help removing center brace?

[bawla47]

i just bought a 65 gallon tank, i wanted to remove the center brace and replace it with a piece of acrylic. i dont care about the warranty at all in that reguards, just dont want it to bow and break out of no where.

plan on using weldon to glue it well to the rest of the plastic border on the top of tank.

how wide and how thick of material should i use?


1/4" maybe 3-4" wide? maybe 3/8"?


anyhow, thanks in advance,

 

[ReefWreak]

is it glass or acrylic? If the tank is acrylic, you can either do the center brace (though I would worry about it with a halide directly over it), or you can euro-brace it, which is like 3" or so of bracing the whole way around the top of the tank, which means no brace going through the center.

If it's glass, you can do either option, but use glass instead of acrylic for the center brace, and be sure to use silicone, and make sure it cures all the way before the tank is comissioned.

I would suggest checking out the DIY forum and posting this there, as they'll probably have more knowledge with that type stuff.

 

[compulou]

Hey Bawla I've got the same tank. I have a 65g All-Glass RR and I cut away the center brace with a dremel, drilled two holes in each side of the remaining plastic from the brace and using some nylon screws and nuts I was able to brace it using a clear piece of acrylic.

I also had ( I say had because I have since upgraded to a dual 150mh and they are now further away from the acrylic brace) I used to have the Single 150mh light that was inches from the acrylic brace and never had a problem.

Here's a shot of what I'm talking about:

 

[bawla47]

hot damn you are so awesome compulou! EXACTLY what im lookin, even happier cuz you have the same tank.


someone in the DIY did suggest 2" 1/4 acrylic, but i was still a bit scared. how thick and how wide is the piece you put in?

yours actually looks skinnier is a 1/4" 1" ?

thanks again!

 

[agave60]

bawla, I just did the same thing to a 180 and it's been fine for a month. I used the same width of the brace I was going to remove and had 3/8" clear acrylic cut, I then used three 5/16" nylon bolts/nuts on each end of the braces. The only difference from the picture above is that I decided to place the acrylic underneath the remaining tank brace. Hope this helps.

Carlos