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Glass thickness?

ahjoe0digi said:
planning on build my third tank, this time should be 120*40*40 or 150*50*50. I like to build my own tank to save money and I can get any size and shape I want.

View attachment 95916

Do you know what is this?? May invest some money to get this in case I need to build bigger tank

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Click to expand...

That's a corner clamp / square clamp
 
Oops missed question. It looks to be this model clamp

https://www.cromwell.co.uk/shop/han...-129f235df603&istItemId=aqrxqimia&istBid=tztx

They are not bad prices. I would suggest getting 4 so that you can keep it clamped on one side whilst you add the new side. Bar clamps are also a good idea for larger tanks.

https://www.cromwell.co.uk/shop/han...-129f235df603&istItemId=aqrxiwxam&istBid=tztx

Don't forget you need a large perfectly flat surface to produce on as well. I know one place that created a concrete plinth with self levelling compound and polish finished it so it was solid and dead level so that they could work on the glass.
 
Wow thanks for all the info guys. Some really good suggestions etc.

A very good point was about the size of my aquarium. I'm got a 120x60x60 at the moment and your right it's a nightmare to try and reach the back (it's just that little bit far) maybe I will scale it back abit to 900x50x50?

I've already got some of those clamps in the shed so I'll be using them for sure 🙂

Ok so if I was to go 900x50x50 then the glass measurements I need would be:
880x500 base
900x500 x2
500x500 x2
(I want 500mm internal atleast. Size is worked out on the scape I have planned)

Is this right? Or so I need to take 2mm off the base measurement for silicon?


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Last edited:
No problem 🙂

In regards to dimensions. Assuming you are going for internal base design (as standard) then you want to allow 2mm for each side that has a silicone bead.

So that would mean you want

Panel A = 876x496/Length x Depth (base)
Panel B = 900x510/Length x Height (Front & Rear Panel)
Panel C = 496x510/Depth x Height (Left & Right Panels)

This would give you internal measurements of 880x500/Length x Depth and internal height of exactly 500mm (Allowing the standard 2mm bead depth for silicone & 10mm low iron glass being used).

I would make sure every edge is polished and has diamond edging (chamfered edges) Elos & Evolution Aqua both do this and they are both pretty high end so I would use the same principle. It also means you can not get them the wrong way around accidently.

Hope that helps. Here is a quick diagram (top down with basic dims).

yZqiiD2.jpg
 
Just got my first quote for the glass, for 10mm float glass with polished edges to the sizes I need would be $511 (about 260 pound) does that sound reasonable to you guys?


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That seems expensive for float glass (standard glass) I can get a full low iron cut with polished edges to your dimensions for 5% more.

and the cost for float glass version is about 20% less than the low iron making it about £220

To give an idea a commercial made low iron can be brought for £299 in same dimensions pretty much (bar 2") so add in silicone and the time and all that and savings are minimal TBH.

And ND aquatics for instance in U.K. does a float glass tank 90x60x60 (36x24x24) for £184 and another company offer a 120x60x60 float (braced mind) for £144
 
Adam Chambers said:
That seems expensive for float glass (standard glass) I can get a full low iron cut with polished edges to your dimensions for 5% more.

and the cost for float glass version is about 20% less than the low iron making it about £220

To give an idea a commercial made low iron can be brought for £299 in same dimensions pretty much (bar 2") so add in silicone and the time and all that and savings are minimal TBH.

And ND aquatics for instance in U.K. does a float glass tank 90x60x60 (36x24x24) for £184 and another company offer a 120x60x60 float (braced mind) for £144
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Yea I thought it seemed pretty expensive. Considering it's just for the glass and no assembly. Maybe I should just buy a sheet of glass and just cut and polish it myself. Still waiting for a few more quotes to come through. Hopefully I can get it down abit more. I can get 1200x900 sheets of 10mm toughened for $96 so it really does make the float glass look expensive


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I have managed to find a place in UK that would do the glass for £230 which appears cheapest so in honesty I don't think it is cost effective unless you are buying in bulk from China with custom panels and making 40 tanks a year in honesty.

I can work them out to cost closer to £100 a tank then which means you could sell them for £220 built to others and make around £100 per tank then. But of course it is the time and effort. It may be worth it if you had enough space to do so.

I mean you can get low iron glass panels pretty cheap. It's about US$8 per m2 and your aquarium is around 1.82m2 so that would be US$16 for all the glass but you need to order 1000m2 in bulk so about 500 aquariums worth 🙄

Or you can get the glass for around US$11.50 per m2 so US$23 and you need to order min 100m2 of glass so more like 50 aquariums. Of course there are shipping fees to be added which I can't guess at.

However this is why there are not lots of little independent tank builders knocking 10 tanks a year out as it needs commitment. I did look into it years ago but realised would need around US$50k to set up.

Materials were about 50% with equipment 40% and 10% for first 6 months rental on a unit large enough for the machines.
 
