question on glass

[1972ford]

I have a large piece of glass (45"x60"x1/2") that I would like to use to make an aquarium with. Figure I'd go with either concrete or plywood aquarium. I am a concrete batch plant manager so cost of concrete is not too much of an issue. I'm just wondering if this glass would be suitable for the viewing pane I am 99% sire it's a tempered glass as it was an old tabletop.
If it's not quite thick enough is th really anything I can do structurely I can do to make this work? I'm wanting a larger tank my 200 is just seeming to get too small. Been looking at buying a larger aquarium but that kind of cost is not in the budget for quite some time. I already have a sump ready for a monster tank 300 gallon old petsmart plant tank

 

[windsor]

At 45 inches high it's nowhere near thick enough, tempered or not. You would need 19mm or 25mm glass for that depth of water.

 

[1972ford]

Well that sucks is there a way anyone can think of to make this glass work maybe bringing the bottom of the plywood up a foot higher so I could still use this glass? Glass just sucks to buy when I got such a large piece to use even if I need to modify the tank design to make it work

 

[gzeiger]

The key parameter is the water depth to the bottom of the glass. The amount of glass overlapped onto wood support matters too, but that's not reflected in any calculator I've found as far as quantifying it. Either adding support at the bottom (which is effectively depth below the viewing window) or maintaining the water level below the top of the glass are effective solutions to the problem.

Even with a 2" overlap on all sides your safety factor is less than 2. I wouldn't be legal doing anything at work with that margin. Bring the bottom up by a foot and you're into a range I'd be comfortable with, assuming the water level is at or below the top of the glass and the top is overlapped onto a wood support.

Having said all that, the safety margin is in part there to compensate for variations in manufacture. If you're very against buying new glass and have time to spare, you could devise a method to test the glass you have and see if it holds up. Make sure you test it to a higher standard than you intend to actually subject it to, and understand that there is a certain risk of breaking it - but at least you'd know under controlled conditions!

 

[1972ford]

My dream aquarium would be 12' long 4' front to back and 30" tall how much would that glass costs assuming I would only want the front side glass.

I could use 2 pieces of 60"x24" glass starting viewable glass 4" from bottom of aquarium. That would only require 1/2" thick glass. That would leave me with 3" on either side of the tank and 6" middle verticle brace to use to overlap the glass to.

It would fit perfectly on the west wall of my manage where I got nothing else and leave room for the 300 gallon 4'x6' sump I already have.

 

[spiff44]

yeah, just don't fill it higher than what is safe. Then you could either cover off the rest, or use it as a water/air tank.. like for turtles where you can see above the water line so you can see turtles sitting on a log.

 

[gzeiger]

To be clear, the safety margin on the dimensions in the original post could be as little as 1.2, which is in the range where you could break it just by filling above the top of the glass.

I'm very interested in the question above about cost of glass too. I'm looking for a 3-part window, each piece 34x42" and 3/4" thick. Only have one quote so far at almost $1300. Does anybody ship this stuff? I don't know what the going rates are, but that's certainly more than I expected.