Ok ok so i'm so excited I emailed my landlord and he said we can have as many fish tanks as we want!!!! I was so scared he'd say no! But anyway to the question..

I'm going to be getting a 5x2x1.5 tank with a pine stand and hood (i'm goin all out on this one, no second hand/tinted glass/breaking stuff this time!). But i'm wondering about the stand. Would it be best to varnish it to make it waterproof or can i leave it raw? The problem is is that the tank will be massive and hence massively heavy and i'll have to take it out, varnish it and put it back in somehow.

So will the stand be alright raw? or is it really necessary to varnish it..?

I am sure it would be fine "raw" wood, but you realize that wood with no finish on it can discolor with time - pine will gray out and not be nearly as pretty as it could be. The wood's grain can be greatly enhanced and with a careful varnish, should last that lovely yellow color, smooth and even, for a lifetime.

If it is at all possible to pull the tank and varnish the stand, I would. You are dealing with water - even though there should be a minimum of water on the stand, but you will have humidity and all to contend with. A gray stand is also not what I would choose for inside a house..

JMO

I have 2 pine stands in use that I haven't varnished. The oldest is 9mths and hasn't shown any discolour as yet. Of course over time I guess they will, hadn't thought about that, but because they are not exposed to the weather, rain, sun, temperature extremes, etc, I think it would take a long time before they discoloured.

I've got a pine stand, I was too impatient to waste time varnishing. Filled it up as soon as i got home

I'm extra careful doing water changes and make sure if I get any water on the wood I soak it up real quick.

Thanks guys, but i think i'm going to varnish it. I am very impatient like you benno, but it's going to take me a little while to get everything set up, with new filters, substrate etc etc, so i figure i may as well do it.

In summer our humidity is near 100% so thats a problem, as well as it being a 420L tank, so i'm BOUND to spill water everywhere because thats what i do best! (you should see the water trails leading from my 3 tanks to the bath when i do water changes!!)

If you should happen to varnish your stand, put some wax paper between
the tank and the stand. This way they won't become permanently
bonded together. I do this with my homemade tanks and it works great.

i varnished them all separately the tank was upstairs and the hood/stand downstairs It looks good though, i'm glad i did it!

I knew you'd do it, you're not as lazy as me.

How long before it dries and is ready for us?

Its up now i'll go take some pics! Except i havent decorated it yet, i just put my existing wallpaper backing stuff to hide the canister filter tubes..

I used all my existing filters (2 existing, 1 new) and same gravel, so hopefully cycing shouldn't be a problem...

I used a water based varnish, so it didn't darken the natural colour of the pine, it has a slight gloss look, but you probably cant notice it in the photo.



My canister filter didn't fit under the tank, which is a bummer, i should have measured but i assumed thats what the space was for hence canisters would fit! But oh well, it dosent look too bad.

If you do not like seeing the cannister, you can make a open top wooden box of pine that it sits in. Varnish it up and you have a custom system!

That looks very nice. I bet you have a blast decorating it!

Wow, that tank is nice and big.

Remember that thread about the RE agent when I said the things we worry about the most usually never turn out as bad as we think. See, your agents are big pussycats.

yea i'm just a scardy cat.. if they had said no i wouldn't have argued and would have had to stick with my 100L tank and a few tubs but its all good now. Its a bit scary to think of how much water is sitting in that tank though, everytime you look at it your like... "dont explode.... dont explode!!!" But it has 1cm thick glass and 2cm thick glass on the bottom, plus heaps of supports on the top.

I might do something like that daryl, but normally i'm quite lazy and if i have a system that works i dont like to fiddle with it. Maybe one day when i'm feeling particularily DIY'y.