sNEIRBO Posted June 12, 2005 Author Share Posted June 12, 2005 I know there are advantages to glass versus plexi - but I've never heard of a plexi tank "popping". Maybe we should start making plexi replacement tanks for Nano Cubes . . . Link to comment
steelhealr Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 sNEIRBO....you should. Look at the advantages to this tank as far as visual appeal and 'total contained system'. Considering that you are an engineer, you should design a tank with all the mods and more structurally secure without having to modify their product: --unbreakable glass --adequate circulation --lighting to support SPS corals with heat compensation --fuge light and back fuge design --in-tank skimmer You should go for it. BTW, if you don't think that I, like others here, am concerned now....I am. My tank is in one of our front empty rooms with wood floors, basement is underneath. If it cracks, it won't be as destructive to the house as yours was. Despite the warranty, I would still pursue it. SH Link to comment
Nickeleye Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 I'm sure you're referring to acrylic. In any case, one of the things that makes the NC able to hit certain price points is because they use glass instead of acrylic. I'm sure you've seen the prices for acrylic tanks. Not cheap. I agree though... an acrylic NC would be nice although some people would probably then have even more problems in the way of temperature control. Acrylic tanks have advantages of glass as well, but the trade-offs are up to each person's tastes. Link to comment
Sparkling_Surfer Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 sNEIBRO... So sorry to hear about your loss--but it is a great thing that you didn't have any fish and/or coral in your tank! I too didn't find out about the whole cracking issue until after I bought my tank-- even after doing many hours of research on these tanks! It's funny how that fact passed by unnoticed...??? I'm worried about my tank now, especially since I have to move it back and forth to college 2 times a year. I hope & pray that it will be fine!!!!! I have a lot of time, money, and love invested in that cube... Link to comment
shao-lin nano Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 I've had to replace my 24g nano cube twice. Both times the top back corner of the first chamber had a crack in it. Not large though and it happened while i was testing w/ just tap water. When I took it back they gave me a hard time at JBJ. There was an obvious crack and by running your finger nail accross it you could feel the crack and one of the workers kept trying to convince me there wasnt anything wrong with it and it wasnt a crack...what and ASS! Then what would be the big deal for exchanging my tank if there was nothing wrong with it! Finally they did get me my replacements. Horrible customer service. Link to comment
bobioden Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 Originally posted by oogie Anyways, anyone seen or heard NC6 cracking? I think there are 3 so far in the contest with cracked NC6's. I was going to swithed to the NC24, but after hearing all the problems I am going to re- think that decision. Bob Link to comment
lavalars Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 Ummm, this whole thread is making me freak out. My 12DX is at work in my nice new office. How many 12DX's have broken? Anyone know? Link to comment
ccjung Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 my 0.02 on the cracking cubes- These cubes are mad of 3 pieces of glass. The Front, which is a big U, the bottom and the back wall. This glass structure is under a lot of stress from the beginning. Container vessel shipping from China to the United States, theres a fair amount of rough handling. Once they get to JBJ, they are usually trucked in Pallets (4x4 units high) to their distribution centers around the country. From their, its either frieght again, or good ole UPS/Fedex. Theres so many hands that touch these aquariums, that the possibility for breakage is out there. Bear in mind tho, that JBJ goes through about 10-15k units a month, so statistically, the occurance of a cracking tank is still small. With respect to the nc6 cracking lately. I posted about what i feel was a "quality of service" event at my local Fedex Station. That day, i had 3 damaged cubes (all shipped the same day) 2 -6g 1 -24g. Those customers have already gotten replacements/and or have made arrangements to. I think that there was some sort of incident/anomalie at my local station, and as a result, the packages got hit really hard. As for the 6g in Santa Barbara, I'm not sure what happened, but hopefully your LFS will take care of you. As far as the acrylic tank, Ive been talking for some time to some manufacturers who may be able to help me manufacture an acrylic cube to the NC's specs. I have some issues to discuss with JBJ, but just as NASCARs are just "bodys in white" i envision these acrylic cubes to be for the most discerning cube owners, who seek the performance and safety of acrylic. my 0.02 Chris Link to comment
