Advice On Resealing Tank

Hello everyone!

I have a glass aquarium that is 9 years old and I want to know if it needs resealing. The tank is 60 gallons and is currently empty. The sillicone has started to let go a little bit in some of the corners but the air gap only reaches about 20% of the way across the width of the sillicone. I can get a bit of my finger underneath it, however it is extremely difficult to peel off. Should I reseal it or should I wait a couple of years? Also the glass is a bit dirty with algae etc. so I would like some advice on how to clean that as well.

Thanks in advance!

 

Howdy!

For most DIY tanks the resealing date is about ten years, but there is no reason not to do it sooner. The easiest way to get the silicone off is to use a razor blade, they are relatively cheap at lows or home depot or at any home improvement store. The King of DIY does some great videos on how to go about this, I suggest looking him up on youtube.

For cleaning the glass you could try Bar Tenders Friend, which can be found at most stores where they would sell other cleaning products and house wears.It is also easily ordered off of Amazon.

For resealing, use GE silicone one as it is pure silicone and does not contain any fungicides.

Hope some of this helped, I really do suggest looking up The King of DIY as he has many helpful tips! The king of DIY

 

Thank you for your help. I will try using Bartenders Friend for cleaning the glass. I've been comparing the sillicone on this tank to the sillicone on my other tanks and this tank looks very different. There is a lot of sealant and it almost looks like tubes. Its texture is slightly different as well. Is there any possibility that rubber has been used as sealant for this tank?

 

Huh, I'm not sure, I haven't heard of rubber being used as a sealant, is it the same clear/milky white as a normal tank? Where did you get the tank? If it's from a normal pet store it's probably just old silicone, but if you bought it used, who knows what they could have used.

Any chance of a picture of the silicone?

 

The silicone is black and the manufacturer has used a lot of it. It is from a company called aquael. I don't want to risk getting a leak so I have bought aquarium safe sillicone and I will be resealing it. I checked out the king of DIY and he had great tutorials.

Thanks for all the help!

 

I took a look at Aquael's site and it looks like they use a special black silicone that "is non toxic to fish and dirt resistant". That was about all I could find on it, but I wish you the best of luck, and let me know how easy the black silicone came off!
I'm glad you had luck with the king of DIY, he's pretty great!

Glad I could help!