Acrylic or Glass that is the question!
- Thread starter kajung2k
- Start date
You know when I worked at Campbell Soup (a lot of tank owners worked there)
we'd have this debate all the time.
In the end, it boils down to two things.
Personal preference, and money.
With that being said, IMHO, glass wins it out, unless you have a specific reason not to go glass, its almost counter productive not to. I'm not saying that Acrylic is bad, or doesn't possess some clear advantages, no matter how you debate it, how you slice it glass has the cheaper cost benefit ratio.
I've seen a lot of debate over the Internet saying glass is stronger or Acrylic is tougher, and both are fallacies.
Items such as Acrylic or glass posses set physical properties. They also have a set chemical properties as well, but we really don't need to go this deep into it, unless we plan to write a book on it.... (if you're bored read http://pslc.ws/macrog/mech.htm#long)
First lets get the terms right, Strength DOES NOT EQUAL TOUGHNESS! (OR HARDNESS FOR THAT MATTER)
There are many physical properties, but we are most concerned with the following:
#Ductility Being able to bend (normally into a wire) without breaking
#Hardness We'll look @ scratch hardness, though the other types do play a slight role
#Strength - There are different types of Strength.. such as...
* Compressive strength the capacity of a material to withstand axially directed pushing forces.
* Tensile strength is the stress at which a material breaks or permanently deforms.
* Shear strength
*Torsion Strength - The resistance of a bar to twisting. Closely related to its shear strength.
is a term used to describe the strength of a material or component against the type of yield or structural failure
#Toughness is the resistance to fracture of a material when stressed.
#Thermal Properties... (IE Coefficient, Heat Transfer, etc)
There are TONS of other properties (IE Malleability, Tension, etc) but they play less of a role in this. In addition to these desired properties, there are also undesirable properties such as brittleness. Now we all know glass is brittle, but people tend to forget, that acrylic can get brittle over time, or in the right conditions .. under a MH for example. Yet still, Acrylic in FAR less brittle.
Glass has a HIGH tensile strength, in fact glass fibers are stronger than most metals in this sense of the word. This is why its used in boating, and aerospace applications. Glass is also Harder than Acrylic, and thus this is why it doesn't scratch as easily. Acrylic on the other hand has a higher Compressive Yield Strength (MPa), and thus thinner sheet is needed to produce the same size tank as its glass counterpart. This is why most of your 800 gallon + aquariums are Acrylic.
Then there's clarity. I will say this. A Brand new top of the line acrylic tank looks clean as hell. Revisit that tank in 6 months. Acrylic tends to fade, and or yellow over time. Even the best acrylic. While working at Campbell Soup, the front doors to the main building we both glass (from the 60's). One broke, and was replaced with acrylic. Within a year, it was so scratched, it was hard to see through, it looked like a shower privacy panel. LOL. That was all it took for me.
Again, though its all a personal choice.
Acrylic:
Pros: Clearer(over all), lighter, less heat transfer, creative shapes, easier to drill.
Cons: More expensive, less heat transfer. Requires a bulky top/Iframe
Glass
Pros: Cost effective, more scratch resistant, transfers heat out quicker (in summer) more open up top, thus allowing for bigger LR easy of maintenence .
Cons: transfers heat out quicker, Can crack, break, is brittle.
we'd have this debate all the time.
In the end, it boils down to two things.
Personal preference, and money.
With that being said, IMHO, glass wins it out, unless you have a specific reason not to go glass, its almost counter productive not to. I'm not saying that Acrylic is bad, or doesn't possess some clear advantages, no matter how you debate it, how you slice it glass has the cheaper cost benefit ratio.
I've seen a lot of debate over the Internet saying glass is stronger or Acrylic is tougher, and both are fallacies.
Items such as Acrylic or glass posses set physical properties. They also have a set chemical properties as well, but we really don't need to go this deep into it, unless we plan to write a book on it.... (if you're bored read http://pslc.ws/macrog/mech.htm#long)
First lets get the terms right, Strength DOES NOT EQUAL TOUGHNESS! (OR HARDNESS FOR THAT MATTER)
There are many physical properties, but we are most concerned with the following:
#Ductility Being able to bend (normally into a wire) without breaking
#Hardness We'll look @ scratch hardness, though the other types do play a slight role
#Strength - There are different types of Strength.. such as...
* Compressive strength the capacity of a material to withstand axially directed pushing forces.
* Tensile strength is the stress at which a material breaks or permanently deforms.
* Shear strength
*Torsion Strength - The resistance of a bar to twisting. Closely related to its shear strength.
is a term used to describe the strength of a material or component against the type of yield or structural failure
#Toughness is the resistance to fracture of a material when stressed.
#Thermal Properties... (IE Coefficient, Heat Transfer, etc)
There are TONS of other properties (IE Malleability, Tension, etc) but they play less of a role in this. In addition to these desired properties, there are also undesirable properties such as brittleness. Now we all know glass is brittle, but people tend to forget, that acrylic can get brittle over time, or in the right conditions .. under a MH for example. Yet still, Acrylic in FAR less brittle.
Glass has a HIGH tensile strength, in fact glass fibers are stronger than most metals in this sense of the word. This is why its used in boating, and aerospace applications. Glass is also Harder than Acrylic, and thus this is why it doesn't scratch as easily. Acrylic on the other hand has a higher Compressive Yield Strength (MPa), and thus thinner sheet is needed to produce the same size tank as its glass counterpart. This is why most of your 800 gallon + aquariums are Acrylic.
Then there's clarity. I will say this. A Brand new top of the line acrylic tank looks clean as hell. Revisit that tank in 6 months. Acrylic tends to fade, and or yellow over time. Even the best acrylic. While working at Campbell Soup, the front doors to the main building we both glass (from the 60's). One broke, and was replaced with acrylic. Within a year, it was so scratched, it was hard to see through, it looked like a shower privacy panel. LOL. That was all it took for me.
Again, though its all a personal choice.
Acrylic:
Pros: Clearer(over all), lighter, less heat transfer, creative shapes, easier to drill.
Cons: More expensive, less heat transfer. Requires a bulky top/Iframe
Glass
Pros: Cost effective, more scratch resistant, transfers heat out quicker (in summer) more open up top, thus allowing for bigger LR easy of maintenence .
Cons: transfers heat out quicker, Can crack, break, is brittle.