Adam Chambers said:
I have managed to find a place in UK that would do the glass for £230 which appears cheapest so in honesty I don't think it is cost effective unless you are buying in bulk from China with custom panels and making 40 tanks a year in honesty.

I can work them out to cost closer to £100 a tank then which means you could sell them for £220 built to others and make around £100 per tank then. But of course it is the time and effort. It may be worth it if you had enough space to do so.

I mean you can get low iron glass panels pretty cheap. It's about US$8 per m2 and your aquarium is around 1.82m2 so that would be US$16 for all the glass but you need to order 1000m2 in bulk so about 500 aquariums worth 🙄

Or you can get the glass for around US$11.50 per m2 so US$23 and you need to order min 100m2 of glass so more like 50 aquariums. Of course there are shipping fees to be added which I can't guess at.

However this is why there are not lots of little independent tank builders knocking 10 tanks a year out as it needs commitment. I did look into it years ago but realised would need around US$50k to set up.

Materials were about 50% with equipment 40% and 10% for first 6 months rental on a unit large enough for the machines.
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Yea it's actually looking to be more expensive than I thought. I might just keep my eye out at my local shops for a rimless of similar size and just buy a tank without a stand. However u just don't get the clarity like u do if u custom make it with optiwhite 🙁

Rimless tanks seem to be hard to find down here though. Plus it's hard to find the width I want.

I'll keep an eye out for glass in my local but and sell forums and hopefully something pops up.


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Adam Chambers said:
Haha, you could always check out shipping, probably still work out cheaper lol
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Definitely worth looking into. However we have the most expensive shipping lane in the world. Bass straight we pay 20 cents more for our fuel than the rest of Aus because it needs to be shipped across bass straight. (Basically we just get ripped off) haha

However there is still hope, the company I got the quote off told me where they source the glass from so I might go there and see if I can get it direct. I can also cut it myself and just pay to get the edges polished. That might save me abit too


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Fair play. I got a quote for a tank I was looking at doing and the guy in China said US$34.50 per m2 for 15mm panel and all edges polished. Works out about US$170 for a 1500x90x600 tank but need to buy enough material to make 50 😉
 
Adam Chambers said:
Fair play. I got a quote for a tank I was looking at doing and the guy in China said US$34.50 per m2 for 15mm panel and all edges polished. Works out about US$170 for a 1500x90x600 tank but need to buy enough material to make 50 😉
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That's a lot of tanks! Haha it's amazing how something that costs so little over there can be so expensive over here lol. You'd need a shipping container just to store all that glass and the tanks lol


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Bert2oo1 said:
That's a lot of tanks! Haha it's amazing how something that costs so little over there can be so expensive over here lol. You'd need a shipping container just to store all that glass and the tanks lol


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Certainly wood, this is why I was looking into it. Getting a small warehouse unit with tools and going into building such. I have a friend who is a metal worker so could create steel stands. We would offer generic sizes but in more custom size compared to that of the mainstream.

To try and fill a gap in the market really. We had some designs done where the rear panel would be a frosted panel also and there would be an overflow system with holes pre-drilled into base for filter tubes to fix too with lock-tapes. The design would mean that you still use a standard canister filter however you don't have any visible pipework as that is all built into the aquarium itself.
 
I just hope that there are glass factory with precise laser cutting machine controlled by computer. I always ask them to cut and polish for me because I don't have the necessary tools and working surface. However if you plan to cut yourself, just remember to cut a bit more than intended. Polishing going to remove some glass.

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Adam Chambers said:
Certainly wood, this is why I was looking into it. Getting a small warehouse unit with tools and going into building such. I have a friend who is a metal worker so could create steel stands. We would offer generic sizes but in more custom size compared to that of the mainstream.

To try and fill a gap in the market really. We had some designs done where the rear panel would be a frosted panel also and there would be an overflow system with holes pre-drilled into base for filter tubes to fix too with lock-tapes. The design would mean that you still use a standard canister filter however you don't have any visible pipework as that is all built into the aquarium itself.
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That sounds like an awesome idea!! I'd buy one! The frosted glass idea would look great with back lighting! And I hate seeing those ugly filter hoses! Sounds like u put some serious thought into this 😉 wouldn't work here where I am because our population is only 500,000 so I recon u would struggle to sell them (we don't have any aquarium groups or anything).


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ahjoe0digi said:
I just hope that there are glass factory with precise laser cutting machine controlled by computer. I always ask them to cut and polish for me because I don't have the necessary tools and working surface. However if you plan to cut yourself, just remember to cut a bit more than intended. Polishing going to remove some glass.

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Thanks for your input 🙂 about how much would the polish take of the glass? 1-2mm?


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This would have been about '72 I saw my first ever all glass tank in Au, Perth or Freemantle.
I was amazed silicone had just about come in in the UK but only as a sealer to help stop metal framed tanks with putty from leaking.
Decided it would never catch on!!
Doh!
Not often I'm right but I was wrong again!
 
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