Hood for 72-Gal. Bowfront Tank

[Joel Hall]

I am looking for plans/instructions/suggestions for a do-it-yourself hood for a 72-gallon bowfront tank.

Thanks,

Joel Hall

[AquariumPro]

Hmmmmmm! That's a tough one. Why do you want to build one, if you don't mind me being nosy? Your answer may yield more suggestions.

[Joel Hall]

The hood is necessary to upgrade my lighting beyond normal flourescent bulbs. Right now I just have a hinged glass top with a single 48" light strip.

As for why A I want to build it myself, the main reason is to save money (I have been told a custom hood may run $300-$500) Secondly, I am pretty handy and enjoy doing things like this myself. Although, I am not a master carpenter by any stretch and have never worked with a curved surface.

[AquariumPro]

Ah Ha! I think what you mean is a canopy. You would leave your glass cover over the tank and place a 6" to 8" high wood structure over the tank top which would have a hinged top in which you would mount your lighting?

(See the photos in our portfolio http://aquariumpros.com/portfolio.htm)

What would be helpful, me-thinks, is if you could go to an aquarium store that would allow you to set a new 72 bowfront on a piece of cardboard to trace a template. I am not a carpenter AT ALL (flunked shop because I couldn't cut a 45 with a miter saw!), but seems to me that with a template, you would have the perfect radius of the front, along with all other dimensions.

Question is: How the heck do you build the front upright panel? How well does wood bend?

I do know that the canopy should be built a little larger than the outer frame of the tank, with stops placed inside, one inch up from the bottom lip of the canopy so the canopy will overlap the top rim of the tank.

I will see if I can speak with our cabinet guy for suggestions on how to do the radius front panel. He builds canopies for our aquariums and we do sell bowfronts. Something tells me he probably uses several pieces of wood and a joiner to form a rough arch, then sands the thing into a radius front and back.


Get back to you next week.

[Joel Hall]

I guees it would help if I used the right terminology, huh?! Sorry for the confusion but you got it exactly right.

I would appreciate any suggestions you guys can offer for the curved front construction.

Just for kicks, what would you guys charge to build one?

[AquariumPro]

Please email us at aquariumpro@msn.com.

[Lisa]

Hi Joel, we also have a 72 bow front tank, my husband built the canopy for ours, we wanted to add MH light to the front of the tank and could not find a canopy to fit. You can e-mail me and I'll have my hubby send you the info on how he did ours. Lisa
lisasdaycare@prodigy.net :D

[IVAN]

if you want to make the bow in your wood you can get some oak it has to be some long peaces and it depends how wide on how tall you want the canopy. well place a chair in each end of the wood and put some bricks or something heavy to make it bend it'll take about 2 weeks to get it bow like your tank.

[BOB_Gorden]

Hi, here is a link to a websight that shows how to build a bow front canopy. This one is on a larger scal, but it should help. <a href="http://www.rmgconstruction.com/reef.htm" target="_blank">http://www.rmgconstruction.com/reef.htm</a>