Stainless Steel Tanks

I like how you think.That is a superb idea and i think steel will give the water a shiny look.So this tank will be a little above a 1000 gallons i think 1123.68 gallons.
But if you are heating the tank wont the steel heat alot faster then the water which could lead to the silicone breaking?

Pout

Gasket leaps to my mind as well. I'd talk to a good plumber about it.

Maybe you could use urethane like they use to set car windshields in, it will allow for expansion and flexing a little. It stays sort of soft but is stronger than hell. If you've ever removed a car winsheild you know what i mean lol

Sounds like it could work. With the wooden tanks I've seen most of them use a thick bead of silicon as the viewing window gasket and like you say, the water pressure pushes the glass against the frame to help seal it. I'm not sure how silicon adheres to stainless though, I would think not too well?

Another thing you may need to think about is to insulate the tank, stainless is a much better conductor of heat so you may have problems with heat loss?

electricity flows easier through metal so watch out or u might end up frying ur fish

let me know how things go. i might try this idea

Have you ever thought of the product "sanitred". It seems this product molecularly bonds to metal as it does wood. Very expensive but take a look:
http://www.sanitred.com/metalroof.htm

Below was my project back in May using sanitred on a 8'X3'X2' plywood tank:
For the plywood tank itself, I just followed the plans from the garf website.
As you can see from the cost below, it is well worth it for a tank this size (8X3X2, LXWXH). However, sizes smaller than 8X3, the cost of a regular glass tank starts becoming comparable to the price of this waterproofing material. I just followed the instructions for waterproofing in my previous post. I applied the material with high quality paint brushes. If I were to do it again, using a high quality roller would have saved alot of time.

When the waterproof material cured, it left an oily residue. The reps at Sanitred told me to clean it out with Tide detergent. It helped, but a tank this size still took about 4 rinses, filling it up halfway each time (to try and save water!!).
The waterproofing consisted of 4 steps as shown below.

The result is some sort of high tech rubber/polymer that seems very durable yet flexible. I placed a thin sheet of plexiglass on the bottom before I put the rocks in to be cautious. I'm sure that if I put gravel or sand in first, then rocks on top, then there should be no problems. But I have no substrate. I am pleased with the result.

Also, I have a common pleco in there since May that went from 2" to 12". There seems to be a whitish growth on the surface from time to time, that may be some type of plant life because the pleco always eats it and keeps it under control. I was watchful at first to see if the pleco would damage the waterproofing material but never had a problem with the pleco even trying to eat through this rubber (the sanitred rubber is supposed to taste very bad) or no penetration that I can see at the present time. I am also raising 6 juvenile umbees (from Jeff Rapps) which happens to be my 3rd batch by the way. The first two batches turned out all females!! I'm sure everyone knows how hard it is to actually get a male

360 Gallon Project: Costs:

5 lb. Box 2.5” exterior screws : $13.99
5 lb. Box 2” exterior screws : $13.99
2 - Liquid Nails : $6.00
6 – 2X4X12 : $4.78 each (for stand)
5 – 2X4X8 : $2.49 each (for stand)
3 – 1X4X12 : $5.71 each
2 – 1X6X12 : $8.23 each
3 – 0.75” Oak Plywood : $38.66 each
2 Gallons LRB : $64.75 per gallon
2 Quarts TAV : $18.50 per quart
1-Gallon Permaflex (Black) : $70.75
1 LRB Mini-Vial : $0.80
6 Oz. Vial Permaflex Accelerator : $7.00
5 Paint brushes : $30.00
93"X 22" glass front (0.5" thick) : $184.00

So the materials cost me roughly $650-$700 (and alot of labor) compared to an 8X3X2 at glasscages for I believe was about $1100 (this size would have to be a special order).