Lovergasoline
Community Member
I need some input for those who've been here before. The plastic frame's cross brace on my 37 gallon (tall) tank has broken. The tank is a used one and I just purchased it ... it was intact but I moved it a couple inches foolishly grabbing it by the brace and the brace snapped in half. The gap between the two sides of the brace is almost 1/4" (actual gap is 7/32").
Any suggestions on how to perform a repair? I was thinking some material (plastic? Plexiglass?) to span across the gap sister to the brace (maybe 4"+/-), drilled with a couple holes on each side of the break and attached with stainless steel bolts? I'd like to keep a low profile to the repair as I need to place my Above Tank Basking Area (ATBA) for my turtle, which is a plexiglass box the same footprint as the tank and it fits into the tank's top plastic frame.
Presently I have a clamp squeezing the tank's sides together slightly to relieve the outward pressure on the glass.
This is distressing as the previous tank I had (catastrophic leak a few weeks ago) was about a decade old,was also acquired used, but whoever owned it previously had completely cut off the cross brace. I noticed the tank would bulge a little bit (always had it filled to the absolute brim. On that one I'd siliconed a piece of glass across the tank - installed at an angle - as a ramp for the turtle to climb to his basking area and also to help brace the tank ... however the silicone would eventually fail and pull away from the glass due to the forces involved.
Below: Broken frame crossbrace
Below: 7/32" gap in crossbrace when tank is full
Below: bar clamp as temporary bracing
Any suggestions on how to perform a repair? I was thinking some material (plastic? Plexiglass?) to span across the gap sister to the brace (maybe 4"+/-), drilled with a couple holes on each side of the break and attached with stainless steel bolts? I'd like to keep a low profile to the repair as I need to place my Above Tank Basking Area (ATBA) for my turtle, which is a plexiglass box the same footprint as the tank and it fits into the tank's top plastic frame.
Presently I have a clamp squeezing the tank's sides together slightly to relieve the outward pressure on the glass.
This is distressing as the previous tank I had (catastrophic leak a few weeks ago) was about a decade old,was also acquired used, but whoever owned it previously had completely cut off the cross brace. I noticed the tank would bulge a little bit (always had it filled to the absolute brim. On that one I'd siliconed a piece of glass across the tank - installed at an angle - as a ramp for the turtle to climb to his basking area and also to help brace the tank ... however the silicone would eventually fail and pull away from the glass due to the forces involved.
Below: Broken frame crossbrace
Below: 7/32" gap in crossbrace when tank is full
Below: bar clamp as temporary bracing
