I'm not that clumsy!

[Parka]

peeing on your corn-flakes;

Good thing I eat cereal dry! Hahaha! This is a true story. One time, I saw what I thought was a chocolate sprinkle on the counter at our old house in Akron, and because my Lover often used sprinkles to fancy up our love child's treats, well what I assumed was a chocolate sprinkle was in reality mouse feces! And I ate on purpose by accident! I still haven't recovered and it was a good 25 years ago! I need help is what I need and I need it yesteryear!

This is MY mermaid, and it Shan't be Denied that I might be in love!

 

[Parka]

I also don't know what safety factor your engineer friend is considering acceptable.

What safety factor do you yourself consider acceptable? I'm using 1/2 " tempered glass, AKA SAFETY glass.

I'm pretty conservative and don't like to take chances of this type.

Oh, are you building the same build as me, then? I'm just askin is all.

Hopefully a few other builders can chime in here and prove me totally wrong.

Your warning has absolutely no urgency with me. None whatsoever. The reason why I am not at all alarmed is that you presented zero technical info supporting your 'opinion' , just some charts that you saw one day or something. And no real life experience either, just your unqualified opinion.

As far as other builders proving you wrong, to be fair I emailed my engineer friend to tell him I was warned and he proved you wrong, again.

But, even if that happens, I stand by my statement: IMHO, a 42-inch depth calls for thicker glass than a mere 24 inches.

Really? Do you realize how stupid that sounds or looks? That's my opinion.

Check out this picture of four grown men standing on a piece of 3/8" tempered. Now, imagine if that glass was supported on all 4 edges as it will be in the tank that I build with 100% confidence. Plus mines is HALF INCH thick!

 

[jjohnwm]

Wow. I had no idea that simply expressing an opinion made me sound so stupid. Thanks for pointing that out; how lucky you must be that you can express your own opinion and somehow manage to avoid that embarrassing pitfall.

Absolutely, continue on as you see fit. Do no further research; don't bother consulting the various sources online and elsewhere that make suggestions regarding glass thickness calculations. Do not waste time even learning the definition of "safety factor", or reading the suggestions regarding tempered safety vs annealed glass.

I apologized earlier for my gall in making suggestions, so I won't waste your time or mine repeating that. My 15 or so plywood builds over the last 30-ish years have all progressed smoothly, with no major problems and certainly no catastrophic failures; I guess that avoiding those things has prevented me from learning anything useful.

I won't trouble you further; enjoy your build.

 

[Backfromthedead]

I agree with John 72x42 window should be thicker. He's just trying to save you the trouble of a flooded house.

 

[esoxlucius]

I must say, i disagree with your thread title, "I'm not that clumsy!"

You may very well know your way around your DIY projects, and being disabled to boot, that's great, a real achievement. But I must say, as far as interacting with people, who are just offering friendly advice, I'd say your "style" is extremely "clumsy!"

Imo you've come across as rude. In fact I don't really understand why you've posted at all, given that you have all these experts on tap, with real life experience!

 

[Niki_up]

I agree with the others in that you are coming off quite rude…pompous even.

I know nothing about building aquariums or glass thickness and when I did a quick Google search the calculators out3/4 inch thickness for the front and back glass with almost 1 inch of thickness for the bottom pane of glass.

I used the measurements 12 feet long, 2 feet deep and 30 inches high.
That alone would have me questioning if your using the correct thickness.

these fine folks are just trying to help save you some potential hassle of a future tank leak and a future post titled “I’m THAT clumsy”.

I understand your looking for “qualified” and “real life experiences” well these are you qualified real life experiences being shared of non tank failures and you are just dismissing them like their years of tank building, fish keeping, and experiences are not worth wiping your ass with.

I do have one suggestion that will come across as rude but whatever….if this group of people are not qualified enough and their real life experiences are not real enough for for you…have you tried going to an engineering forums and posting your plans there for feed back?

 

[jjohnwm]

I do have one suggestion that will come across as rude but whatever….if this group of people are not qualified enough and their real life experiences are not real enough for for you…have you tried going to an engineering forums and posting your plans there for feed back?

I actually think that's part of the problem, Niki. An engineer has apparently already told him that he will be fine; I don't know what safety factor he has utilized to come to that conclusion, but if you are willing to go low enough with the safety factor, then perhaps half-inch glass will withstand that water, if construction is done carefully and perfectly. Hell, you could probably build it out of quarter-inch glass if you accept a safety factor of less than 1...failure is guaranteed, of course...but apparently he doesn't even understand the concept of "safety factor", so...

But virtually every one of the references I have consulted over the years has, without fail, recommended a safety factor of 3.8 - 4 as a minimum for aquarium use...which of course calls for the thicker glass. An aquarium must withstand not only the weight and pressure of static water; there are also the inevitable bumps and shocks resulting from decor moving or tipping over, or simply a stray elbow banging into the glass...and of course when dealing with monster fish we can't simply ignore the possible impact of a spooked fish weighing a few or more pounds smashing into the glass at high speed. That one factor would push a rational person towards the "just in case" stuff, rather than pulling the them towards the "just barely enough".

 

[Niki_up]

I don't know what safety factor he has utilized to come to that conclusion, but if you are willing to go low enough with the safety factor, then perhaps half-inch glass will withstand that water, if construction is done carefully and perfectly. Hell, you could probably build it out of quarter-inch glass if you accept a safety factor of less than 1...failure is guaranteed, of course...but apparently he doesn't even understand the concept of "safety factor", so...

He clearly said his safety factor is tempered glass aka SAFTY glass!! Yeesssshhh learn to read jjohnwm!!!

 

[Backfromthedead]

The panels could still work, OP would just have to cut the viewing window height down. 24" should be fine, I would go 27-28" max though.

 

[FINWIN]

I'm kind of hoping he'll try the 1/2" glass pane and post results. There's a certain amount of excitement to sleeping with one eye open.