So... I'm planning to upgrade my 125 to a 180, and I was thinking about using kitchen base cabinets for my stand for a few reasons:
The cabinets will extend well past the tank on either side, so there will be probably 2 'double walls' under the tank where the cabinets meet up, and the weight will be distributed across a larger area. I'm going to go with Ikea cabinets for both the kitchen and tank stand. (For those of you not familiar with Ikea, they are particle board, but not the cheapo crappy particle board that you'd see at Walmart or Home Depot. Ikea furniture would likely survive a tornado, IMO. The only way I'm not going with Ikea cabinets is if you know a secret handshake kind of place where I can get frameless hardwood cabinets for less. I have yet to find such a place.)
Here's my concern- will kitchen base cabinets work as a tank stand, or will they not be strong enough? If they're not strong enough 'stock', how can they be reinforced so they are strong enough? What are your thoughts? Has anyone done this? Have you had good or bad experiences with it?
- The tank is located right next to my kitchen, so matching the kitchen cabinets would make the whole area look more cohesive.
- My tank is also my office 'desk lamp', and extending the cabinets underneath it out on either side would make for very sleek printer stand, file storage, etc.
- I'm just not a huge fan of ordinary tank stands. Most of them don't look terribly well built to me.
The cabinets will extend well past the tank on either side, so there will be probably 2 'double walls' under the tank where the cabinets meet up, and the weight will be distributed across a larger area. I'm going to go with Ikea cabinets for both the kitchen and tank stand. (For those of you not familiar with Ikea, they are particle board, but not the cheapo crappy particle board that you'd see at Walmart or Home Depot. Ikea furniture would likely survive a tornado, IMO. The only way I'm not going with Ikea cabinets is if you know a secret handshake kind of place where I can get frameless hardwood cabinets for less. I have yet to find such a place.)
Here's my concern- will kitchen base cabinets work as a tank stand, or will they not be strong enough? If they're not strong enough 'stock', how can they be reinforced so they are strong enough? What are your thoughts? Has anyone done this? Have you had good or bad experiences with it?