Anybody shoot panaramics?

[gregr]

They call it 800 gallons actually. It is acryllic and it's pretty thick. I'd prefer starphire but then, I'd also prefer not to have to pay for it
I'll ask the exact dimensions next time I'm in the store. As for the sand- that is part of the stand you're seeing. It was designed to hide that part of the tank. I'd estimate the sand bed to be about 4" deep.

[Ninong]

I don't like acrylic either; I much prefer Starphire. And now that the 3/4" Starphire is back in production, you can build a really large tank with Starphire without having to laminate it. For example, Wayne Shang's 718-gal tank was built using 3/4" Starphire but that was back before PPG halted production of the 3/4" thickness. Wayne's tank is 96"L x 48"W x 36"H. It has 4" wide perimeter bracing plus a single 8" wide center cross brace. Kevinpo was considering having an 810-gal tank built with 3/4" Starphire: 130"L x 48"W x 30"H. It would have had NO cross braces at all, just 5" perimeter bracing. The 3/4" Starphire lites are usually 130" x 108".

There is a thread on Reef Central of a beautiful, large tank in some guy's basement. The thread has been going for five years now. The tank was already seven years old when he opened the thread. That tank was build with a 120"L x 36"H x 3/4" thick Starphire front pane. It's built into the wall, so you don't see that the side panes are just regular float glass. I believe it's 45"W, which would make it what we would call an 841-gal tank. He calls it an 800-gal tank. He says that he had a hard time finding a flawless piece of 3/4" Starphire that was 120"L x 36"H twelve years ago. Most of the panes he was offered had one or more flaws. He finally located a flawless piece and paid to have it shipped "across the continent." Nowhere in his thread does this guy identify which continent he's speaking about but if you read through the entire thread, which I have done, it's obvious that he is not an American. His tank has 5" perimeter bracing and lots of cross bracing. One of the clues that he is probably not an American came on the very first page of the thread when he said that he "paid to have it shipped across the continent." An American would have said that he paid to have it shipped across the country.

Once you get past about 750 gallons, you might as well consider yourself to be a full-time caretaker. You can't go anywhere for any length of time without having someone to look after your tank on a daily basis. My doctor has been planning to build a 2,000-gal tank for the past three or four years now. It's part of his plans for his next new home. He put his new home plans on hold. His present home is really a "new" home. It was built around 2001 or 2002. It's only a few lots over from my sister's house. He has a 210-gal reef tank in that house and a brand-new 210-gal reef tank that is built into the wall in the lobby of his new office building. That tank was just started a few months ago. The guy who set it up for him rushed things and it had to be started over. In other words, he lost almost all of the fish. It looks a lot better now. The aquascaping in particular is much, much better. My doctor doesn't have time to do things like this for himself. He works full-time as an internist and part-time as chief of staff for the local hospital. And, he has five sons! He's only 39, so he has lots of energy. He even did his own landscaping after moving into his house back in 2002.

I don't understand how he will be able to take care of a 2,000-gal tank! I think he had to scale it back because he wants to use Starphire and he found out that you can't go that big with Starphire unless you want to do triple laminated 12mm or double laminated 19mm. My 120-gal tank had 12mm Starphire on three sides with a 19mm regular float glass bottom. The back was 12mm float glass with two different 3/16" colored panes laminated on top of it -- black and smoke. It was almost 1" thick. Even with the smoke on top of the black, the black was still too much of a mirror. Just plain old black paint on the back of the glass would have been better. Or maybe a removable black acrylic sheet behind the glass?

Once you get past about 500-750 gallons, you sort of have a second job taking care of the tank. And you would need a good-sized room to house all of the equipment.

[gregr]

"Once you get past about 500-750 gallons, you sort of have a second job taking care of the tank. And you would need a good-sized room to house all of the equipment."

Ah what I would give to have those problems When I win lotto I will get a 2000 gallon tank and a full time staff to take care of it. And I will stock it from the reef that is just outside the door... yeah...
Doh- reality check.
I know what you mean though about a huge tank requiring a whole lot of attention. The tank in that panaramic is in a store and the owner has some excellent employees that take very good care of it. I just don't see how someone with a regular job, let alone 5 kids, could give the amount of attention it needs.
My current tank is 150g starphire- everything before this was acryllic and I couldn't be happier with what I got this time. The tank is one year old and there are no scratchs.
I'll go read that thread but it will only make me jealous

[zhenya]

Ah what I would give to have those problems When I win lotto I will get a 2000 gallon tank and a full time staff to take care of it. And I will stock it from the reef that is just outside the door... yeah...
Doh- reality check.

Hah, after a day I had today I am ready for a 0.5g nano... :eek3:
Snow day...bored outta my skull.