Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey Chris,
After being here for a while, I've noticed that you seem to know what you're doing when it comes to plastic welding and just plain old plastics.
I have a Sea Clear Acrylic 55 gallon tank for one of my snapping turtles. I want to add an acrylic basking shelf to one side, and want to make it water tight so I can add a custom filter assembly under the shelf.
What would you recommend to seal the acrylic with? Weld-on?
Since the top of the tank is not completely open, getting an exact fit with the new piece of acrylic will be hard.
Should I use silicone?

Thanks in advance...

-----
Coastal Carpet Python 0.1 (Lillith)
Albino Burm 0.1 (Kimba RIP 10/23/04)
Columbian RedTail 0.1 (Squishy)
Kenyan Sand Boa 1.0 (Shai'hulud) MIA
Brown Water Snake 0.1 (Fang)
Common Snapping Turtle 1.1 (Sherman and Tiger)
(RIP Abrahms)
RES 1.0 (speedy)
African Rock Python (Mongo) 0.0.1

Actually there are several posters who are more experienced with solvent welding plastics, I'm probably just the one with the most time to share the info.

>> What would you recommend to seal the acrylic with? Weld-on?
>>Since the top of the tank is not completely open, getting an exact fit with the new piece of acrylic will be hard.
>> Should I use silicone?

The appropriate Weld-On will require a perfect fit between the acrylic shelf and the acrylic sides. That may be very difficult.

I would probably solvent weld strips of acrylic onto the sides of the tank to act as cleats. Then I would cut a shelf that fits as tightly as possible between the sides. This shelf would rest on the cleats. I would solvent weld the shelf to the cleats and to the sides. Silicone only if the seal is not water tight.

I don't remember which Weld-On is used on acrylic. I think it's #3, but I'm not sure. It's on their website.
-----
Current snakes:

1.1 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Silver/Yellow)

2.2 Gonyosoma oxycephala - (Green)

4.3 Gonyosoma janseni - (Black)

New to this forum but, correct me if I'm wrong, you want to take a plexi tank that does not currently leak, add a watertight basking shelf so you can have a pump underneath? If so, how do you access the pump? If part of the shelf were left "loose" so you could lift off, would not be watertight, or were you planning on cutting away part of the tank?
-----
Thanks,

Dave "Rainbows-R-Us"

0.1 Wife
0.2 kids
4.12 Brazilian Rainbow Boa
1.1 Ball python
0.1 BCI "Elvira" normal from 1989
1.0 BCI albino / het-anery
0.1 BCI Hypo / het-albino
0.1 BCI Anery / het-albino
0.1 BCI Hypo (possible super)

lots.lots.lots feeder mice and rats

The pump won't be under the shelf. I will still use my canister, but I want to route the intake and exhaust thru the tank and shelf... I took it out of the drawing.

Chris, thanks for the idea about the shims... I started today with cutting the plexi. And I ordered the Weld-on #5, they said it has a longer cure time so it gives me a little more time to work with it.
-----
Coastal Carpet Python 0.1 (Lillith)
Albino Burm 0.1 (Kimba RIP 10/23/04)
Columbian RedTail 0.1 (Squishy)
Kenyan Sand Boa 1.0 (Shai'hulud) MIA
Brown Water Snake 0.1 (Fang)
Common Snapping Turtle 1.1 (Sherman and Tiger)
(RIP Abrahms)
RES 1.0 (speedy)
African Rock Python (Mongo) 0.0.1