Downsizing my 280 to a 240 rimless.

[pecan2phat]

Joe,

Is your clone the anemone in Greenwich's show tank in the back right, top corner?

Was admiring that hard to keep beauty

 

[tosiek]

Whats glass thickness? I wouldn't worry too much about the seams parting out, GC uses alot of silicone on their corners. + a brace would destroy the look of it. Just double check for bubbles in the seam. If you take a look at Elos rimless tanks they don;t have much of a corner bead at all, and for some reason are now earthquake proof to some extent 0.o.

Its a sweet looking tank, can;t wait to see how it turns out.

 

[cali_reef]

I'll be more concerned with cutting my arms on a GC rimless tank :lol2:..

 

[2Sunny]

My clones.

Joe,

Is your clone the anemone in Greenwich's show tank in the back right, top corner?

Was admiring that hard to keep beauty

Yeah that's one of them. I was so happy it only moved a few inches when we put it into Jason's reef before settling down. For some reason my primary anemone has been growing like crazy in the last 6 months. Not sure what I did differently. As is commonly said of the H. Magnifica if you get a good one they seem to be extremely hardy, and now it turns out they can be prolific as well. 3 clones in 3 months ; how crazy is that? I only hope its not an indication of stress. Although it very well could be. The odd aspect is that the clones seem to have even better color than the mother animal.

Joe

 

[2Sunny]

GC workmanship.

Whats glass thickness? I wouldn't worry too much about the seams parting out, GC uses alot of silicone on their corners. + a brace would destroy the look of it. Just double check for bubbles in the seam. If you take a look at Elos rimless tanks they don;t have much of a corner bead at all, and for some reason are now earthquake proof to some extent 0.o.

The sides are 1/2 inch and the bottom is 3/4 inch plus there are 1/4 inch thick trim pieces glued around the bottom inner perimeter. Trust me when I say I've been going over this tank with a "fine toothed comb". I did find a small scratch in one of the side panes, but since I was not around when the movers delivered it I can not be certain they didn't cause that. Otherwise the silicone seams appear to be bubble free.

And did you see that earthquake video!:bigeyes: Pretty scary stuff . .

I'll be more concerned with cutting my arms on a GC rimless tank :lol2:..

Funny thing is I was expecting to hire someone to grind the edges since I had read they came clean cut from GC, but they came polished and beveled. I don't know if GC is trying harder or if I was so nice on the phone to Beth and Tom that they gave me a little extra service. In any case I was pleasently surprised by the edges.

 

[2Sunny]

Todays progress.

Final tear down today, big mess, sore back, but everybody seems o.k. in their temporary home downstairs. Also the PFO hood arrived. Oddly enough the PFO hoods now come with VHO plugs that only work with the PFO ballast even though I paid for the IceCap upgrade. I have the IceCap ballast, but presumably I now have to buy some kind of adapter. Wasn't the case with the last PFO hood I bought. Wouldn't really matter except that I like to use my Solar 1000 for dimming the last actinic lighting off and on. Oh well, its always somethin'


Joe

 

[2Sunny]

Lot's left to do. The light hangers are temporary as I am expecting steel bars eventually. The back will be all black once I get my sheet of acrylic. I'm working on hiding the Tunze. The overflow teeth need some widening, and most critically I'm looking for ideas to reinforce the seams. At the moment I am contemplating 1 inch by 1/2 inch glass glued to the outside corners, but I need to talk with some glass specialists, and I'll save that for another thread. Suffice to say all those who said don't do GlassCages can now officially say "I told you so". Anyways, its holding for now, and hopefully I have time to do a repair. Aside from that happy thought every thing else is fabulous. The tank is everything I dreamed of in terms of aesthetics and acessibility. The pictures do not do justice to the beauty, and I'm only sorry I waited so long to change from a tall acrylic to a short glass system. The aquarium really is neat to look at from above and from a seated position on the couch.
Joe

 

[chazertis]

Nice, i like the rockwork.

 

[2Sunny]

Nervous about the glass reinforcement . . .

So my plan is to silicone 1 inch strips of glass to the outside corners tomorrow. I'm nervous about the plan since I've never done any glass work before, but we'll see. As part of the process I invested in some large wood clamps to stabilize the tank while the reinforcement dries.


Meanwhile, I'm running into a minor nuisance algae outbreak on the LR that was not already coralline encrusted, but nothing I can't get past with a few weeks time. I'm still blown away by the overall pleasure I get when looking at this tank. Once I get the black backing up I'll have to find a better camera to take some quality pictures.


Seems like a never ending process though. My "To do" list seems to stay the same length day after day . . . ah well . . .

 

[crox99]

It looks like it's coming along nicely.:happysad:

 

[NYreefNoob]

id do this before i would seal glass to the outside, and with using 1 to 2 bands it's only 3\4" or 1 1\2" width, with 2500lb's to 5000lb's of holding strength



http://www.fourstarplastics.com/pack9.htm


http://www.uline.com/Browse_Listing_2804.asp?desc=Heavy+Duty

http://www.strappingtoolsandparts.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=12

 

[cali_reef]

So my plan is to silicone 1 inch strips of glass to the outside corners tomorrow. I'm nervous about the plan since I've never done any glass work before, but we'll see. As part of the process I invested in some large wood clamps to stabilize the tank while the reinforcement dries.

What is the reason for the strips on the outside?? I don't think they will do much to prevent an improperly glued corner from splitting.

be careful with those Beissy clamps, they WILL crack the tank if too much pressure is placed on them. I know this first hand.

