Acrylic fabrication questions? I can help!

It's less about thickness than is it about coverage and location of the crack. Is the crack in the middle of the panel, or does it get close to a joint?

If it's in the middle, you can do as you plan. Since there is no strain on the bottom panel, the patch should probably just cover 2" in all directions around the crack and you can bond it on with pretty much anything, #3, #4, #16, #40, all should be OK.

If it get close enough to a joint, like within 1", the patch would probably be OK still but any closer than that and I personally would start to get a little nervous about the repair. That's one of those times when I would try it and then water-test it for quite a while...
 
I'm planning on making an acrylic liner to go in the bottom of the stand I'm building to catch any spills that will undoubtedly never occur. :p It will essentially be a 2' x 4' box with 2" sides. Can I use a standard table saw blade to cut the sides or do I need to get an acrylic blade?
 
I'm not sure what the guy was thinking when he did this but he sandwiched a bunch of acrylic to attach these overflow boxes. I'd like to remove them and add a coast to coast overflow along with drilling the back of the tank. Do you have any ideas? Thanks.


I just got the tank home and haven't had a chance to do any cleaning.
 
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I'll follow up with a second question. I would really like to remove the paint on the back and sides. I do t care if it's perfect, my plan is to paint it black if possible. Would you sand then buff it or is it just an insurmountable task? Thanks again.
 
jc03 said:
I'm not sure what the guy was thinking when he did this but he sandwiched a bunch of acrylic to attach these overflow boxes. I'd like to remove them and add a coast to coast overflow along with drilling the back of the tank. Do you have any ideas? Thanks.
Click to expand...

That's weird! And UGLY!! Are they held on by the BH or are they glued?
 
sleepydoc said:
I'm planning on making an acrylic liner to go in the bottom of the stand I'm building to catch any spills that will undoubtedly never occur. :p It will essentially be a 2' x 4' box with 2" sides. Can I use a standard table saw blade to cut the sides or do I need to get an acrylic blade?
Click to expand...

That sounds too complicated - why not just use a liner? I was looking on a couple of the big tank threads for something I had seen but can't seem to find it. I want to say it was in a thread by Newbie Aquarist, spotter, or dustin1300 but it was essentially like a pond liner or something used below showers and tubs. It works well if you have a framed bottom of the stand and your sump just sits on the floor. but if you have a solid bottom on the stand bottom frame I suppose that would not work as well. You could still use it though, just make a frame out of 1x2s
 
Sorry guys. I'm a bit distracted. Fear I've bitten off more than I can chew. Finally got the thing and the excitement has turned into being overwhelmed.

What's BH? I don't have a ton of experience but it looks like they're attached with weld on 4 or something similar. I don't think its caulking.
 
Floyd R Turbo said:
That sounds too complicated - why not just use a liner? I was looking on a couple of the big tank threads for something I had seen but can't seem to find it. I want to say it was in a thread by Newbie Aquarist, spotter, or dustin1300 but it was essentially like a pond liner or something used below showers and tubs. It works well if you have a framed bottom of the stand and your sump just sits on the floor. but if you have a solid bottom on the stand bottom frame I suppose that would not work as well. You could still use it though, just make a frame out of 1x2s
Click to expand...

I'd thought of using pond liner - I think they sell 30 mil pond liner in rolls by the foot at Home Depot. The acrylic tray just seemed neater. Of course if the seam leaks, it's kind of pointless. :fun5:

My stand will have a ¾" plywood bottom with at least 2" on all side, so the pond liner would work just fine.
 
Oh, I get it. So they had to push the internal overflow box out far enough to clear the euro, and did that by stacking pieces of acrylic up until it was our far enough. Wow, talk about doing it the hard way, could have clamped that on to the euro instead or something.

That's going to be quite difficult to remove and get the inside back panel flush without causing some damage. The safest way is to cut it off with a hand saw and that is going to take some time bro. Any power tool is going to shake rattle & roll and you risk cracking out the back panel.

After cutting it off then you probably will have to just sand and sand and sand - this time with a power sander, maybe even a handheld belt sander, maybe a grinding wheel.

I would opt for the internal/external overflow without bonding, i.e. build 2 boxes and hold them on with bulkheads. That way you don't have to deal with getting a perfect bonding surface on an existing tank. Plus you can change that type of overflow later if you feel the need, once it's bonded on you're stuck with it so it had better be dead on perfect.

JMHO

HTH
 
Floyd R Turbo said:
Oh, I get it. So they had to push the internal overflow box out far enough to clear the euro, and did that by stacking pieces of acrylic up until it was our far enough. Wow, talk about doing it the hard way, could have clamped that on to the euro instead or something.

That's going to be quite difficult to remove and get the inside back panel flush without causing some damage. The safest way is to cut it off with a hand saw and that is going to take some time bro. Any power tool is going to shake rattle & roll and you risk cracking out the back panel.

After cutting it off then you probably will have to just sand and sand and sand - this time with a power sander, maybe even a handheld belt sander, maybe a grinding wheel.

I would opt for the internal/external overflow without bonding, i.e. build 2 boxes and hold them on with bulkheads. That way you don't have to deal with getting a perfect bonding surface on an existing tank. Plus you can change that type of overflow later if you feel the need, once it's bonded on you're stuck with it so it had better be dead on perfect.

JMHO

HTH
Click to expand...

As always Floyd, thanks. I guess I'll lay in there and cut all but the last (attached to the back panel) piece off with a hack saw then sand the rest.

Would it change your mind on the bulkhead attachment of the overflow boxes if I just siliconed conventional 3 sided boxes into place?
 
Yes, that is a very bad idea IMO. Silicone does not bond structurally to acrylic. One could argue that the water pressure keeps it in place and the silicone just keeps it sealed, but it will, IMO eventually fail. Think about it, if the overflow box is 1/2 empty, that is a lot of buoyant pressure pushing up on the box. If it breaks loose, you're looking at a significant downtime since the minimum cure time is 72 hours and you really *should* wait 2 weeks before exposing fresh silicone to water. You're better, for many reasons, to use a 5-sides box on the inside and outside and hold it on place with bulkheads -kind of like how Reef Savvy does their overflow boxes, or Glass-Holes.
 
+1
The only way to reliably use an acrylic box in a glass aquarium is to have a 5-sided box so the bulkhead holds it against the glass.
 
sleepydoc said:
I'm planning on making an acrylic liner to go in the bottom of the stand I'm building to catch any spills that will undoubtedly never occur. :p It will essentially be a 2' x 4' box with 2" sides. Can I use a standard table saw blade to cut the sides or do I need to get an acrylic blade?
Click to expand...

i just use an 80t fine finish blade.
 
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