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sgwill122

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Oct 24, 2006
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I am about to start building a tank stand for a 180 gallon in wall. The front of the stand will sit on the walls existing 2X4's, the backend will sit on top of a concrete slab in a tank room I have built. I am planning on using 4X4 pressure treated for the backend of the stand. I plan on using pressure treated since they are sitting on a slab which will get wet occassionally as I have a drain in the center of my room. Should I avoid using pressure treated since it will move on me as it dries or is it not enough to be worried about since they will only be about 3 feet long?
 
PRessure treated should work great..... if you are worried about it moving, realize pretty much all the wood you would be likely to use for a stand will dry on you and move slightly. even the kiln dried stuff.

Are you going to paint it?

Good luck! D
 
A couple things to keep in mind with pressure treated lumber; If you cut it, make sure you do so outside. The dust is full of arsenic. Also, any cut will not be treated, unless you retreat.
As Danno said, all wood will expand when wet and shrink as it dries. I think you're making a good decision to use pressure treated where you have wood/concrete contact!!
 
Thanks for the feedback. I will proceed with the treated timber. I plan to paint it all except the pressure treated since it is pretty wet.
 
i dont stongly recomend arsink treated wood it exspoed to water can then escape from wood and contaminate any thing it come in contact with here a bout a year a go komo 4 news did a artical on where a comounity built a park play area out of treated wood and then around the kids play toys they put wood chips the supring thing was how fast the wood chips was getting high levels of arsink just from the rain washing over the treated wood and then settling on the wood chip coverd play area
 
Most if not all treatment plants stopped using cca back in 03 or somewhere about then. Now its ca and is safe with no arsenic.

Don
 
That’s what I thought. Use new wood not recycled to insure you don’t get any of that old stuff in your house.
 
Wow, too bad I missed this thread. For future reference. Don is correct. Law does not permit the use of arsenic in PT wood anymore. You have to buy new Zmax fasteners, anchors and nails so the new treated wood wont corrode it. Returnofsid is correct that you must treat the cut ends of the wood to remake it PT again. Also, wet wood does shrink when it dries. It will shrink accross the grain a bit, but will not shrink enough lenght wise to be concerned about. An 8' 4x4 might shrink a 64th of an inch at most. 95% of settling you see in new houses is from weight alone. Not shrinking wood
 

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