Glass Or Plastic ?

[daz1968]

hi folks im thinking of getting a bigger tank currently have a juwel vision 260,fancy a juwel vision 450 my lfs has some nice big tanks but are plastic rather than glass like the jewel,same kind of volume 400l+ seem quite a bit cheaper than the jewels, whats the differnence between glass and plastic please ! oh by the way mainly for plecos

 

[ellena]

I think plastic almost unavoidably gets scratched and looks rubbish

 

[karin]

I've been looking at the same issue. Here is what I've found.

Acrylic is much lighter in weight and this seems to be one of the biggest benefits.. It will scratch but 1) you can supposedly buff out scratches and 2) some scratches will disappear once tank is full of water. It will not shatter. Also it does not alter the color or size of fish the way glass does. Glass apparantly always adds a bit of green to colors and the defraction does effect what we perceive as true size. It is more expensive. Older acyrlic tanks can yellow over time. Apparently new ones do not.

Glass tanks are cheaper, Harder to scratch but if you do, you have a scratch forever.

I have googled acrylic vs. glass and found some good articles. I, myself, would consider on if it was in really good shape.

 

[forby3]

"Glass tanks are cheaper, Harder to scratch but if you do, you have a scratch forever."
sorry but this is not correct as there is a few ways of getting scratches out of glass such as
Jewelers rouge which will help elimante small scratches out of the glass slightly expensive but will help you do the job there is a few other things that may help just google it