 

[2Sunny]

What is the reason for the strips on the outside?? I don't think they will do much to prevent an improperly glued corner from splitting.

be careful with those Beissy clamps, they WILL crack the tank if too much pressure is placed on them. I know this first hand.

Cali,

Why don't you think the strips will help. The bond will be equal in area to the original seal and perpindicular in force so the forward panel support will be in shear and the side panel support will be in tension versus the opposite for the original seal. Its not unlike chines on the sides of wooden cabinetry. Is there some element to the nature of glass that I'm missing. And yes I promise to be be VERY gentle with the clamps. Also I'm adding triangles to the top corners to provide additional shear strength bonds. The base has 3/4 inch glass and 1/2 strips factory installed along the inner perimeter so I have confidence in the lower half of the tank. Its the top portion of the seal that makes me nervous. Finally I think I will add strapping around the top and bottom perimeter as NYreef suggested above.

Anyways I am genuinely interested in engineering input on this repair job so thanks for the helpful questioning!


Joe

 

[cali_reef]

When I think of improper glued corners, I am imagining the two piece meeting at the corner are not perpendicular to each other to begin with, putting thin scab patches over an uneven surface will not yield the same strength as a the original joint. The unevenness of the silicon will have different amount of holding strength, the part with least amount of contact will fail first, before the design strength limit. I am not a glass specialist but I have never seen a repair done this way before, I can tell you this will not work in a composite or aluminum pressure vessel repair, the scab will have to be a lot bigger and form the 90 deg from a single piece of material to reinforce the load in a corner.



The rim pieces they put on the inner perimeter are a form of bracing to increase the stiffness of the length of that edge The vertical pieces (walls) are made more stiff with these strips,same concept as the euro brace.

You have a picture of the faulty joint?

 

[jab161]

didn't check if anyone posted about the lighting brackets, but 1/2" emt bends very easy and i would bet that over time it will sag even under the lightest load. I also would not want salt getting on it because it rusts very easy. If i were you i would use 1/2" galvinized conduit. it is much stronger and will not rust.

 

[loismustdie]

Is this a repair job, or preventative maintenance? I read the posts from the previous page, but as an unhappy "proud" owner of a GC tank, I believe the last picture of post 27 shown was one of the seam beginning to split.
I'm not a glass guy, but I don't think your plan will work. I would feel better with a 3/4X3/4 piece siliconed on the inside of the corners and allowed to dry for a few days.
Tosiek... I've seen Mshur's Elos tank and I've seen a few GC tanks. GC doesn't have anywhere close to the bead of silicone Elos does. Trust me... I'm regretting my recently learned info.
So back to my ?... repair or preventative?

 

[2Sunny]

Silicone in tension vs. shear.

The corners are well done and 90 degrees its just that there seems to have been a tiny amount of movement during the curing process that caused the seam to discolor (see below), and there has been no evidence of movement since I added water so this is all preventative rather than repair.


My original idea was to beef up the "weakest link". I was working under the assumption that the side panels which are supported by the shear strength of the silicone bond were the weakest link, and that by siliconing 1 inch glass bars to the outside corners I would be adding a bond that is supported by tensile strength for the side panels and thereby significantly improving the strength.

But trust me when I say the general concensus is causing me to seriously reconsider. I'm investigating the strapping mentioned above to add as a final insurance policy against catastrophic failure. My biggest concern with the strapping is the tightening process and the nature of the squeeze being such that it will tend to "bow" the glass if its too tight. Has anyone ever used such strapping before? What I really need is a steel frame that could slip over the top perimeter and act like Eurobracing, and of course the final solution is to change out the tank for a new one, but I just don't have the money right now so it will have to wait a few months.

Thanks again for all the input!

Joe

 

[bigbris1]

Looks AWESOME!!

I would like to know what GC has to say about this. Please don't let your excitement & pleasure with your aquascaping & the overall aesthetic appeal cloud the fact that you may have received an inferior product. I wouldn't even bother with preventatives. I would demand my tank be perfect straight from the manufacturer or my money refunded. ASAP.

If not, the corner triangles would be my bet.

 

[2Sunny]

2 Months later . . .

2 months in.
Not really sure what is going on, but 2 months into my new tank, and I have to say I am blown away by the results so far. I am getting phenomenal growth, color, polyp extension, mating fish, and just plain enjoyment from the new set up. My tri-color is purpling up like mad. My yellow tort is changing from yellow polyps to blue polyps, and what's really wierd is I'm getting some of that paler pastel effect on some corals like the Zeovit boys. Not in a bad way mind you, but rather in a really cool way. I changed so many aspects of my reef and reef keeping routine so I'm not sure I can point my finger towards any one reason for my success so far but here's a list of changes that come to mind so far:

1) maintaining higher Mg levels, was 1150 now 1350
2) maintaining higher pH was 7.8 now 8.1
3) Tunze's now cycle every 3 seconds from high to low
4) removed my DSB and now I clean the shallow sand bed weekly
5) basement grow out tank is barebottom and cleaned weekly as well
6) reduced amount of Rowaphos but now I change it every 2 weeks
7) changed from three 400 watt 10k MH to four 250 watt MH with 2 x 10k and 2 x 20k
8) reduced my calcium reactor output and began using some B-Ionic 2 part.

I'm still waiting for Christmas to get a new digital SLR so I can take some decent macro photos, but here's a couple I took today that came out o.k. Hope you likee!

 

[jejton]

Wow thats an amazing tank! Im curious though, like the previous poster - did GC have any comments about the seam issue?