# DIY aquarium stand



## aquatic_clay (Aug 17, 2009)

Here's a DIY stand that i made for a 29 gallon. I made this a while ago but haven't had time to make a build journal for it until now. I hope this will help any one that is interested in building their own stand. So far i'm much happier with this than i would have been if i just would have bought a stand.

Pictures are a little bit low quality since all i have is a camera phone at the moment.

Materials used...
2x4's
4x4's
1/2" plywood
1" wood screws
2.5" wood screws
Wood glue
Wood stain
Polyeurethaine
3 electric outlets

Tools used...
Power drill
Various drill bits
Jig saw
Hand saw
Hammer
Clamps
Paintbrush
Flat head screw driver

1st step is going to be cutting the 2x4's to length to build the top and bottom of the frame.










Here's the top and bottom of the frame after it's been put together. I used plenty of wood glue and screws to do this.










Now it's time to get the vertical supports ready. I used 4x4's since i wanted to make sure that the stand could hold the tank. To make the ends fit with the top and bottom of the frame i used a jig saw and cut it to fit with the frame.










Here's the basic "skeleton" of the frame.










I decided to add more support to the middle to help stabalize the stand.










Here's the finished frame! Now it's time to add the outer shell.










After tons of measuring and cutting... Here's the stand after the outer shell was added on. I decided that i wanted to have 2 doors and have some space in the back of the stand for equipment cords and canister filter hoses.



















Added handles for the doors. Ths wood working part of the stand is now done. Now it's time to move on to adding electric outlets inside the stand, stain it, and then add polyeurethane to water proof the stand and make it nice and shiny!










Here's the electric outlets that i added in.










And here is the finished stand!!! 










Don't make fun of the tank! It recently went through a major trim and rescape.










This project took me about 2 days to complete. Over all i'm very happy with the results.

Here's some notes that will help any one wanting to do this.

Buy the best quality plywood that you can afford the stand will look much better if you do. I planned on using formica over the wood to get a better look but found out that everywhere around me was sold out so i was stuck with low quality wood.

Measure twice cut once! This is probably the most important thing to remember.

If you leave space in the back of the stand for cords or hoses make sure they'll fit! I had a bad time making more room for canister filter hoses to fit through the back.

If you decided to add electric outlets be sure that everything is wired correctly. You wouldn't want to fry the entire set up when you plug it in!

Be creative! One of the coolest things about DIY stands is that you can customize it when ever you want to! in the time that i've had this set up i've added a self to hold up the canister filter, a light inside the stand so i can see in the dark, several hooks to hold towels and aquascaping tools, i even drilled holes to hold test tubes from test kits in side the stand and have a tiny self just for test liquids!


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