Center brace broke this morning on 46gal bowfront!

[DeLegge90]

Woke up this morning and found not only was my fluval 305 canister filter leaking, but the top center brace had failed at the bowfront. I went into panic mode and used my mountain trekking poles to clamp the top of the tank to keep it in it's original shape. After that I applied aquarium safe 2-ton epoxy to where the brace had broken. Then went to home depot and had an aluminum brace made for redundancy. Hoping it will hold for a while until I can make up a euro brace or something more practical... I feel pretty confident in the repair, but at the same time I'm worried cause I'm on day three of my first reef aquarium (still cycling the tank so I do not want to drain it and start from scratch again), so there is still much I have to learn, i just wish I wasn't always learning through trial by fire! Lol. Oh well, it comes with the territory of the hobby. My first three days have been pretty hectic (also realized that the $350 worth of live rock I just purchased is riddled with aptasia/feather dusters, and a friend of mine suggested just giving the live rock a freshwater bath to kill everything and start them from scratch. I said fk that!!)

 

[reacclimating 2 the hobby]

Hmmmmm… sounds like some great live rock to be honest. Feather dusters are harmless, but you can clear up the aptasia with some peppermint shrimp.

Hopefully the repair holds up... if not you could get a 40 breeder and transfer everything without losing much time spent.

 

[erdrick80]

I also have 46 bow. Now this is very concerning to me...thinking that these braces fail easy in these tanks. So it's a matter of time till it happens to mine. At least I have a deep blue 80gal tank as back up.

But, like you said "f" that starting over. lol time to go to home Depot.

As for aptasia.. I took it out,dumped lime juice and fresh water dipped it. Lucky for me it was a small live rock.

 

[BestMomEver]

Is the tank brand new or did you get it used? Seems appropriate to contact the manufacturer if it’s new. I’m sorry you’re going through this.

 

[DeLegge90]

It's been almost a week now since the repair, and everything is still holding. Looks like some epoxy on the old brace and also adding the custom made aluminum brace did the job. Keeping an eye on the old brace where I repaired it with epoxy, cause that will certainly be the first thing to fail.

 

[jsvand5]

I’m assuming this is a used tank? I think the problem that plastic in the trim is probably old and has become brittle. If it were me I’d be looking for a replacement.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Woke up this morning and found not only was my fluval 305 canister filter leaking, but the top center brace had failed at the bowfront. I went into panic mode and used my mountain trekking poles to clamp the top of the tank to keep it in it's original shape. After that I applied aquarium safe 2-ton epoxy to where the brace had broken. Then went to home depot and had an aluminum brace made for redundancy. Hoping it will hold for a while until I can make up a euro brace or something more practical... I feel pretty confident in the repair, but at the same time I'm worried cause I'm on day three of my first reef aquarium (still cycling the tank so I do not want to drain it and start from scratch again), so there is still much I have to learn, i just wish I wasn't always learning through trial by fire! Lol. Oh well, it comes with the territory of the hobby. My first three days have been pretty hectic (also realized that the $350 worth of live rock I just purchased is riddled with aptasia/feather dusters, and a friend of mine suggested just giving the live rock a freshwater bath to kill everything and start them from scratch. I said fk that!!)

I have exact tank, I removed mine no issues. Tested outside for 8mo. No issues. Comrade

 

[DeLegge90]

I’m assuming this is a used tank? I think the problem that plastic in the trim is probably old and has become brittle. If it were me I’d be looking for a replacement.

A little more info: I purchased the tank used, and the brace was already broken when I got it (not a manufacturer defect or anybody elses fault but my own for botching my first repair job and purchasing the tank in the first place, lol). I used a different epoxy on the first repair but it didnt hold (my guess is when I first applied it, I didnt roughen up the surfaces enough for the epoxy to hold onto, and although it held when water testing the tank for 48hrs, it gave way after a few days). After it failed, which was last Tuesday, I removed all the old epoxy with a new box cutter blade, and then repeated the same repair, only this time I used a much stronger epoxy, and roughed up the edges/surface on both the brace and frame to give the epoxy a better hold. Then to reinforce the original brace, I added on the aluminum brace which helps lessen the load, so neither is taking the full pressure/force now. Seems to be in good shape, just a little ghetto looking, lol.