# Vivarium Stacks and weight



## Heim (Aug 3, 2008)

Hi all,

I have been reading tons of guides and posts about building vivarium stacks, however alot of them look pretty much the same design. This is generally a 'book case' style stack with a number of decent sized 'shelved' areas with glass on the front. Which is fine and looks pretty good!. However I was planning on having just two vivariums, one to house the 'family pet' if you like and the other mainly for a room focal point and a pretty display. Out of all the lizards Ive read about on the forums, I think a beardie is probably gonna be the winner as the 'family pet'. So with that in mind, I need a viv at least 4-5ft long when taking into consideration of an adult beardie. However, although I have seen many very well decorated 'desert' vivs, I personally do not think they are as 'pretty' as the tropical vivariums. Therefore the beardie viv I would like on the bottom of the stack, which will also be easier to access anyway.

Now the trickier part. I would like another viv on top that would be the room focal point, and this viv I would like to simulate a tropical rainforest habitat. So the viv itself will either need to be made from glass or possibly some kind plastic (acrylic), which wll sit within the wooden frame. Im also thinking about the gravel or clay for drainage, the weight of substrate, I would like a small water/pool area (possibly enough room for a few white cloud minnows or something similiar), plus the plants and obviously the lizard/amphibian's that will live within the viv.

Now as this is going to be a stack, and I want them to look flush, the top viv will most likely be the length of the bottom viv. Now Ive not actually kept or dealt with large vivs before and Ive never had an aquarium this big either, so Im unsure of the exact weight of this, but Im thinking heavy. What I dont want, is the top viv coming crashing through onto the beardies head! lol. I have some ideas of how I could create a solid frame to take a decent load, but my lack of imagination (and probably design talent lol) would mean blocking part of the poor beardies view and probably ruin the overall look.

So... I (eventually) get to the point of this post. Im assuming there has been other people people who have wanted to do similiar things, with wanting a heavier viv on top of a lighter viv. How have people gone about building a stack to allow for heavy vivs? Am I just over complicating this and worrying about something that probably isnt going to be as heavy as I think its going to be? Of course Im willing to use the lightest materials (plastic viv, clay drainage) etc to help achieve my goal. Basically Im after doing this safely, and I want a good design thats going to last.

applogies on the post length, I do get carried away :blush:


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## Meko (Apr 29, 2007)

theres a couple of ways you can do it:

1 - just build a basic stack and hope for the best
2 - build a basic frame and put supports in the beardie viv so hold the weight of the viv above it - such as a thick branch in the centre from base to roof to hold the weight.
3 - build a frame out of timber and put supporting struts across to hold the weight of the top viv. so you have, bottom viv - ceiling - supports - top viv floor. 
Then just make sure its not visible when you add the outer wood.


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## Heim (Aug 3, 2008)

Option 3 is where I was mainly going with this. My only concern was building a decent enough frame, to support the top vivs weight evenly while not having to include a front middle 'leg' within or in front of the bottom viv and not have the middle part of the stack sag... not that it should sag with a solid build glass/plastic viv on top I guess but either way, I wanted to make sure the middle had enough support, as Ive never built anything this long before and never really had to worry about the middle of a tank being supported.


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## Meko (Apr 29, 2007)

i built a 6x2x2 for my beardie and as it was in my bedroom i felt it was taking up too much space and wanted to build a wardrobe on top of it. I built a 6x5x2 wardrobe, full of clothes and shoes so probably weighs a lot more and an additional viv and used about 4 3x1 timber beams on top of the viv to support the weight and it was fine.
If the weight is distributed evenly it will work a lot better than having a heavy tank just in the centre.


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## Heim (Aug 3, 2008)

Ah that puts my mind at rest , Ill just go with my initial design idea and see how it goes.

Thanks for the reply.


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