craftgrrl | TV Aquarium (Reply)

This isn't crafty in the same way as a lot of these posts, but I hope it is appropriate for this community. We made an aquarium out of an old TV.

This is not an easy or low-commitment project. Or particularly cheap, for that matter. If you're interested in doing this, you need to have access to power tools, and you need to commit to maintaining an aquarium.

Since every TV is different, there isn't a step-by-stemp template for everyone to use, but here is what we did:

- Obtain a TV. We got ours for free off Craigslist.

- Open it up and start taking out parts. CAUTION: Be sure the TV has been UNPLUGGED for AT LEAST A WEEK before you start or you risk shock. Even once it's been unlpugged, use a rubber or plastic handled screwdrive to tap metal parts to discharge any charge.

Inside of the TV

We mostly used a socket wrench to disassemble the TV-- mostly an electric one, but some of it we did by hand,

Using a socket wrench to remove parts of the TV

We cut out all the wires first thing, which provided easier access to the components, and then it was suprisingly easy to take out large pieces at once.

The trickiest part was removing the tube itself, because it was quite heavy. We just went slowly, and removed piece by piece. We unscrewed from bottom to top, so if it dropped we would have more warning and still be able to access the bottom.

Altogether it took about 45 minutes to remove all the pieces-- much faster than we thought!

NOTE: Because TV tubes have lead and various other toxis compenents in them it is considered HAZARDOUS WASTE, and you might not be able to just throw it away. Check how to dispose of hazardous waste in your area. I had to take ours to a recycling plant, and it cost about $25 to recycle.

I don't have pictures of the next part, but what we did was:

- Take measurements and buy and aquarium. We got a 29 gallon tank measureing 30" x 18" x 12"

- Measure the inside of the TV and your aqarium well! It turned out our lamp was too tall, so we had to improvise.

- Saw off the top of the cabinet. This required a heavy duty power saw because it's a well-made piece of furniture!

- Since the sawing damaged the cabinet some, we sanded the clean-cut edge and stained it.

- Attach hinge. We needed some extra clearance, so we attached the hing to give us that.

- Line the edges (both top and bottom) with felt. You can buy felt tape at a hardware store. See photos below to see this.

- Attach the light to the lid (we didn't have enough clearance for the hood) using screws & a power drill.

- Set up the aquarium! My boyfriend is taking care of this part :) What you see in the photo is not a finished aquarium; it's only a few days old, so it hasn't cycled and we only have about 8 Tetras in there.