Glass or Acrylic

[Steven91]

Hey everyone,

Looking at going to a larger tank (like most of do) and trying to think of what is the best solution for a 10+ year tank. Looking at having it 8ft long, 2 ft wide, and 2ft tall.

Should I go glass or acrylic for it? Pros and Cons would be great

 

[Fishingandreefing]

Low iron glass. Acrylic is a pain in the butt

 

[Steven91]

Low iron glass. Acrylic is a pain in the butt

Why do you say that?

 

[Drysea]

Glass would be more prone to catastrophic failure at long/ bigger sheets of glass. It has no give so you have to be thick or somehow reinforced. Joints are also weaker. IMO glass looks better.

acrylic is softer but stronger with some give. But it scratches much easier.

 

[KrisReef]

Acrylic is lighter, clearer to look through, scratches easier, and doesn't have silicon seams that fail.
Glass is heavier, scratches less easily, has seams that can fail but is more durable during algae scraping.

 

[BornHandy]

Glass all the way. Tanks that size are available in glass, and the only reason to go acrylic is to get a tank bigger than glass allows.

Acrylic is a great material, but in 2 years, it'll almost certainly have a fine collection of scratches. I know a guy that almost never cleans his tank because it's acrylic. (food for thought).

Maybe if you're super lucky, and mega-careful, you could get away with it, but I can't see a reason to risk it unless the tank is much larger than this one...

jmho.

 

[Steven91]

Glass would be more prone to catastrophic failure at long/ bigger sheets of glass. It has no give so you have to be thick or somehow reinforced. Joints are also weaker. IMO glass looks better.

Ideally want a tank that I could go worry free about over the long haul, would love it to be my last tank but who knows. I just dont want to wake up or come home from work one day to water all over the floor and fish dead on the ground

acrylic is softer but stronger with some give. But it scratches much easier.

Acrylic is lighter, clearer to look through, scratches easier, and doesn't have silicon seams that fail.
Glass is heavier, scratches less easily, has seams that can fail but is more durable during algae scraping.

Heard about acrylic scratching easier but I know you can buff it out, and I have a scrapper that has the acrylic end on it

 

[fuelman]

I love my acrylic tanks I have 4 I would go acrylic for every reason but one they do scratch easy & no getting around that. you have to be really careful & cleaning Without scratches can be a challenge with Coraline.

 

[Steven91]

I love my acrylic tanks I have 4 I would go acrylic for every reason but one they do scratch easy & no getting around that. you have to be really careful & cleaning Without scratches can be a challenge with Coraline.

Scratching is somewhat of a concern as I want everyone to be able to see the beauty of the tank and fish, Have you buffed out any scratches?

 

[BornHandy]

Heard about acrylic scratching easier but I know you can buff it out, and I have a scrapper that has the acrylic end on it

Clean it with cotton balls, it'll still get a scratch somehow. Every reefer I know that has an acrylic tank has scratches-o-plenty. In my opinion, you'll regret acrylic way before you second guess glass.

 

[Drysea]

Even with the softer acrylic cleaner all you need to scratch is a piece of coraline to get between your pad and the tank. Buffing is a pain and I think you can’t do it wet.

 

[BornHandy]

Oh, and how often do you want to drain your tank to buff scratches?

 

[S2G]

I like glass at 240g. The only reason I like acrylic is the weight. Its very hard for me to get a group of people to move a tank past 240.

 

[albano]

ACRYLIC... been using them since 1991... still have 3 120g acrylic tanks that are over 20 yrs old, and can be buffed to look like new! Have/had 120s, 200, 300, 450 and 500g tanks... you could not give me a large glass tank!
Most of the people that will tell you ‘how bad’ acrylic is, have never had one.
It is not that hard to avoid scratches, but the good news is that they CAN be sanded without draining. Scratched glass is scratched forever!

 

[pdxmonkeyboy]

Yeah, perhaps knowing for sure what you are talking about before posting is a good idea. Can't buff a tank wet?? Ummmm yes you absolutely can.

As stated above, you WILL scratch your acrylic tank. BUT unlike glass, it just takes a little elbow grease to get them out. A scratch on the inside= mag scrapper, 5k grit paper then 10k and your done. You ever been to the zoo or any public aquarium? Those are ALL acrylic, and there are kids banging on then all day.. yet perfectly clear.

Ask me about my $5k custom AGE glass tank with a big scratch in the side... I drained it, spent 3 hours with circum oxide, diamond paste and an electric buffer. It's still there.

Also, acrylic is much much much stronger and never gets weak with age. A 240 gallon, 10 year old glass tank. Sure they exist, but.

Also, you can severely damage a glass tank by just hitting the silicone with your scraper every time you clean.

There are lots of people that like to rag on acrylic on my local forum, then when they come over they are like WOW! ITS SOOO CLEAR!!

The good news is, because of the perceived down sides of acrylic you can get an old beat up tank on craigslist for a song, take it home, spend what seems like eternity sanding and polishing and poof... new tank!!

Full disclosure, I am currently in the process of building my own 600G 4x8x30" acrylic tank

And before someone says it... you will be in the grave before UV light degrades your cast acrylic tank.

 

[ca1ore]

Lots of threads on this topic .... including one yesterday. Search is your friend. Same basic set of pros and cons in all of them.

 

[afuel]

Heard about acrylic scratching easier but I know you can buff it out, and I have a scrapper that has the acrylic end on it

Buffing out is probably not a huge deal on the outside but the inside would be a huge pain I would think. Your dimensions I would say glass

 

[afuel]

Having said that I’ve never owned an acrylic tank so I don’t speak from experience on that part but I’ve had glass tanks in operation for over 30 yrs and find them extremely durable. Also have never had scratches in them that need attention

 

[tc760]

I'm switching from acrylic to glass now. I had an acrylic tank running for 6 years. It does scratch easy. I didn't have a lot of deep scratches but over six years there were tons of small scratches that definitely lowered the clarity of the tank. For a 10+ year tank I could only imagine it would get worse. That being said it is possible to buff it out and make it new again. It's no trivial task but can be done. I think that for a tank that long I would consider it again. They are solid and durable. I just feel like it took a lot of extra care when cleaning. The hard Coraline build up on the viewing panes were always a pain to scrape off since metal blades are a gamble.

 

[fuelman]

Scratching is somewhat of a concern as I want everyone to be able to see the beauty of the tank and fish, Have you buffed out any scratches?

I bought all my tanks used so I have wet sanded & buffed all of them before setting them up. it's not hard just time consuming. & Contrary to popular belief you can fix scratches on the inside of the tank without draining it. I also have a few glass tanks still & have removed small scratches from them but it's 10 time's more work than acrylic & deeper scratches in glass can't be fixed. Having owned both I would still go acrylic if i had to do over again