Hey everyone!
Not quite sure where this question would belong, so I'm posting it here.
Long story short, I've been looking at a bunch of different plastics, and I'm wondering what problems I might run into (theoretically) if I made an aquarium out of clarified homopolymer polypropylene? From what I've read, it shouldn't leach at all, and, looking at the data for it, it looks like the clarified polypropylene would literally be as clear as glass or acrylic at comparable thicknesses - so there wouldn't be any issues with viewing the tank through it. Additionally it's tensile strength puts it as being stronger than glass (about 1/2 as strong as acrylic). The only thing I've seen that really concerns me about it is the fact that (according to the data I've looked at) the polypropylene would be about twice as flexible as acrylic, which, to my mind, means that it would be twice as likely to bow.
From my admittedly limited knowledge in this field, I understand that that is a major problem for every kind of tank *except* for seamless cylinder tanks (provided you have it on a completely level surface, which you should either way), as the cylinder tanks spread the pressure from the water evenly across the entire tank. (This is probably phrased in such a way as to be technically incorrect, but it should get my point across.)
So, is my thought that a seamless cylinder aquarium of this material should work accurate or not? If not, why not? Also, if I wanted to make a normal (read: rectangular) aquarium with it, what would I need to do (theoretically) to make it work despite the high flexibility?
Thank you!
Not quite sure where this question would belong, so I'm posting it here.
Long story short, I've been looking at a bunch of different plastics, and I'm wondering what problems I might run into (theoretically) if I made an aquarium out of clarified homopolymer polypropylene? From what I've read, it shouldn't leach at all, and, looking at the data for it, it looks like the clarified polypropylene would literally be as clear as glass or acrylic at comparable thicknesses - so there wouldn't be any issues with viewing the tank through it. Additionally it's tensile strength puts it as being stronger than glass (about 1/2 as strong as acrylic). The only thing I've seen that really concerns me about it is the fact that (according to the data I've looked at) the polypropylene would be about twice as flexible as acrylic, which, to my mind, means that it would be twice as likely to bow.
From my admittedly limited knowledge in this field, I understand that that is a major problem for every kind of tank *except* for seamless cylinder tanks (provided you have it on a completely level surface, which you should either way), as the cylinder tanks spread the pressure from the water evenly across the entire tank. (This is probably phrased in such a way as to be technically incorrect, but it should get my point across.)
So, is my thought that a seamless cylinder aquarium of this material should work accurate or not? If not, why not? Also, if I wanted to make a normal (read: rectangular) aquarium with it, what would I need to do (theoretically) to make it work despite the high flexibility?
Thank you!
