Fish Tanks

[fatheadminnow]

There's water on mars.

2 + 2 =

? lol

-FHM

 

[llamalord305]

Hiya Simon and welcome. I have mainly Juwel tanks 180l upto 400l, I love the fact there is no big pieces of glass around the top to strenghten the tank its a large plastic surround, however I do find the brace bars (I have the older juwel tanks) very flimsy and easy to break and a pain when trying to catch fish!! From a design point of view I would love a large tank without bracebars, impossible probably unless I went for a trigon style (Triangular with a curved front). I hope this is the sort of info you are after

You know some large tanks have no bracebars?
I'm getting a 150 gallon soon, with no braces. It has really thick glass to compensate. It's pretty old, from the 70's.

 

[PDSimon]

I would love to be able to get "inside" my tank with my fish, something like those tanks at the sea life centre where you put your head in a hole and you are inside the tank. Having crazy ideas now about getting a biorb, cutting a hole in the bottom of my rio 400 and siliconing the biorb to the bottom

I thought you meant literally inside then! Good idea

 

[waterdrop]

Hi PDSimon and welcome to TFF!

I was unsure at first whether your query was about the actual glass boxes (the tank itself) or about designing a fish tank as a whole with rocks and plants and fish etc. but from the posts it looks like its the glass box so I had these thoughts:

I would think one of the hardest aspects of a design or marketing exercise, because of time limitations, would be the analysis of unintended consequences.

An example of this with tanks happened to me. I got my son a medium-small bowfront (106L/28G) tank. These are tanks that are usually a basic rectangular shape but with a curved front glass that bows out toward the viewer. I felt the bowed section up front would provide the opportunity for the fish to come out and allow the viewer to feel as though they were viewing those fish even more closely than usual, thus giving the viewer a new feeling of being a little more "in" the tank with the fish.

That form of "suspension of belief" when one can feel as though one is "in the tank with the fish" has always been a characteristic of the fundamental enjoyment that the hobby is founded on I believe, along with the joy of creating overall tank and caring for its occupants and showing it off.

The unintended consequence that arose from my choice of the bowfront shape was that the water and glass interface of the front curved panel was able to act like a true optical lens and what the lens did was cause the tank to appear more "shallow" (of less distance front to back on the inside) than it would have if the front glass had been flat.

Who, on a business design team (if they were designing the bowfront), would likely have noticed and pointed out this fact? Well, first of all, the design team would have need not only just a drawing of the shape, not only a model of the tank, not only a one-off model of the tank but, most importantly, would have needed to actually FILL the tank with water. Because only after the tank were filled and had things in it would the water/glass lens have gone into effect and only if there were things to look at front to back would one have noticed the effect. And only if one were experienced with the deeper joys of the viewing part of the hobby would one be able to put together the difference to the "experience" that this design deviation would initiate.

So, who on the design team would have noticed? Well, I guess if there were an optical engineer on the team.. but what small industrial design team for tanks would include someone like that? Unlikely, I think. It could have been an artist. It could have been a hobbyist. Actually it could have been anybody, so I guess the thought there is to be prepared to listen to anyone who is involved in your process.

What's another major example unintended consequences when a company might design a new tank shape? Well, there's a whole world of practical things the hobbyist must worry about. There's the "parts ecosystem." Will there be hoods and lights and other bits of equipment to choose from or will the new "out of the box" design limit the customer/hobbyist to buying from just that tank supplier? So choice and aquisition of other items that must work -with- the tank is important.

Another thing like this are the mainenance aspects. Can all parts of the tank be easily reached? Can the substrate be reached and worked with? Is there room for different sized nets and other things to be moved around the tank? Can large objects be put in and out? Can the full top surface be accessed? Is there edge room from which objects can hang? Is there access to inner side surfaces on which things can be suction cupped?

Finally, let me just mention that perhaps the most important aspect of all, in tank design, is the aspect of the environmental viability that the tank provides to its occupants, animals, plants and bacteria. This is the subject FHM touches on above, talking about surface area to volume ratio. I'll just leave this whole aspect unexplored, with only the comment that this is one of the main areas of the hobby where it takes time (on a forum such as this for instance) for knowledge and wisdom to be passed from experienced hobbyists to beginners. Over in the "Your new freshwater tank" section we get to watch that a lot.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[tom130691]

have a look at the bottemless tank

 

[FaWa]

Hey, I'm new here too!

I'm getting back into the hobby, and trying a 20gal. I'd go for a rectangle acrylic tank to start. Good luck!

 

[PDSimon]

Hi PDSimon and welcome to TFF!

I was unsure at first whether your query was about the actual glass boxes (the tank itself) or about designing a fish tank as a whole with rocks and plants and fish etc. but from the posts it looks like its the glass box so I had these thoughts:

I would think one of the hardest aspects of a design or marketing exercise, because of time limitations, would be the analysis of unintended consequences.