tMoney Posted June 12, 2005 Share Posted June 12, 2005 Does that mean, Chris, that you could sign me up for an acylic cube? LOL Link to comment
sNEIRBO Posted June 12, 2005 Author Share Posted June 12, 2005 Chris - You've probably got the most experience of anyone on this forum with the Nano Cubes - what are your thoughts for failure mode? Are you saying all of the shipping is causing problems? I could see that being a problem if my tank sprung a leak on day 1, or was cracked when I unpacked it. But this happened 27 days after I set it up. I was not shocked to see that the shard of glass that was expelled from my tank contained part of the curve from the front right corner. While my LFS has the tank, I found the shard while cleaning up last night. I worked in the Injection Molding Industry for a few years designing heated injection nozzles for molds (sprue bushings for the techies). I know first hand that bends / turns like those in the corners of the Cubes are serious problems for plastic. I don't know for sure how JBJ's overseas supplier manufactures the glass, but I'd guess at blow molding (like milk jugs are made). If plastic has a hard time with curves / bends I would think glass would have even more problems based on its density and structure. As I said further up, there is a noticeable difference between this DX tank and the other tank - the optics are completely different when viewing from the front. The DX tank appears to fan out from front to back when viewed from the front. The other tank didn't do that. That would suggest to me that they redesigned the geometry of the corners to reinforce them. Link to comment
patio Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 ccjung i kinda agree with you, if it is passed around alot then something bad wil happen! but here is my 2 cents! they are cracking because jbj didnt use thicker glass on the 24 they used the same glass as the 12 and 6. the the glass has to be stronger than the presure (?SPELL?). Link to comment
nanocustoms.com Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 Steve- I think that there are several failure modes possible: 1. Thermal expansion (as you mentioned) 2. Improper temperature/cooling times. 3. Shipping damage/stress 4. Design Flaws Im not sure what model you have, but in the very early releases of the 24g (2004) model, there were quite a few spontaneous tank crackings. Most early model failures were characterized by larger shardlike pieces such as your failure. If you happen to be able to trace the lineage of your tank, its very possible you got one of those units. The most common type of cracking occurs near the bow, but in a small crack that continues to grow. I think the nature of glass, remember its amorphous (a liquid solid), so if the curved area is not sufficiently thick/layered, or if imperfections exist in the glass, thermal expansion and static pressure can cause the parts to fail. If you really want to get nerdy, heres my other thoughts.. Since glass is an amorphous solid, its consistently sinking (via gravity) based on its temperature. When your tank temp is cool and the outside temp is warm, you create varying amounts of shear force along the body of the solid. With the glass shifting slowest on the glass side, and more on the hot side (greater viscosity). if your tank happens to have below the critical value of thickness in that part of the tank, and the conditions are correct, you may be able to crack the glass due to the varying velocities of the glass settling. I think the reality, tho still lies in the statistical possibilities of your tank cracking. It happens occassionally, and when it does, people take notice. If you can go back to the product launch of the cubes, youll see that the incidents of occurance are statistically representative of the cross section of nanocube owners. My 0.02. Chris Link to comment
oogie Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 Originally posted by tMoney Does that mean, Chris, that you could sign me up for an acylic cube? LOL No need to wait. We already have NC equivilant made with acrylic. Elipse 12! Seriously, I think one of the reason why NC is attractive is fact that its made with curved glass. Too bad sometimes it cracks but glass is SO MUCH better then acrylic. You breath on acrylic and you will get annoying hairline scratchs. I would take cheapest glass over most fancy acrylic tanks. And yes I have both! Originally posted by steelhealr Considering that you are an engineer, you should design a tank with all the mods and more structurally secure without having to modify their product: --unbreakable glass --adequate circulation --lighting to support SPS corals with heat compensation --fuge light and back fuge design --in-tank skimmer I think difficulties are not the reason why NC isn't made to do all that. Its the cost. Sure it would be nice to include all your suggestions but who would buy 12 gallon tank for $1000 right? Link to comment
steelhealr Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 I still think that someone can redesign this tank and make it all that I think it was meant to be. Hey Chris...why don't you change directions and just do a whole rebuild of this NC system instead of modding their tank? If they are selling 10-15K per month, imagine what someone could do with a better design...no??????????? And I think you could do better for under 1K SH Link to comment
