# Making a fishtank



## Corwin (May 23, 2010)

I was just curious if anyone has ever actualy made their own aquarium tank before, and how difficult it is.


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## AquariumTech (Oct 12, 2010)

I tried, and wasnt successful, then I had my friend who has before show me how to make one, and succeed. When I built it, it sprung a leak when I was testing it for this purpose. I think its real hard, but, people with more experience, say its not hard but takes time and patience that I know. Everything has to be perfectly level on every plane (or dimension). Its quite a task to line it all up perfectly like this without special tools (besides levelers and other common tools). The spreading the sealant doesnt have to be perfect, but it does have to be sufficient and it does have to perfectly hold everything together. You can make a mess with it is what I am saying but it still take a lot of effort to still have everything line up, on every plane, all at once. 

Anyways to make a long story short, I would suggest not building one by your self, but with someone who has much experience with this. Not only that, if your not good with hardware, tools, and etc. it just makes it that much harder. I am pretty good with that stuff, and I really couldnt do it without help. Also like I said, real pain in the ass, time taker, unless your a master at this or have some trade specific tools or machines.


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## emc7 (Jul 23, 2005)

Aqueon tanks are all made by hand. But the glass is cut by a computer-guided cutter. IMO getting the edges straight and true would be the hardest part. I'd suggest you mail-order the rectangles of trim to hold everything square. I don't think building a glass tank saves money unless you have scrap glass laying around. There are old threads in the DIY section about large tanks built with only 1 side glass. These can save you money because glass is pricey as you go up in size.


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## Corwin (May 23, 2010)

In light of the responses I've gotten I think I'll just buy one  I'm not really that handy especially when it comes to measurements. Lol


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## ThatDude (Jul 10, 2010)

How does one side of glass work out for an aquarium?


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## emc7 (Jul 23, 2005)

you have 4 sides plywood, fiberglass or something else cheap. All covered in a nice, water-proof epoxy or other boat-quality paint/coating. Fish don't mind tank dark sides, in fact they prefer them to shiny glass. The tanks at the Shedd used to all be like this. The bigger the tank, the less likely there is to be anyone behind looking at fish from the other side. So it would well for a tank built into a wall. 

The trick to these is the same as for glass tanks, getting the edges lined up perfectly, keeping them there and making a good seal that lasts a long time. Mixing materials complicates things a bit because different sealants stick best to different stuff and stuff with different expansion rate during temp. changes will try to pull apart. 

But go to any public aquarium and you will see tanks where only the 'viewing public' side is clear.


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## burninrubber390 (Oct 25, 2010)

http://www.eastcoastaquariumsociety.ca/forum/viewtopic.php?id=21030&p=1

I found this the one day and save it for future reference as it has a lot of key points in a diy tank maybe it could help


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