Thin Acrylic Sheets as waterproofing agent.

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Desdinova

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Oct 1, 2010
119
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Kentucky
I'm nervous about using pretty much every waterproofing agent that I've seen used on this site - from epoxy to liquid rubber.

This idea might be little more expensive, but I suppose that I could line the inside of a tank with thin sheets of cell cast acrylic.

acrylicorder.png

Thus, a 8' x 4' x 2' tank could be made of plywood and the inside lined with acrylic sheets, as above.

Any reason to believe this won't work? I'm a bit worried about the thickness of the acrylic. Liquid rubber is supposed to be waterproof, but only if it's as thick as 60 mil. I just can't find a way to waterproof that I'm comfortable with.

acrylicorder.png
 
There was also the idea to use thin ABS sheet by a member. Not sure how it turned out though. You mights see if you can search for ABS and find it.
 
Someone did this a couple years back with abs sheet and "goop" brand glue. I would use .25" acrylic and weld on #40 and you should b good to go. 1/8" acrylic can crack pretty easily. If you do use that tilt the tank to achieve a 1" seam of glue. I would tilt the tank and throw down some 1" seams with .25" material also . In conclusion what your proposing is not very cost effective when its all said and done. Do you trust liners?

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Sometimes I even think of combining things... like epoxy on plywood and then rubberizeit on top of the epoxy... but then what if the rubberizeit doesn't adhere to the epoxy?

Maybe I should line the tank with rubber seaming tape and then coat it with liquid rubber, :ROFL:
 
In that thread he did not use fiber reinforcement, offcourse its gonna crack then. I did epoxy with fiberglass, worked out pretty great, was a hassle to work with tho. But to do the ultimate, i would go epoxy, then rubber on that aswell. But as far as ive checked out, there is no way back when you go with the rubber. But as an extra security, definetly..

But i dont see how your idea wont work, as long as the ply is slate, and everything sits as it should, i dont see how it could go wrong. I would not glue the sheets to the ply tho, since then you will probably get small areas that dont have glue, and will have some distance to the ply, then cracking. I would go straight on the ply.
 
1/4" glass doesn't have a chance because your plywood will flex more than the glass would resulting in broken glass.... I can't remember who built it, but someone made a 1000gal 8x4x4 out of 1/4 poly sheeting with an aluminum frame. I don't see why your idea would be much different... try it and tell us how it goes ;)

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the poly tank your referring too wheatgerm is johnptc's and he used 1/2" polypropelene not 1/4". I also used 1/2" poly p in my 650 build. John and i both heat welded the plastic seams together with a plastic welder. Very great way to build tanks. You can buy them "stock" like this from many places online made in high density polyethyleyne and polypropolene. There are many different types of heat welders and the more expensive the better. Only downside of plastic welding is the cost of the welder and little information of how to do it. I put an additional epdm liner over my poly p. so the tank is actually sealed twice.
 
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