Scratches on Glass

[chongk]

Dear reefers,

Is there any way to repair scratches on the inner glass surface? Preferably something DIY which can be done without needing to temporarily re-house the fishes and inverts?

[chongk]

Any bros or sis have a suggestion?

Very frustated to see the scratches...spoil the overall experience

[Achilles Tang]

Very little you can do actually.

Just numb yourself to the that area.

[onizukaa]

change a new tank , or you can hide it with live rocks covering it

[albinosage]

I read about a brand of household sponge, "Magic Sponge" or something like that. Some member on an american board accidentally found that it removes scratches from acrylic tanks when he was cleaning algae.

It is possible to buff off the scratches on a glass tank with really fine abrasive media like that sponge or jeweler's sandpaper, if they are not too deep. Best to practice on a junk piece of glass to get a feel before proceeding to the tank, if the scratch is near the top half of the tank, you can even lower the water level to buff out the scratch before polishing, if you are afraid of disturbing the livestock.

The main problem is finding a suitable fine abrasive media - removing scratches in a tank is not impossible

[chongk]

Can't afford to change tank ler......both tanks 5ft and built in

Sigh....guess resigned to it then

[albinosage]

Hi all, just want to share the results on my 4ft glass tank I got from using a sponge similar to Magic Eraser for 10 minutes, the product I mentioned in the earlier post:

Before:

After:

The sponge was sold as "Sponge King", bought from a neighbourhood hardware store for $2.50. From what little I can understand from the Japanese words and pictures on the packaging, it is made or developed in Germany, and is recommended for removing scratches from the paint work of cars. Most of the fine scratches were removed, and the deeper ones became less visible. I think it would be gone completely with long term usage.

I did some searching to dig up the following article where I learned about this material, also known as melamine foam:

So what is this "Magic Eraser"? It is a melamine foam scrubber. Sound worried? According to the wiki article, melamine foam is safe for our reefs.

http://blog.fragd.it/2009/03/03/a-magic-to...n-your-acrylic/

[bezz]

The sponge was sold as "Sponge King", bought from a neighbourhood hardware store for $2.50. From what little I can understand from the Japanese words and pictures on the packaging, it is made or developed in Germany, and is recommended for removing scratches from the paint work of cars. Most of the fine scratches were removed, and the deeper ones became less visible. I think it would be gone completely with long term usage.

I think they 'remove' the scratches by grinding off a thin layer of car paint, since the original car paint is coated a few layers, grinding a little off is ok. But over time, the paint gets thinner then the metal body starts to show...

I think same theory for glass. It grinds abit of glass off. For rimless big tanks don't know if this will weaken the glass...

[albinosage]

I think they 'remove' the scratches by grinding off a thin layer of car paint, since the original car paint is coated a few layers, grinding a little off is ok. But over time, the paint gets thinner then the metal body starts to show...

I think same theory for glass. It grinds abit of glass off. For rimless big tanks don't know if this will weaken the glass...

Yup, melamine foam is a very fine abrasive, it works by removing micro layers of the glass to even out the scratch. I think 10 minutes a week of scrubbing won't cause any damage lah, probably will have to scrub for decades or centuries to actually weaken the glass haha.