The 300

I will start with the history of the 300 as I know it.

It was custom built for a Dairy Queen in Orangeville, Ontario Canada. One day just before the store opened the tanks front pane split and sent water spewing everywhere. The tank is built from 5/8 glass and I feel that the tank was originally under built for its dimensions as it had no Euro-bracing. This aside the tank was offered up for a grand total of 0$ to the first person to respond by Aaron at Scenic Aquarium In Guelph, Ontario. As it turns out I was sitting at the computer at the right time and was the lucky Winner.

The tank had a specific date to be removed on so I got 4 friends of mine (all the guys I worked with), one with a truck. We rented a U-haul trailer and headed to Orangeville. I will have to get the receipts but by memory the whole trip cost me somewhere around 90 bucks for gas, food and trailer rental. I know we certainly got some strange looks driving back down the 401 and the QEW with a 300 gallon tank on a service trailer at night. Our theory was that it weighed enough to keep itself in place, and if it did come of.. we weren't stopping to pick up the pieces.

The tank sat in my garage for ages and then sat in my basement for ages as I thought about exactly what I wanted to do with it and saved money to buy the glass to fix it. Every thing came together about a year after I initially received the tank and the old glass was replaced over the period of about a month once work began. First removing the old panels, then cleaning, then I decided it would be easier to work on if it was already on its stand so the stand had to be built. The tank was then moved onto the stand and the new glass added.

The first day checking out our first house and me eyeing up the future fish room location

The stud walls are up for the original configuration of the fish room with a place for the FW tank in the pick on the left and a place for the 90 gallon reef in the wall in the right picture.

Inside the fish room (for those that haven't been here the tanks are designed to be viewed from the hall on the other side of the wall) the  shortly after we moved into the house. The freshwater tank, the tank in the foreground, is a +/- 73 gallon. This tank has been with me since I was 8 and has been in my family for +/- 40 years. The tank leaked when I first found out about it so it was used outside to hold snakes that i caught from my mothers gardens. Somewhere around age 13 my father and I replaced the glass panels and converted it back to a proper fish tank. The tank was originally obtained in Toronto by my father. Since then it has traveled with my family to Nova Scotia, to New Brunswick, to Florida, back to Toronto and is now in St Catharines. The 90 gallon system in in the back from this view point. In the front center is the bane of my existence.... the hot water heater that was always in the way.... but, thankfully, has now been moved.

Me checking out the destruction and wondering what I am getting myself into.

Picture of the sub frame of the stand from within the fish room.

The frame of the stand from the hall/future rec room once a support wall is replaced with an I beam.

The tank with the broken front panel removed. This was lifted "barely" in place by myself, Pawel (Oscar19), his uncle and a friend of his uncle. Didn't take much time to lift, but was almost too much for the 4 of us. The crack in the bottom was patched and I have no real concerns about it as it is supported fully on the underside and the stand was built with only +/- 2mm fall across the run of over 7 feet. If I can find pictures of the patch job I will post them then.

Cleaning the glass in preparation for the new silicone. This took a lot more time than I expected, but I had loads of help from Pawel and his girlfriend Nora.

Application of silicone to go between the old cracked piece and the new laminated piece of glass

When we placed the new piece of glass over the silicone it became quickly evident that we couldn't push down on it hard enough to remove the air bubbles. At first Nora was walking on it and it was helping to push the air bubbles to the side. So we figured that if that was working some one with Pawel's weight would help so he got up and helped too. It was working ok but some of the bubbles still refused to come out.

Against my better Judgement I got up on the patch and started walking on it. That is my wife Amy in the back ground with that "I can't believe he is doing this" look. To my surprise it worked great and the air pockets were popping out like nothing (I weighed somewhere around 320 at the time). I was just about to get down when I noticed one last bubble. I started working it and stupidly put all my weight on one heel...... CRAAAACKKKK .... and some swear words. I got down to asses the damage and lucky it was only the lower pane of the laminated glass that had a small spider-web in it. Just to be safe I place a smaller patch above this area in case the spider-web ever managed to work its way into the second layer of laminated glass. In the next picture you can see the second smaller patch. I should have taken a picture of the spider web, but at the time I was so pissed that I was done for the night right then.

Taping the glass to prep for silicone

Another pic of taping.. very time consuming

A picture of a finished seam after removing the tape. The silicone I used was GE silicone 1 window and door. I found it worked ok but it skinned over fairly quickly leaving very little time to form the beads and remove the tape. On a smaller tank it may be easier as you would be able to work on smaller portions at one time.

Picture with the Front glass in place and "clamped" on for curing

Picture of the tank curing from the back

Picture of the tank curing from the front... exciting stuff :P

Eventually there will be pictures here of the first attempt at filling and the leak we found.

This is the overflow. 4 2.5 inch holes drilled at the top back, centered. I cut egg crate to fit and held it in place by silicone.

This is the external overflow box as it was being put in place. It is made of mirror as a friend of mine was able to get me this cut to size for free.

This is a picture to show the euro bracing from the front.

This is just a pic to show my gheto skimmer set up while i place the overflow box in place and get the sump plumbed. Its amazing.. there always seems to be another use for a milk crate.

More pictures to come as I find the time October 9, 2004