Cutting down acrylic tank

[Landolakes]

I was offered an acrylic tank from a doctors office but it is extremely tall and was wondering if there was anyway it could be cut down to a more manageable height? It is 38" tall and I was thinking of bringing it down to about 28 or 30 inches.

[geiges]

we cut a 24" acrylic tank into one 10" frag tank and took
the top 8" and made new bottom for a another frag tank.
we cut it with a Circular Saw,you need to lay it out befor you
cut it.
It worked good for us.
good luck

[GTriever]

Table saw; run it against the rip fence, 4 cuts and you're done.

[Landolakes]

Now comes the hard part, I forgot to mention that it is a 360 gallon hex, any ideas on how best to cut it? Would a circular or recip. saw work?

[NYIntensity]

ROFL....I forgot to mention that it is HUGE!!!

[Landolakes]

^

[[17]shawn[17]]

oh ****
thats gunna be hard

[itZme]

Doesn't seem outrageously hard. You would have to use a guide on a circular saw and cut across each side. If you have access to a table saw with a rip fence it seems like almost an easy job. You might need another person to help hold it straight and help guide it through the blade.
If it has a eurobraced top on it I would just set the rip fence to cut the top off after cutting the middle section out and then reglue the top onto the shorter aquarium to be sure it is strong enough.

Oh BTW I did the calculations on an online calculator and the sides on a 38" tall 360g hex should be 29" wide. If you cut it down to 30" high by 29" wide it will then be 283g volume.



HTH

[Acrylics]

Good luck with it, the hard part is going to be how to get a good, gluable edge after it's cut down. Any type of saw will probably not leave a good enough edge and will make it very dificult to get all cuts to line up correctly. IMO a reciprocating saw will fracture it due to the harsh vibrations, a circular saw would be the better of the two. Personally, I'd use a router, but wouldn't advise it unless you are comfortable and experienced using one.

True hex or flat-back hex?

James

[Landolakes]

true hex, I am going to see if maybe I can get a wood or glass shop to try it for me.

[coralnut99]

Originally posted by Landolakes
true hex, I am going to see if maybe I can get a wood or glass shop to try it for me.

They might try it, but they won't guarantee anything.

I would use a circular saw with a fresh 60 tooth carbide tip blade. do it in two passes per cut. It's probably 3/4" thick? The worst thing that could happen is you overheat the acrylic and it begins to craze. Doing it in two or even three quick passes with time in between for heat to dissipate seems best to me. You should also protect the tank from scratches from the saw's shoe as it passes over the acrylic. A run of clear packaging tape should help.

Getting a tank that big on a table saw would need a small army to hold steady unless you have a huge sliding table, and you don't see many of those.

[draleigh]

I would leave it alone and make the stand a little lower. Sounds like a kick butt tank. wish i could find something like that

[Landolakes]

Problem is getting it inside anywhere, not to many doors big enough and none in my place.

[TIMMYE]

Something you could try is to secure a straight edge like 2x4 to the tank then run you cir. saw down that. That way you are not free hading it.

Or go with a real deep sand bed or a plenum to make up some of he heaght. The only problem I see with the heaight that tall is lighting. Goodluck and let us know what you do.

[jnarowe]

Originally posted by draleigh
I would leave it alone and make the stand a little lower. Sounds like a kick butt tank. wish i could find something like that

This is the best idea...just lube it up and squeeze it in!

Seriously, I had to remove an entire slider assembly to get my tank inside the house.Sometimes it takes creative solutions. I would hate to see a cool tank get cut down, but 30" is a lot easier to maintain.

Any plastic shops near you? Know someone with a full blown table saw station big enough to support the tank? If you do, you can get a good quality blade and have at it. And I really like the idea of saving the top.

[coralnut99]

If you do take it to a shop to get it cut and it ends up on a table saw, make sure they have a large sliding table to handle it. pushing it over a stationary blade is gonna give you some nasty scoring across the face that's gonna be a bugger to buff out.

[Schplitter]

I work with acrylic a lot.

1st: you will not be able to use the top once you cut it off. There is no way to cut it that perfectly. It would need to be no more then one 32nd off or you would have a bad bond. You will probably overheat the acrylic with the cutting. This makes it unsafe and impossible to glue. If you do overheat and glue you will end up with fine cracks all along the joint...

2nd: a table saw will work but you will need a very large table to slide the whole thing over. make sure you put something between the tank and the table when you are sliding it or you will end up with a lot of scratches.

3rd: a skill saw will probably be easyer to use. I would go this route. Build a wood frame around the whole thing. Usae that frame as your guide...

4th: take out a window. This would be the best thing to do.

BK

[jaws_too]

thats a crazy idea. good luck!

[Landolakes]

Window is definately the best option but I want to be able to take it to the cellar as this beast would really demand a whole room.