Hiya Paul

[Acrylics]

Just wanted to pop on by and say howdy. Hope you are doing well and good luck with your business venture

James

 

[NY Acrylics]

Hey James!!!

Thanks for commenting I really appreciate it. But I'm actually slowing it down, going to get rid of the forum when its over in Nov. Its more a hobby, don't have the will to try to even run it as a part time business.

BTW, I should have my new tank done tomorrow, I'll show you pics. 1" acrylic is much harder to work with then I thought. I'm having so many issues machining it, especially the pieces that are longer than 2 feet. Its so hard to keep it constantly pressed up against the fence. I feel lucky if I can get one side that feels uniformly flat, many times I can feel bumps over some inches (like large speed bumbs).

For everyone's info, James is the owner/operator of envision acrylics. Basically if I ever have a question this is the guy I would ask. He does beautiful work and if anyone ever needs a hi-end professional tank done he's your man.

 

[Acrylics]

IME, most of the issues you are experiencing can be attributed to the router table setup. If the table surface is not highly polished & waxed, will make controlled movement of pcs problematic, smaller cutter diameters get "grabbier", and so on. There are also little differences in how you angle your fence as weight/force can be leveraged by changing the fence angle. There are alot of little things that can add up and too much to try and teach in an online thread as I'm fairly certain you understand. If you ever find yourself in my neck o' the woods, I could show you a coupla things that might help make a difference.
If'n ya want, send pic(s) of your router table and I'll see what I can suggest. I'f love to see pics of the new tank as well

Are you still going to be doing this for others? Just not as much or ? I like to know people in various regions that I can refer folks to. Shipping a 100gal sump (or similar) gets cost prohibitive from here and I'm not inclined to move as I simply like the area I live in too much.

I hope you are going to keep it at least as a hobby though, nice to see people's skills progress. As always, if ya need anything, you know I'll help where I can.

BTW thanks for the kind words

James

 

[kimoyo]

Hey James,

I've spoken to you via pm since this but I wanted to update the thread. My forum is about to end (actually already ended )but I figured I would get in this last post. Here's the 1" I got done.


(click to enlarge)





Still a tiny bit (not much) of bowing which was disappointing but a learning experience. I had the bottom acrylic piece cut too short (not enough gluing room) so I got some bubbles drawing in on the bottom front and back seams, nothing to worry about but again upsetting. The vertical seams came out very nice, probably some of the best work I've done. I'll have a build thread up soon.

I'm no longer a vendor on here but if I ever got the chance to come out your way it would be a lot of fun to learn from you for a few days if its okay. Next year I might be able to swing it if we can work it out.

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

Hey paul when you say a little bit of bowing, do you mean after water or before? If after water, what's the height of water you are putting in? It's a great experience to chat with someone experimenting the same stuffs. I have some bowing with 1" acrylics when the heights gets to 36". Not sure if that will happen if it's 30".

 

[kimoyo]

Hey Wingo,

Remember this is braceless, so the farther from the bottom piece the less strength there is. The portion that bows slightly is 33" long by 18.5" tall (front and back). Its very close to the top and almost directly in the middle. I can correct by pushing on it a little, its very slight.