acrylic tank building

[limige]

has anyone been making their own acrylic tanks? I did a ton of research years ago and i'm currently debating about making some. a sheet of chemcast runs $250. Weld on #40 would be the glue of choice.

curious if anyone has built and if I should use chemcast or polycast or some other.

[rickztahone]

Are those brands? So long as it is cell cast acrylic and the correct size depending on your end goal dimensions you should be fine.

[limige]

yes they are both lines of cell cast acrylic.

i'm thinking about building some 2' cube tanks, I really dig the size. I think I have to use 1/2"

[John_Nicholson]

Way back in the day I built these for my middle daughter. She was breeding and showing bettas at the time. Each one would hold 12 fish. There were plumbed together with a sump. She could turn one valve and do a water change on all of the tanks. It worked pretty well. The process was not hard but your cuts have to be damned near perfect or it will leak.

-john

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y14/DiscusJohn/P1010155sm.jpg (http://s2.photobucket.com/user/DiscusJohn/media/P1010155sm.jpg.html)

[limige]

nice work john. I'm guessing you did it slightly differently than I intend to.

large tanks are best done with a bevel cut to the inside of the tank, only like 1/32 flat left sitting next to the adjoining panel. you use a two part epoxy such as weld on #40 and fill syringes which are used to fill the bevel and do the weld. if any parts of your flat don't seal you can use a thin glue to bond those spots. this is the method I have played with and tend to try again.

last time I took too long, I should have had a helper glueing the opposite side the glue started to setup before I was finished and it failed. but this was also a repair job as well. i'm looking forward to trying one from scratch... my glue was old last try as well.