Drill holes in glass

[sly]

I want to use a 10 gal glass tank as a refugium and need to drill holes in it. How?:help:

 

[dakar]

Word is a lot of patience, dremel tool with diamond tipped bits, and lots of water to cool the bit. Actually have to slowly 'grind' the hole out.
I've managed to do this successfully twice. You DO NOT want to know how many unsuccessful attempts were made. YMMV
Dave

 

[golfish]

I watch my buddy do it with a glass hole saw. He built a small dam around the hole he was drilling. If the hole was 2" dia the was 6" dam and about 1" tall. He filled in with radiator coolant and started drilling. It takes a while.

 

[sly]

Cool. Thanks for the replys. I took the advice on using a drimel using a grinder attachment. It worked great. I kept a spray bottle of water to keep the glass wet and it took about 40 minutes, but I did get a 1inch hole drilled.
Now I'm off to Home Depot to get some plumbing. Im going to put a plexiglass dam in the middle of the tank so that one side is full of water for baby fish I get, while the other side drains lower for the mangroves I'm putting in the tank. The water will spill over the dam to the mangrove side, creating a smooth current that wont disturb the roots too much. I'll post some pics of the setup as soon as I'm done :joy:
Dave (also)

 

[dakar]

Good deal! BTW you can add my count up to three successful attempts now

Wanted to try soemthing new, old 10g critter tank it had a little 1/4" hole in very bottom, so rather than trying to seal it up I was able to enlarge it to 1" and manufactured a 1/2" PVC bulkhead, now she'll have a skimmer standing straight up in the center. No real reason other than something to do while waiting on the big tank to cycle, maybe use it as a fuge or curing tank, most likely to serve as an overflow tank if my sump goes nuts and overfills the main tank.
Dave