# Hanging a 5G off the wall?



## Harry Muscle (Mar 21, 2007)

I'm gonna be downgrading  from a 55G to a 5G in the not too distant future due to size constraints. I barely will have room for the 5G so I was wondering if anyone has every hung a 5G from the wall? Basically I guess you'd have to build some sort of shelf that strong enough to support the 50 to 75 lbs of weight and stick the tank on it. I'm hoping to avoid making the whole thing from scratch so I'm wondering if anyone has any ready made or simple to make ideas on how to accomplish this.

Thanks,
Harry


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## AquaNeko (Jul 26, 2009)

Well my understanding is that it is 1gal = 8lbs of raw water only. This is not factoring in the weight of the tank or any decorations/gravel/filter/etc. So water by itself is 40lbs. Say 10lbs for the tank so you're looking at 50lbs now. 

Your safer bet would be looking at 90-100lb rating shelf support just to give you that extra buffer of peace of mind should the tank after deco/filter/gravel/etc come to say 70lbs.

I am not a structual person but I know this much you'd want to anchor that good to a lot of studs on the wall so that you don't get a waterfall. IIRC wall studs are every ~12-15". How wide is your shelf going to be or are you going for as small a shelf as possible just for the tank? I was thinking more something like 3-4 triangle braces with 3 bolts each into 3-4 studs spaning ~36" wide and those triple bolts on each and the brace would balance your load. It's just a thought and you'd have to have that checked out by a structures person for that ~90-100lb weight load as I'm not sure that would work. Most I've loaded up with something similar of that was a dual L brace for a network server patch panel and hub (~15lbs).


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## bigfishy (Jun 19, 2009)

AquaNeko said:


> Well my understanding is that it is 1gal = 8lbs of raw water only. This is not factoring in the weight of the tank or any decorations/gravel/filter/etc. So water by itself is 40lbs. Say 10lbs for the tank so you're looking at 50lbs now.


That is just like hanging a large LCD TV in the wall


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## AquaNeko (Jul 26, 2009)

bigfishy said:


> That is just like hanging a large LCD TV in the wall


No LCD but I'll let you know how my 36" Sony Vega tube hangs off the wall.  That suckers like 400lbs I think  or a 50gal tank.


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