Acrylic tank attacked by 5 yr old

[SnowManSnow]

so long story short.. my 5 yr old found a Kent GLASS scraper and decided to do what daddy does and scratched up the outside of my acrylic show tank.

I'm prepared to put in the elbow grease... or use whatever power tool I need.

WHat do I need to get these moderate scratches out?

Thanks, :mrgreen:

B

 

[SnowManSnow]

this seems to be the highest reviewed one... any suggestions?

http://www.marinedepot.com/Rainbow_Life ... -2-vi.html

 

[Anonymous]

Oh my God. :shock:

So, daddy does that good a job, eh? :lol:

I had glass tanks when my kids were little. I have no advice for you.

 

[Sea Turtle]

Here you go...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDiq8SUFAN8

 

[Anonymous]

I've removed gouges from an acrylic tank. some people have used power car buffers and Novus, but if you go too quickly or the Novus gets too thin you can easily melt it then you got a mark you can't remove!

What I did, sand paper, water, and a really strong right arm... started with 400 grit, then increase the grit going in opposite directions with each go. Around 2000 grit there was a good haze over the acrylic but water made it transparent again, at which time I broke out the Novus 2 and 3 with a terrycloth, and it's flawless now.... until the next scratch occurred, and makes me want glass

 

[Anonymous]

8O wow...sorry man. I've never had to do that, but the links everyone else posted look good.

 

[Anonymous]

forgot all the above advice and use what the pros use....

Two words Micro Mesh....

http://www.sisweb.com/micromesh/acrylic ... d_kits.htm

maybe not from them though, I just am using the link to show the product

 

[Anonymous]

Micromesh is nothing but really fine grit sandpaper.

 

[Anonymous]

Micromesh is nothing but really fine grit sandpaper.

With MUCH better backing and a higher standard of grit selection. The backing can also be used underwater. trust me, there is a big difference in performance. But hey, your welcome to keep using sandpaper and Novus (which is not reef safe by any means).

 

[Anonymous]

Well I don't use Novus *IN* the tank, and I've used "micromesh" (cotton/cloth backing) but IMO it was overkill for the grit size, I think they had 15000 grit for christ sakes! However swung by Tap's and they had grits all the way up to 2500 I believe, and for my exterior sanding job that did fine with Novus as a touch up.

 

[SnowManSnow]

Micromesh is nothing but really fine grit sandpaper.

With MUCH better backing and a higher standard of grit selection. The backing can also be used underwater. trust me, there is a big difference in performance. But hey, your welcome to keep using sandpaper and Novus (which is not reef safe by any means).

This scratch thing has bothered me since it happend! I bought a kit from marine depot that goes up to 20k paper, but I still can't get the hazing off the surface.

Is it time to redo the entire panel? being the power tool guy I am... should I go with a sander kit from one of these places and totally redo it? That being said I'm scared to death that I'll end up with a sucky front pannel seeing as I have no experiance doing it.

Any suggestions?

ps. IM STILL GLAD I went with acrylic. If I hadent the tank would have been broken by now via the same perp.

B

 

[Anonymous]

Ok how did you do the sanding? Start with a low grit (coarse) sand perpendicular to the scratch until you can't see the original scratch, then go to the next grit and sand perpendicular to that until you can't see the first sanding lines, then repeat over and over. If you got all the way to 20,000 then you should have something that's completely clear unless you sanded in the same direction each time (or worse did in circles).

An easy way to see if you're close is to dip your hand in some freshwater and rub it on the hazy part and if the haze goes away when it's wet then you're REALLY close, get yourself some Novus 2 & 3 and finish up with that.

 

[pyrrhus]

forgot all the above advice and use what the pros use....

Two words Micro Mesh....

http://www.sisweb.com/micromesh/acrylic ... d_kits.htm

maybe not from them though, I just am using the link to show the product

That stuff looks great, and to think I have been busting my hump with the 3m 1-30 micron adhesive backed disks all these years.

 

[Anonymous]

So how did it go?

Just fished through an old thread of mine to show what can be done with standard really fine grit sand paper, went as high as 2500 grit, then finished up with a Novus 3-2 punch

Before- and yes that's a very sizable gouge (beyond scratch)

After

 

[Anonymous]

Nice tank shot Mike.

 

[Anonymous]

Whoa... that scratch looks so deep I thought it was cracked. (I have a trick for fixin' up those cracked acrylic tanks.) Nice work!