Cracked tank, is it safe to fill?

[Quader764]

This might not be the smartest question in the world, but yesterday I bought a 180 gallon aquarium, and on the ride home it must have gotten a crack at the bottom behind the supports. The crack is only visible and I can not feel anything when I run my fingers along it. Would it be safe to fill the tank? If not, what’s the cheapest alternative to fixing it or making it safe.

 

[jjohnwm]

Hard to tell from the pictures, but that's a fairly odd location/orientation for a crack to occur. Are you sure that isn't simply the adhesive that holds the tank trim in place?

If it's truly a crack, then forget about filling the tank. I'll leave it to others with more experience in large glass tanks to explain how to repair it, but you will essentially be re-building the whole thing.

 

[Quader764]

Hard to tell from the pictures, but that's a fairly odd location/orientation for a crack to occur. Are you sure that isn't simply the adhesive that holds the tank trim in place?

If it's truly a crack, then forget about filling the tank. I'll leave it to others with more experience in large glass tanks to explain how to repair it, but you will essentially be re-building the whole thing.

It does run all the way along the bottom of the trim. Is there a way I can tell if it’s the adhesive? Because that’s the only spot on the tank that looks like that.

 

[jjohnwm]

Again, hard to go just from pics, but to me it looks as though below the line you have the clean, perfectly dark look of a thin silicone layer attaching the glass to the frame...and above the line, it appears as though it's just an empty gap. Maybe take a thin shim, something like a strip of Xacto blades or maybe even a sheet of paper, and slip it down between the frame and the glass. If you can freely push it down to the line, and then it stops at the line, you will be able to see/visualize what you are dealing with.

Examining the line closely from different angles and with the light coming from different angles may also allow you to determine if the line is "inside" the glass (a crack) versus "behind" the glass.

 

[Ruturaj]

It does run all the way along the bottom of the trim. Is there a way I can tell if it’s the adhesive? Because that’s the only spot on the tank that looks like that.

You can try, adding some water on outside of glass and frame. Try moving a finger on glass, ít it's a crack you will feel it mostly.

 

[FESHMAN]

Try running your fingernail on it if it catches then it's cracked

 

[Rass]

You will see an uneven line of silicone through the glass that is holding the trim on. Hard to tell in these pics but that could very well be what you are seeing. I always set new tanks up on their stand in my garage, and leave them filled for a couple weeks. If that thing is cracked that badly you will know by the time there is a few inches of water in there.