Tank modification

[kirru]

Bought a 25g acrylic tank today.. well friday.. and it has acrylic on the top with a fair opening but i want to make it where it only has a 1" - 1.5" lip on the rim on the tank.. would look nicer to me.


any suggestion on how to accomplish this or is it a no, no?

 

[johnr2604]

Kirru;480515 wrote: Bought a 25g acrylic tank today.. well friday.. and it has acrylic on the top with a fair opening but i want to make it where it only has a 1" - 1.5" lip on the rim on the tank.. would look nicer to me.


any suggestion on how to accomplish this or is it a no, no?

You could cut it on a router table pretty easy.

 

[kirru]

Ok, wanted to be sure before I went to cuttin. Even tho it's just zoas, I want to give em as much light as possible. And I may add a BTA for the clown fish later on as well. So this adds to my to-do list tomorrow. And it's a three foot tank so that's the tricky part.

 

[skriz]

How thick/wide is the bracing?

Are you planning on keeping zoas at the edges of the tank? If not, then why mess with it?

 

[acroholic]

If you don't have access to a router like John suggested, you could also do it by hand with a Dremel with a reinforced cutoff disc. But you'd need to have good control, as these can walk easily on you and scuff up the acrylic. A router would be much more clean, IMO, but the Dremel is doable.

 

[kirru]

Skriz;480658 wrote: How thick/wide is the bracing?

Are you planning on keeping zoas at the edges of the tank? If not, then why mess with it?

I would assume the light would not penetrate the acrylic very well and would end up with salt spray and just be a mess in the end. and i am left with a 12"x4" hole pretty much. that is a rough estimate. I'll get some pics and show you guys what it looks like. also, i have this huge rock that may or may not fit through the hole so that would be another reason to cut it out.

Acroholic;480669 wrote: If you don't have access to a router like John suggested, you could also do it by hand with a Dremel with a reinforced cutoff disc. But you'd need to have good control, as these can walk easily on you and scuff up the acrylic. A router would be much more clean, IMO, but the Dremel is doable.

I have a router table and router so that wouldn't be a problem.

 

[kirru]

here are some pics

and my measurements were way off on that hole lol the actual opening is 21.5"x6.5"

 

[skriz]

Wow! That's a poor design if I ever saw one. I see now why you want to cut it.

What's the thickness of the acrylic? My guess is the mega bracing is due to the thinness of the acrylic.

If you do route it, route off as little as possible. I'd be concerned about it blowing out.

 

[kirru]

Haha, figured I would get an acrylic guy to say something about it. It looks to be 1/4" thick acrylic.

 

[kirru]

Well, I started cutting... its gonna take me some time to get this done. will post pics of what it will look like after the slide cut out. gonna draw an out line and leave 7/8" of an inch all around. Raj, this ok since it is 1/4" acrylic or what? I'll wait before I continue

 

[kirru]

well, it is done. looks 1000xs better than it did. lol i found cutting it extremely easy... loud... and white lol will post pics when i get a chance now to clean it