Does silicone stick/bond to aluminum?

[MoshJosh]

I have seen aluminum used as corner bracing or as the rim of custom aquariums. But does silicone stick to aluminum the same was it sticks to glass?

 

[Fish Fan]

Yes, it will stick very well to aluminum :)

 

[MoshJosh]

Yes, it will stick very well to aluminum :)

I figured, you know having seen it done haha but we see plastic rims on tanks all the time and silicone does not stick to plastic nearly as well as, or at least not in the same way, it sticks to glass. I guess I should have worded my title better, do we know how well it sticks to aluminum compared to glass? Is it the same? I don't think my LFS would be to happy if I started pulling on their aquarium trim just to see how stuck it really was haha. Thank for the reply!

 

[Fish Fan]

I figured, you know having seen it done haha but we see plastic rims on tanks all the time and silicone does not stick to plastic nearly as well as, or at least not in the same way, it sticks to glass. I guess I should have worded my title better, do we know how well it sticks to aluminum compared to glass? Is it the same? I don't think my LFS would be to happy if I started pulling on their aquarium trim just to see how stuck it really was haha. Thank for the reply!

From experience, it sticks very well to aluminum and other metals. I was at one time a technician who would build, configure and repair instruments called interferometers, and we used silicon on aluminum in those builds all the time.

I'm not sure what you're trying to stick, but if it's not touching the water you could consider an epoxy maybe?

 

[MoshJosh]

From experience, it sticks very well to aluminum and other metals. I was at one time a technician who would build, configure and repair instruments called interferometers, and we used silicon on aluminum in those builds all the time.

I'm not sure what you're trying to stick, but if it's not touching the water you could consider an epoxy maybe?

Just wondering/curious how much reinforcement it really offers in the corners or how effective it was at bracing, including top/euro-bracing. I don't really plan on using it, was just curious.

 

[Fish Fan]

I've seen a couple of posts here where people were trying to remove the plastic top and bottom trim on standard tanks in an effort to reseal the tank, and from what I've seen it's an absolute bear to get the plastic trim off. So from that, I'd say it sticks pretty good in that application :)