An example of this with tanks happened to me. I got my son a medium-small bowfront (106L/28G) tank. These are tanks that are usually a basic rectangular shape but with a curved front glass that bows out toward the viewer. I felt the bowed section up front would provide the opportunity for the fish to come out and allow the viewer to feel as though they were viewing those fish even more closely than usual, thus giving the viewer a new feeling of being a little more "in" the tank with the fish.

That form of "suspension of belief" when one can feel as though one is "in the tank with the fish" has always been a characteristic of the fundamental enjoyment that the hobby is founded on I believe, along with the joy of creating overall tank and caring for its occupants and showing it off.

The unintended consequence that arose from my choice of the bowfront shape was that the water and glass interface of the front curved panel was able to act like a true optical lens and what the lens did was cause the tank to appear more "shallow" (of less distance front to back on the inside) than it would have if the front glass had been flat.

Who, on a business design team (if they were designing the bowfront), would likely have noticed and pointed out this fact? Well, first of all, the design team would have need not only just a drawing of the shape, not only a model of the tank, not only a one-off model of the tank but, most importantly, would have needed to actually FILL the tank with water. Because only after the tank were filled and had things in it would the water/glass lens have gone into effect and only if there were things to look at front to back would one have noticed the effect. And only if one were experienced with the deeper joys of the viewing part of the hobby would one be able to put together the difference to the "experience" that this design deviation would initiate.

So, who on the design team would have noticed? Well, I guess if there were an optical engineer on the team.. but what small industrial design team for tanks would include someone like that? Unlikely, I think. It could have been an artist. It could have been a hobbyist. Actually it could have been anybody, so I guess the thought there is to be prepared to listen to anyone who is involved in your process.

What's another major example unintended consequences when a company might design a new tank shape? Well, there's a whole world of practical things the hobbyist must worry about. There's the "parts ecosystem." Will there be hoods and lights and other bits of equipment to choose from or will the new "out of the box" design limit the customer/hobbyist to buying from just that tank supplier? So choice and aquisition of other items that must work -with- the tank is important.

Another thing like this are the mainenance aspects. Can all parts of the tank be easily reached? Can the substrate be reached and worked with? Is there room for different sized nets and other things to be moved around the tank? Can large objects be put in and out? Can the full top surface be accessed? Is there edge room from which objects can hang? Is there access to inner side surfaces on which things can be suction cupped?

Finally, let me just mention that perhaps the most important aspect of all, in tank design, is the aspect of the environmental viability that the tank provides to its occupants, animals, plants and bacteria. This is the subject FHM touches on above, talking about surface area to volume ratio. I'll just leave this whole aspect unexplored, with only the comment that this is one of the main areas of the hobby where it takes time (on a forum such as this for instance) for knowledge and wisdom to be passed from experienced hobbyists to beginners. Over in the "Your new freshwater tank" section we get to watch that a lot.

~~waterdrop~~

My brief is very open, it’s to design an object which you can grow something in, anything… I’ve started looking into fish because you’re growing your own little eco-system. So it mainly involves the glass or acrylic shell (or possibly another material) but if I develop this research into ideas and then development I would possibly design a stand as well. The project is a bit short to gain a full understanding of every aspect, designing pumps and heating would be beyond the brief as well as being complicated.

I noticed some of the bowed tanks certainly do have that effect and make it easier to stare for ages! The whole aspect of enjoyment from creating and growing your own little environment is exactly the kind of thing I’m researching.

A design team may have made loads of tanks of various shapes and sizes and seen what happened or they may have just been inspired by some sort of object to design the tank.

Maintenance is an important aspect which I would definitely cover and possibly come up with some new ideas! Either way it would be practical to use so thanks for the list – very useful.

I’ve certainly learnt a lot in a short time of looking through these forums and similar websites so thanks for your help.

have a look at the bottemless tank

Yeah, someone posted some vids, I couldn't even understand it at first really nice.

Hey, I'm new here too!

I'm getting back into the hobby, and trying a 20gal. I'd go for a rectangle acrylic tank to start. Good luck!

Thanks I'm still not sure whether I will buy one as well just because I've always wanted one. I guess the maintenance is daunting and i'd have to be sure i'd put in the full effort before investing in one.

 

[OohFeeshy]

All I would say is don't get bogged down by the 'practicality' aspect. If you want a boring but practical tank, then fine, get a standard glass tank- but that's not exactly new and groundbreaking. Whereas something like the Fluval Edge, while it does have it's difficulties (which can always be overcome by careful planning of the stock and maintenance), is nice to look at and is definitely a unique product. I'd stick to smaller tanks, under 10g or so- they're the most popular and easier to maintain, and also generallt small enough so as not to be difficult to transport or require too many materials.