nanocustoms.com Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 Ive thought of that. I studied wastewater engineering, so i know a lot about overflow rates, biological oxygen demand, settling velocities, etc etc. I think that the ultimate cube would be designed as a system, not just a sum of its parts. I envision a system like this in the future, but really like the cube in general. If you like hi performance cars, etc, you may remember the M3 had tons of vehicles with blown motors. Unfortunately, the reality of engineering and production these days are that testing is sometimes not enough, and money talks. When they are talking abotu saving a dime per unit, they are talking about big money in the grand scheme of things. Little guys like me can take care of their shortcomings in the meantime. Ill be getting pretty serious about a supercube in the near future. I would however like to use/design my own hood preferably out of carbon fiber or other higher tech materials. Chris Link to comment
xsamx Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 Originally posted by oogie No need to wait. We already have NC equivilant made with acrylic. Elipse 12! Seriously, I think one of the reason why NC is attractive is fact that its made with curved glass. Too bad sometimes it cracks but glass is SO MUCH better then acrylic. You breath on acrylic and you will get annoying hairline scratchs. I would take cheapest glass over most fancy acrylic tanks. And yes I have both! I think difficulties are not the reason why NC isn't made to do all that. Its the cost. Sure it would be nice to include all your suggestions but who would buy 12 gallon tank for $1000 right? I’m new to this thing.. But, know about materials. I can’t justify a co. charging $1000 to builddesign a tank from a few cubic feel of acrylic... But, IMO I could envision myself spending @ least $300 on an acrylic cube. At least I know my investment and all my livestock would be safe.. Unlike some of the tanks ive seen on here, mine is nothing special. It looks like some people here have over $1000 invested in their tanks... If I was one of those people, and my tank broke, I'd learn my lesson.. If I could go back in time, I would have just bought a regular old 15 gal tank. Link to comment
embryoguy Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 i have 3 nano cubes(6/12/12) and brother has 24nc. all have been running for atleast 6months. im sorry for your circumstances. i guess ive been lucky so far. it seems that maybe, when setting up these ncs, we should leak test it for 1-2 months. what is the longest duration anyone has reported a leak in there ncs after initial setup? Link to comment
stoney waters Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 That seems to be the way to go. I test ran mine for a week with no leaks. Link to comment
steelhealr Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 Mine was tested with FW for one week. SH Link to comment
burtbollinger Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 I guess it might be a good idea to quit rapping my knuckles violently against the front of my tank to show visitors how zoos respond to vibrations? Link to comment
embryoguy Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 hehe burtbolinger! dont breath on it and put a red rope around it. no touching on glass!. no kids! hehe Link to comment
sNEIRBO Posted June 13, 2005 Author Share Posted June 13, 2005 I water tested mine for 48 hours before loading it w/ LS & LR. That worked out well - huh? BTW - No word from the LFS or JBJ yet! Now almost 1:30pm in Detroit! Link to comment
ccjung Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 Steve, refunded paypal on ICA. Sorry.. The LFS didnt make you pay for the replacement right? Chris Link to comment
sNEIRBO Posted June 13, 2005 Author Share Posted June 13, 2005 Chris - LFS charge me wholesale for the whole setup - $180. They said they'd duke it out with JBJ today. If JBJ will give them a replacement for free - they'll credit me back the $180. If JBJ charges them something for the replacement glass, they'll credit the difference. If JBJ tells them to "F' off" - they're going to ding me full price $210 and I can pick up the DX Hood, pump, sponges, media, etc. later. I'm waiting anxiously to see what this fiasco will ultimately cost me. I'm starting to wish I'd bought from nanocustoms - you've been more help to me than the LFS! Thanks for what you've done so far! Cheers - sNEIRBO - Scott (aka Steve, lol) Link to comment
ccjung Posted June 13, 2005 Share Posted June 13, 2005 lol, sorry about the misnomer. Lol. I see so many names sometimes, but i know who each one "maps" out to on nano-reef. Sorry about your frustration. I hope the LFS can settle for you, because JBJ has been pretty good about that. Let me know if i can go to bat for you. I have a pretty good relationship with JBJ and usually in person. Chris Link to comment
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