# diy glass top



## coldmantis

I joined this forum more than a year ago, and since then I have gained a lot of knowledge about fish keeping and everything related. So I decided to give something back to the community, here my a little guide on how I make a diy glass top, please enjoy and ask any questions you may have.

What you need

2 pieces of glass
Alcohol
Cloth
Scissors
Silicone
Some sort of card
Sharp Blade/Razor Blade








First you need to measure your tank, measure the Length of you inner trim and substrate 1/4 total from each size, and leave around 1.5" in the back for HOB filters. Leave like 2" if your tank is 10g or above and if using a canister filter you can just leave like 1". After you find your width substrate 1/2" for the silicone hinge. Go and get some glass either from a glass/window store or have a friend who's father makes windows. If your getting a big piece of glass go to home depot and get a glass cutter and while your there get a glass lubricant or use vegetable oil like me to lube the blade. It's the red one I think it cost less then $5

Start by using a flat surface, I just use my floor with some canadian tire flyers, I use canadian tire flyers because it motivates me to diy lol. Cut 3 pieces of tape (best kind of tape is the kind that isn't too sticky) cut 1 for the length and 2 for the width, align the 2 pieces of glass so there is about 1/2" gap between them and put 2 pieces of tape under the 2 sides of the width.








Get your Alcohol out and put some on a cloth dap the sticky size of the tape with it, I do this so that the Silicone doesn't stick on the tape too much when you peel the tape off








Now start blobbing silicone on the gap in the middle and the sides of the glass.








After that is done use a card like a metro pass and start smoothing it out, try to do it in one shot to make it look smoother.

















After that is done let it cure for 24 hours, after 24 hours remove the tape carefully!!! and slowly don't do what I did and rush it, or chunks of silicone will come off!!








No worries if that happens you can just patch up the holes with the same method in the first step to apply the silicone. After everything cured use your blade to shave off the edges to make it look clean and scrape off any silicone that got on the glass where it shouldn't be. next step is to put some kind of handle with some good double sided sticky tape, I just use some plastic thing that had double side sticky tape on it already.


























there you go a glass top.
cost
everything I had lying around
GE Silicone I clear I think 2-3 dollars at Home depot this is a small tube I bought not the big sausage one.
One last tip if you want to make it more professional looking use black silicone instead.


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## Dabigmandan

That's a pretty neat idea. Thanks for sharing.


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## mantiz

I know this is an old thread but how long did the silicone hinge hold up with use. I am thinking of doing this with my 48x18 tank.


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## Darkblade48

Wow, a zombie thread brought back to life... 

One thing I would be worried about is trying to adhere new silicone to already cured silicone, as it does not work....

Rather than using silicone, there should also be some plastic sliding tracks that can give you a folding motion as well, I believe.

You can also obviously use them for a sliding function; just make sure that the two pieces of glass overlap (I can take a picture of mine later if it helps).


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## mantiz

Thanks for the ideas Darkblade. I would love to see the pics... I think the sliding top would be the easiest to make but I really want the hinged top. I will have to check home depot to see what they have. Maybe some kind of flexable plastic that can be siliconed in place. I will get the glass cut for me and see what the glass place thinks.


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## J_T

mantiz said:


> Thanks for the ideas Darkblade. I would love to see the pics... I think the sliding top would be the easiest to make but I really want the hinged top. I will have to check home depot to see what they have. Maybe some kind of flexable plastic that can be siliconed in place. I will get the glass cut for me and see what the glass place thinks.


Plastic world. They may have flexible tracks. I will look next tme I am there.

Posted with my Xperia, using Tapatalk 2


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## mantiz

I was just thinking that maybe a strip of rubber could be siliconed to the glass panels in place of a plastic hinge. Hmmm... Thoughts?


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## J_T

Silicone, and plastic don't normally last too long.

Posted with my Xperia, using Tapatalk 2


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## chinamon

neat... however, i was thinking about making my own for my last 10gal but when i found out that a professionally made one only cost about $16.... well.... i'd rather buy one. lol


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## mantiz

I agree about the 10g. I have a 48x18 without the center brace and It's impossible to find one that fits. Need to source the glass panels and assemble it myself. Oh well, DIY's are fun! 

Will post a pic when it's done. Hopefully in the next week.


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## Fishfur

Just a suggestion, but what about automotive fibreglass cloth, impregnated with silicone instead of body compound or fibreglass resins ? It's pretty tough, and the silicone would encase any fragments of glass that were loose. Should hold up for some time.. and be relatively easy to scrape off and replace should it wear out later on. The fabric is quite tough, flexible, and is coarse enough that 'pushing' silicone into it should not be too difficult to do.


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## mantiz

Did a little reading on the tube of aquarium silicone and it says it will bond to metal as well as glass so I decided to try piano hinge. So I got my glass cut today and made a trip to Home depot. If it works i will try to post a pic or two on here. This isn't exactly a cheap DIY... If this works it will be about $75.

Now just to wait for the silicone to set!


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## mantiz

OK, Here are the pics of the construction and plans i used.

Here is the plan I gave to the glass cutter.
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B0OTh8zKB00pajFKUE9MY0I5VU0









Here is the glass cleaned with alcohol, with hinge siliconed and masked off for easy cleanup. I then put down cling wrap over it and pressed it down over night with a couple spare pieces of glass and some weights.
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B0OTh8zKB00pMDVrZ2hSQl9wcUU









Here is the completed unit after the mask is removed and trimmed with a razor blade.
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B0OTh8zKB00pSXVCNTNuc2UtZ0k









Here it is complete and installed. I think i am happy. What does everyone think?
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B0OTh8zKB00pOTVGdURJSkN0OXM









I will be sure to post if it falls apart on me.


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## Riceburner

Very nice. Should hold up for a long while. You probably didn't even need the hinge.


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## Darkblade48

Sorry for the late response.

For the plastic hinging, this is what I have. I think this has to be purchased from aquarium stores, so it will be inherently expensive.





Instead of this, I used sliding track that can be found at the hardware store.





Essentially, what happens is that you can have one piece of glass that is fixed on the bottom track, and then a second piece of glass that just slides on the top.


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## matti2uude

I have one that uses a different sliding track. The track is the shape of a capital E and both pieces of glass can slide in the grooves. For larger tanks there's another track that looks like back to back E and it works in the center. I'll try to get some pics.


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## Riceburner

I had that on my old 90...


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