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Everything DIY build

little bit of an update, got the tank build on the go. I stripped down my original tank to make it 9cm shorter, it took ages to clean off all the old silicone from the glass. getting the worst of it off was no trouble it was the traces of silicone left behind that sucked up the hours.

anyway, the latest on the tank building is in it's own thread, originally started nearly a decade ago, check it out here: DIY Optiwhite tank build
 
little bit of an update, got the tank build on the go. I stripped down my original tank to make it 9cm shorter, it took ages to clean off all the old silicone from the glass. getting the worst of it off was no trouble it was the traces of silicone left behind that sucked up the hours.

anyway, the latest on the tank building is in it's own thread, originally started nearly a decade ago, check it out here: DIY Optiwhite tank build
That looks like an impressive way to build a tank - I could have done with one of those.
 
The second pane is in

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got another update on the tank build aspect, on its own thread. made a mistake... go check it out if you want to see where I went wrong
 
Last pane and it’s starting to take shape now. Pleased with the dimensions, looks just as I hoped.

When looked front on it appears to have a good depth from front to back and gives an appearance of being relatively shallow.

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Slow progress as promised. Nearly done this tank though. One more side to seal and clean the edges up.

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The tank is all complete and sealed up, but I’m not happy with the finish on the front panel. It could be better. It is sound and tidy but looking up close there are some tiny bubbles in the silicone. I don’t really want to compromise on the finish of this tank so I’m going to pull the front pane out, clean off all the silicone and redo it.
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That's dedication/perfection, when it's a real pain to re-do, but you'll never be able to avoid that little "niggle" unless you do ! Been there myself. Progress looking good so far though.

thanks, you're right. it would have got on my nerves and I could have done better. now is the time to sort these things so just got to get on with it and strip it out and redo. I'm aiming for a really high level of build quality here, so making do isn't really going to cut it.
 
After much cleaning of silicone with razor blades and pins to get every last scrap off, got silicone back on it 99.9% bubble free. Was worth redoing.

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Got back to the workshop today, one of the things I’ve been trying but failing with is making clean slots in the tubing for the outflow pipe. Drilling just didn’t work, angle grinder did the job but it was messy. What i have found to work is this, I managed to make some clamps for the tube and bodge some fittings to hold a 0.8mm angle grinder slitting disc in my mill.

It’s worked out quite well, the disc doesn’t spin that fast so it shouldn’t discolour the metal. Most importantly it does clean and straight cuts. This is just a test on a bit of old tube. When I do the proper one I’ll measure the cuts to get equally spaced slots.

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A little more done today. Each of those slots took aaaaages, if I went too fast the disc would wear down and the slots wouldn’t be even. So had to go real slow. Like 25mins per cut slow. It worked though. All the slots are exactly the same.

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Slots now cut, 6 in total about 2/3 of the way round the tube, which is plenty.

After a bit of maths and measuring and with some bends, I now have a pair of 316 stainless inflow and out flow pipes.

Still need to do bends at the other end of the tubes where they enter the stand, trim the outflow down and polish them on the mop.

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Slots now cut, 6 in total about 2/3 of the way round the tube, which is plenty.

After a bit of maths and measuring and with some bends, I now have a pair of 316 stainless inflow and out flow pipes.

Still need to do bends at the other end of the tubes where they enter the stand, trim the outflow down and polish them on the mop.

View attachment 164237

They look great!

Standard pipe bender or did you make a form?
Amazed there’s no “flattening” on the tube although it’s quite a large radius I suppose!


What are you intentions of capping off the inlet?


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They look great!

Standard pipe bender or did you make a form?
Amazed there’s no “flattening” on the tube although it’s quite a large radius I suppose!


What are you intentions of capping off the inlet?


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thanks, used a specific ridgid half inch stainless tube bender for this. off the top of my head the radius is 3cm. you need the correct tools to bend this stuff with no kinks, it is very hard tubing and only gets harder the more you work it. you may get away with a cheaper bender but I'm quite a fan of using the right tool for the job these days.

I have a plan for the cap, I was going to tig weld it up, then had ideas about making a silicone bung or compression plug of some kind so it could be cleaned or unplugged if needed.

the cap will be one of the next things. it will incorporate another two bits of hardware that will reduce clutter in the tank.
 
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That sounds interesting,

Not sure if it’d work with you incorporating other things into it, but turning out a cap to freeze fit tolerance is what I’d do, if you have access to a lathe.

Although having re-read your intentions, an interference fit wouldn’t really allow for cleaning!



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