acrylic thickness calculator

[Michael Populus]

Flabbergast!! Sorry to thread dig like this but what's the highest anyone has gone with 1" cell cast and a braced top? I want to start a plywood/fiberglass tank and I can make 1" work in my price range but really want to go 48" high so figuring at least 40" to 44" on the acrylic by 96" L. If I "have" to go 30" I will but I will be greatly saddened.

Did you ever get an answer to this?

Im planning on building a 12x4x4 plywood and was planning on using 1 inches as well. Was hoping to over brace and allow at least 8 inches of overlap on the tank to really hold it in place. I was hoping to get at least 40 inches of viewing out of the 48 inch width

 

[wannadivesteve]

How easy does acrylic scratch?

Back when I had an aquarium shop I had 4 125 gallon acrylic tanks prominently featured. I get people telling me they’d never get acrylic because it scratches so easily... then I’d take out my keychain with about a dozen keys on it and huck it at the tanks from 10-15 feet away and they’d bounce off, then I’d pick the keys off the floor and rub them on the tank hard enough to shake them a bit and say “I’d never do that with my glass tanks”. It usually took people back. Then one day a guy said “what would happen if you took the sharp edge of a scissors to it?”... so I did and It scratched the heck out of it. So I polished it out and never took the sharp edge of scissors to the tanks again.

Acrylic can scratch. I’ve seen loads of glass tanks that are scratched as well. Acrylic can in most cases be polished out. Take care of either and it shouldn’t be a huge issue.