Scratched acrylic help

[reefsupply]

any one know how to take small scratches out of an acrylic tank. I not a big acrylic guy so I am lost on this one, here is a shot of it so you can see what I am talking about. I think it is a loss, was going to use it as a holding tank in the back.

 

[Fly n Reef]

Hi Steve,
Are you talking inside the tank or outside and if inside is it filled?

We just buffed out Mushroomboy's tank when he did his move last weekend and used a small car buffer and buffing compound in two different grades of coarseness. It looks awesome.

Novus makes a product sold at our LFS and TAP plastics store for this purpose but you can also get the made for automobile buffer that works too.

Good luck hope this helps,
Fly

 

[reefsupply]

there i got some shots up. it is stress cracks on the outside of the tank I'll try to buff it and see what happens. Got the tank for nothing

 

[fishermann]

Steven if it is deep buffing well do no good. If you are going to just use this as a holding tank and aren't concerned about a little distortion you need to round the crack out to get rid of the stress factor. You can wet sand it out with say 320 or 400 wet/dry paper from any auto supply house. Then go to say 600, then 1000, then 1500. Then you can buff it out easy. The main thing is to round that deep scratch out to relieve it as a stress point.

 

[Fly n Reef]

If those are stress cracks I don't think you are able to buff those out. That you may want to ask an acrylic guy for any options. Here on RF is iapjohn. He does nice work send him a pm and see what he says.
Good luck.

 

[mojoreef]

Steve why dont you jump over to JOhn at IAP's forum and ask him. if anyone would know it wold be him.


Mike

 

[reefsupply]

Thanks Mike.

 

[iaplarry]

From what I can tell from the pictures it looks like your tank has crazed. In other words it looks like someone used a cleaner or chemical on it that wasnt compatable with the acrylic. Not much you can do about it. Tank should still be fine to hold water but it will never be a show tank. Crazing usually goes pretty deep and sanding them out would be near impossible. We always recommend just warm water never any aromatic spirits or products like windex. HTH.

Larry

 

[fishermann]

sorry I thought you were talking about a single deep scratch, my eyes aren't what they used to be.

 

[reefsupply]

lol Talked to the guys at IAP, it will be a good sump