Is this seal ok?

Kapital · Jan 10, 2020

I would like to hear what others think about this seal. My wife and I have been working on this since early Nov 2019. The tank was purchased new, put up and running for the last 2 years with no problems. We moved into our new house and rebuilt the stand. Confirmed 3 times the stand was level with our 4&6 foot levels, as well as put some styrofoam underneath it. The tank is a 210 gallon aqueon tank and i wan to make sure we are not loading a ticking timebomb in our living room of our new house. Please let me know if this is the seal seperating or if this is normal bowing from filling the tank. It has been holding water (75% full) since middle November. Thank you in advance for your responses.

vetteguy53081 · Jan 10, 2020

Seems like an imperfection than bad sealing. I would do one of 2 things:

Add a small bead if silicone from top to bottom and/or gill tank with water and leak test for 2-4 days

Kapital · Jan 10, 2020

Thank you for the response. I will try to get it plumbed so i can fill it 100%. The silicone i thought would not bond to old silicone. Will that be an issue if i do that? Also have attached some closer up pictures of the openings on the outside. All inside silicone seems to be throughly attached to the glass.

Marlon C · Jan 10, 2020

no bubbles in seam. Looks to be ok

sharpimage · Jan 10, 2020

Looks fine. What is the issue you are seeing? Adding new silicone over it will do absolutely nothing. You are correct in that It will not bond to the old silicone.

sharpimage · Jan 10, 2020

If the tank is rimmed, remove the styrofoam. It is made to rest on the trim, not the glass

Dom · Jan 10, 2020

Before investing any time and effort into plumbing and such, I'd fill it and let it sit for several days.

When I test a tank, I tape paper towels to the edges so I can see even the slightest moisture developing at the seams.

Kapital · Jan 10, 2020

Thank you again for the recommendations. I was worried that the water my fill into the overflow. I had it in the garage for 2 weeks full of water and no leaks there. I will try the paper towel method tonight when i get home though. An ounce of prevention and all.

what I’m concerned about is these “holidays” aka silicone voids on the edge of the glass where you can see the seperation on the edge. I have marked on these the exact areas. If you look closely you can see the voids circled in red.

sorry if i seem like a nervous nelly but measure twice cut once kinda thing.

Marlon C · Jan 10, 2020

The glass is beveled so when they tooled the seam they might have not tooled it flush.

Dom · Jan 10, 2020

Plug the overflows and fill it. The longer it holds, the greater your confidence will be.

sharpimage · Jan 10, 2020

I would not sleep at night seeing that full of 200 gallons of water in my house

steallife904 · Jan 10, 2020

do you recall if it looked any different before you put water in? Looking at the last closer photos... ya couple spots have me nervous. But if its been like this then it could just be imperfection. I wonder if it may still have a warranty on it?

Kapital · Jan 10, 2020

Well it has been like this since i got the tank just never noticed that side since it was push up against a wall. Now that the corner is exposed in the new house i see it clearly. I do remember seeing the area (see through corner) at the previous place just never noticed the spacing. As for the warranty, i was informed at the time of purchase by the LFS if i did not go with the standard aqueon stand, it will void the warranty. Purchasing a stand from the manufacture was the only way to keep the warranty entact since the manufacture cannot garuntee the level or stability of the stand. Looking back at old pictures from july 2017 it seems to have the same seam issue. As seen in the pictures below.