150 gallon display + 55 gallon sump weight / placement question

exsequor

New member
I rent a home and have renters insurance that covers aquarium floods / aquarium leaks. I called and asked. It is through ALL STATE, $100,000 liability. $20k personal property coverage.


We will start with that. I have given permission from the property manager (didn't have to ask, but I did) to set up my 45 gallon reef with 80-100 pounds live rock, 40 pounds sand, 10 gallon canister filter, 5 gallon H.O filter, 5 gallon skimmer, 15 gallon refugium back in November.

It is going great, I have it in the office/man cave, up against an exterior wall in a carpeted room. Not concerned about weight as it is likely around 800-950 pounds.

Here's some background on my house:
Built 1945. Remodeled completely inside, exterior, landscaping, everything a few years ago. It has a shoebox foundation, so therefor a crawl space. The house had an addition added fairly recently, not sure on exact year or anything, but based on my knowledge, and that addition included adding a large, concrete slab floored master bedroom to the previously small rancher, making it an L shaped home.

It also involved constructing a detached 2.5 car garage. During this construction, it was likely at this time that a cinderblock wall spanning from the back to front of the "original" house was added, for added structural integrity. I do not think it was added when the house was constructed. The reason I know about this cinderblock foundation support walls existance isn't because I've crawled into the crawl space, but because the last 2 out of 4 summers have had insane rain / flooding. This house hasn't flooded, but the rain caused the ground to heave and buckle.

What this has done has made the house teeter totter on that cinderblock foundation support wall underneath in the crawlspace, and that cantilever effect is causing the house to split cosmetically at the wall to ceiling seams right there.

I was told this by most of the hydro or helix mud jacking companies that the landlord has had come out. Insurance won't cover the actual owner who currently lives in Europe, so he has to pay out of pocket between $45,000 - $80,000 depending on the company. We stated that we wanted one of the companies that could do non invasive which I believe was 3 out of the 5 companies. These companies don't require you to move out at all, or move anything during the process. However, the old school concrete pier companies have to cut open the living room floor and have us move out for 1-3 weeks, which the property manager knows we will move if they were to choose a company that did it like that, because that isn't right for a tenant to have to go through, and they agree, and I have all that in email.

Anyways, this work was originally supposed to be performed in January, and it just kept getting bumped out and out until now, where I haven't heard anything for 3-4 months.

We are not having the rain so far, so the house has settled back, and is much less concerning from a door fitment / cosmetic perspective.

All of the foundation jacking experts assured me that the house was not weaker at all, it was just due to the cantilever effect of this cinderblock wall underneath the house.

This leads me to tank placement for the 150 gallon. I have 2 potential spots inside the house. My preferred spot is in this living room, up against the wall that runs right on top of this cinderblock support wall. Would this be a good location to place a 150g tank that could weigh over 2000 pounds with sump, rock, sand, etc?

Should I just ask the property manager like I did with my 45 reef display?

Because my second tank placement spot is in the master bedroom, and I already know that spot can support it weight wise, because it's concrete slab.

But, you'd think a cinderblock wall could support that type of weight too. And I'd rather have this tank in the living room (even though I do have a nice 29g biocube reef on the other side of this living room).

What are you guy's thoughts on my 150g displays placement?

I am planning on renting this place for another 1-2 years. They approved me to move to month to month lease after June rolls around and my originally 1 year lease expires, which is preferred in a rented residence in my mind, since leases are very binding with property managers, and month to month is a lot more flexible.

Amyways, I have to wait until next years taxes to qualify for an FHA loan for the type of home I want to buy, as my preferred price range is between $225,000 and $276,000 or whatever FHA caps at. Can't wait for that, because I don't want to move my tanks around every few years if I can avoid that :lmao:
 
So coming to the one year mark here, the floor is still holding fine, for those of you with old/older homes and are worried about the floor supporting it.


I believe if this floor can, that many can support the weight of a tank this size, but still it needs to be positioned adjacent to the joists so remember that always and call your insurance like I did.!!

I attached a pic of the tank a week after I set it up.

Here it is now:
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/B9Kwu6I3arM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 

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