the following tools and material were used: 10 2x4's (Get ones that are as straight as possible, but looks don't matter...they will be hidden) 1 sheet (4'x8') of 1/2" Birch plywood (I used particleboard core) 1 small sheet (2'x4') of 1/4" Birch Plywood, G1S is fine Box of 1 1/2" finishing nails Box of 2 1/2" wood screws Lots of metal angle brackets (see the pics for what they looklike) Wood Glue (carpenter's yellow and "stainable" Wood putty (Natural Colour) Power Mitre Saw (can substitute a Circular Saw or MitreBox with backsaw if required) Mitre Box Clamps (Lots of em) Hammer Drill with Screwdriver bits Hand Plane of some kind (optional, if you're lucky) Nail Set (Optional) Speed Square (Optional, helps to square the joints) Router (Optional) Shop Vac (Technically Optional, but you need something to clean up the dust and shavings!) Table Saw (Optional) Couple of Woodworking Chisels 2 Door handles, 4 door hinges (Got these from Lee Valley)

Requirements were that it be strong enough to support the weight of a 90gal, look good, be relatively inexpensive to build (within reason), and have lots of room for equipment. I decided on a double-2x4 frame wrapped in birch plywood for a basic design, with 2 doors, and some nice moulding. Although I've been doing the garage woodworking thing for a couple years, I've never attempted anything of this scale before...so this is a real challenge. Many others build stands out of a 2x4 frame...I chose to double up on them for a couple reasons. First, 2x4's are cheap, so it's not really a cost consideration. Second of all, although overkill, I guarantee you it won't fail and this basic design would be good for much larger tanks as well. Lastly, it made the wife happy to hear me say the word "overkill" when I described something holding over 1000 lbs. Never underestimate the value of Pleasing The Spouse. I started with the bottom dimensions of the tank (48"x18"), added an inch to each for safety, and used those for dimensions for the top (so 49"x19"). It will be 30" high, because my other stand is that high, and I had to pick a number. I purchased about 10 good quality 2x4's from Home Depot and proceeded to cut them up to the sizes I needed. You have to make sure to take into account the thickness of the double 2x4's when performing your cuts (3" thick). Look at the pictures and you will see what I mean. I won't post the exact measurements i used as you will need to adjust them for your tank size anyway if you decide to do this yourself.

Stack-O-Cuts. I cut all pieces on a power Miter saw; you could do it with a handsaw or Circular saw as well (but it wouldn't be as accurate).	I cut all the pieces first, then used Yellow Carpenters Glue and clamps to double them up. I could have doubled them before gluing; I might try that next time. Only thing is, 2x4's aren't really all that straight or precise...cutting them seems to help eliminate some of the irregularities.
One of the ways I tried to make sure all the "doubling-up" was as even as possible. The extra blocks keep the wood aligned.	To maximize usage of clamps (which you never have enough of!) I clamped all the similarly sized boards together. This also helped with alignment.
These metal brackets I'm using to connect the wood together. Home Depot has these for $0.34(cdn) each, so they're cheap. Also, the little tab you see can be hammered into the wood to hold it in place while you put in the screws, which helps more then you think! I used regular 2 1/2" wood screws all around for the frame, putting in 4 per bracket.	The bottom of the frame assembled. Notice I went with a full frame design as opposed to legs; this helps to distribute the weight on the floor, and helps the whole thing stay level. The boards are also lying on their "sides", as opposed to their "top" or "bottom" (does that make sense?) as it handles weight better in this configuration.
Legs Attached to the bottom frame. The legs are on "top" of the frame, as opposed to the frame being attached to the bottom of the legs, again to even out the weight distribution. This way the wood handles all the weight, and the screws merely hold things together in-line.	Closeup of the bottom corners. Nothing is moving that.
Here's a good example of the main problem with 2x4's...they're generally warped. As careful as I was to align the pieces, I ended up with a few wonky joints like this. As you will see, it ended up being very correctable...so if you try this, and get a few joints that look like this, don't worry too much.	Top rails added. Notice that the orientation of the top rails and the legs leaves a small "lip" on the inside which the support beams will rest on; this was intentional and helps with the overall strength of the frame.
Side top support beams added.	And the basic frame is complete.
Next I had to find a way to flatten some of the weirdness of the 2x4's. I bought this small Block Plane years ago and never found a use for it, until now. I started out trying to sand with a power sander but it was just not feasible for the amount of wood I needed to remove. This guy works perfectly, and was only about $40. I did have to sharpen the blade first on a waterstone, but once that was done this cut the 2x4's like a hot knife through butter.	This is one of the reasons a plane is better than a sander for this kind of thing...it creates large shavings of wood rather than a fine dust all over everything. A shop-vac cleans this up much easier than the dust. Yes, you still have a mess, but it's a...better mess!
Next step was to add the exterior. I chose to use 1/2" Balticbirch plywood (well, actually it's a particleboard core). A good combination of cost and good looks made me choose it. This stuff was about $45cdn for a 4x8 sheet at Home Depot. I really tried and managed to use only a single sheet for the whole shabang. I measured and got Home Depot to cut it on their big Panel Saw. I glued and clamped the back on first.	I also added a line of finishing nails (1 1/2") along the frame for some extra support. They will be sunk below the wood surface with a nail set.
Here you can see that the plywood isn't as exact to the frame as I would have liked. A combination of 2x4 unstraightenness, my measurements, and HD's "accurate" Panel Saw proabably contributed to this. Sigh. More handplane work was required here to bring things together.	I sank all the nails with a nail set, and used some neutral coloured wood putty to fill the holes.
As you can see, the wood putty is close to the colour of the plywood. Once sanded down to be flush after it dries, it should leave only a tiny dot of slightly off colour, which hopefully after stain/paint it will be virtually invisible. At least, that's the theory.	Adding the first side, with lots of glue and clamps. As I'm planning to put moulding on the top and bottom of the stand, finishing nails were used in the top and bottom rail as well. The web-clamp in the middle was used to pull the plywood tight to the middle where I couldn't get clamps (as the back is attached at this point).
Closeup of where the nails were placed. Just where they will be hidden by moulding. I cared more about this on the sides and front, cause any nail holes would be more readily visible.	Once sunk, they won't interfere with the moulding.
(Sideways shot). Putting on the second Side here. Same as the first, but I used a "monitor clamp" to hold down one bulging side of the plywood.	Making a mess planing the 2x4's. Also demonstrating the first weight test, by standing on it while taking this pic!
Here I've cut strips of Birch plywood to construct a faceframe. I'm just trying out the fit at this point.	Now we have a top. I happened to have some 3/4" Maple plywood from a previous project, so after flattening the top with lots of planing, I cut two pieces of about 10"x50" and glued/nailed it to the top. As the tank will be sitting here, I wanted something thick, but it's not necessary to hide the nailholes to any extent...sinking them will be enough.

This is the end of Part 1 of the article. Please see Part 2 for more!.