Bare Bottom Cutting Boards...

[Alaskan Reefer]

It looks pretty decent bubbly, not as nice as sand, but is beautiful in its own way. Whether you go straight on the glass or with Starboard, you'll end up with a coraline pink mat in the long run anyway. There no good reason I know of other than protection in a rock fall to have it.

 

[MargieInAZ]

I'm planning on going BB on my new tank. It's a 175g acrylic tank.
I'm planning on just painting the bottom of the tank white so it will block out the view of the stand until coraline has a chance to grow on it.
Does that sound adequate for a large acrylic tank? I wouldn't think I'd need to worry as much about rock slides as with a glass tank.
Any thoughts on that? I don't mind the starboard bottom, but I don't want to spend the money if there's not a good reason to do so.

 

[Alaskan Reefer]

I wouldn't use starboard in an acrylic BB. The painting is an excellent idea. Maybe a "sandy" brown would look nice.

 

[CoRPS]

May I suggest painting black instead? I will be doing this with my 20L AIO

 

[romanr]

I have BB with nothing under the rocks. Bottom of tank was painted sand color and I must say it looks pretty good and keeps light from filtering down to sump. I do worry about what would happen if a rock hit the bottom but I have a pretty solid setup so hopefully I won't ever have to worry about that.

 

[crvz]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=14775634#post14775634 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by bubbly
I have a barebottom tank, and I see the point of siliconing it so there is no debris under it, was just wondering about the purpose of using the cuttingboard / starboard.

Is it just to make sure the glass isn't cracked if a rock falls? Bigger tanks have heavy rocks, so that makes sense. Are there any other benefits? I wonder how it looks.

the logic is to protect the glass as you mention, but I do like the aesthetics of it as well. My tank is set up that way, you can click the red house to see a few pictures of it.

 

[Dave Harms]

Since my tank isn't tall, I'm not too worried about rock slides... I just want to give my frags a place to attach that is taller than the trim on my tank. If I put them on the glas I wouldn't be able to see them from my normal viewing spot on the couch.