Tank disaster, cracked bottom

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Rbishop

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Dec 30, 2005
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The egg crate is a great solution for SW or FW tanks. Even more so with any amount of rock work.
 
Jan 6, 2019
8
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67
This is taking me back a bit so my dead grey matter may exceed the functioning neurons on this one: I think the eggcrate fell out of favor to at least some degree because it created dead pockets within the sandbed. I remember a bunch of folks going to a plastic cutting board material and lined entire tank floors with it. It was silly expensive and tough to find back then. Maybe that’s changed or SW best practice has made it obsolete now. I really don’t know. But with either material the concept was the same; to protect the bottom panel from the use of heavy, jagged stones in aquascaping and maybe some diehard DIYers have found better solutions and materials.
 

Rbishop

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Dec 30, 2005
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The issue was to minimize/eliminate high pressure points from the jagged edges in some cases, especially wit the added height of additional rocks stacked on them. IME, the egg crate was 1/4-3/8" thick...not sure how that would create a dead spot in a true deep sand bed, but who knows.
 
Jan 6, 2019
8
3
3
67
This is taking me back a bit so my dead grey matter may exceed the functioning neurons on this one: I think the eggcrate fell out of favor to at least some degree because it created dead pockets within the sandbed. I remember a bunch of folks going to a plastic cutting board material and lined entire tank floors with it. It was silly expensive and tough to find back then. Maybe that’s changed or SW best practice has made it obsolete now. I really don’t know. But with either material the concept was the same; to protect the bottom panel from the use of heavy, jagged stones in aquascaping and maybe some diehard DIYers have found better solutions and materials.
The issue was to minimize/eliminate high pressure points from the jagged edges in some cases, especially wit the added height of additional rocks stacked on them. IME, the egg crate was 1/4-3/8" thick...not sure how that would create a dead spot in a true deep sand bed, but who knows.
I think it’s 3/8 but if I remember, the issue was the boatload of deadspots all those squares created. If they actually did or not, who knows. I just remember that plastic cutting board material being crazy expensive. Some of the early reef tanks were just heaps of live rock and rockslides weren’t unheard of. There were so many odd issues. Melting center braces under metal halides, rock slides, top-off disasters, and more. Took me 13 years to get back to FW and back to having fun in the hobby.

And my apologies for derailing this thread yet again. But I guess if there’s a moral to be had from all of this long-winded reminiscing is that heavy and jagged stones should be separated from the bottom pane of the tank in some fashion if possible.
 
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