# Attaching acrylic to glass



## npaull (May 8, 2005)

I'm making a custom-door vert, and the tank/front panel are glass. I have some acrylic hinge I want to use to attach the glass door.

Can I use weldbond to glue the acrylic hinges to the glass front and door? If not, what is the best way to attach acrylic hinges to a glass door?

Thanks!


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## defaced (May 23, 2005)

thistothat.com recommends Loctite Impruv, Household Goop, Weldbond, or Hot Glue. The first two I think may be toxic, but being on the outside of the tank, I wouldn't be concerned. Weldbond and Hot Glue are non toxic.


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## Grassypeak (Jun 14, 2005)

I think that most people just use silicone for hinges. It is true that silicone will not form a good bond with acrylic but most piano hinges provide enough surface area to make this work O.K. 

I have done this and the bond is workable. You can break it without too much force but If you aren’t going to be yanking it around you will probably be O.K.

I have not tried the others but would be interested in a comparison. Hot glue has never been a favorite of mine. I never thought it formed a very good bond with anything. JMHO.


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## npaull (May 8, 2005)

Thank you both for your replies. I think I am going to try weldbond because I have some handy now, and I was really impressed with how well it attached my FCA insert to a 20 vert I did awhile ago... hopefully it'll stick!

I'd love to hear any other recommendations, cautions, or (best of all) personal experiences. Thanks!


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## Grassypeak (Jun 14, 2005)

Please let us know how it works. I have to attach an acrylic hinge to the black rim on a 5 gallon and to a piece of glass sometime next week.


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## npaull (May 8, 2005)

Will do. I can tell you from experience that weldbond literally lives up to its name when gluing acrylic to the black rim around aquariums - it made a perfect, totally watertight bond for my insert, even though the "insert" was actually just resting on the top of the rim, not "inside" on the lip just below the top of the cage (if that makes sense) so I'd say go for it there. I'll probably be trying to glue my hinges to my glass tonight or tomorrow, I'll post how it turns out.


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## Dancing frogs (Feb 20, 2004)

To clarify:
Weldbond...is a water soluble glue that can be used mixed with coco fiber or other fiber to form backgrounds.

Weld-on is a solvent cement that only works between certain plastics, and I don't think it will work to bond acrylic to glass.


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## npaull (May 8, 2005)

THANK YOU!! for that clarification. I did indeed use Weld-on, NOT Weld-bond, when attaching my acrylic to the aquarium plastic rim. I didn't read the name carefully enough, and had "weldbond" in my head. Funny how the eyes/brain work.

Well shoot. Looks like I won't be using Weld-On to attach the glass to the acrylic... back to silicone, or???

What about epoxy?


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## Dancing frogs (Feb 20, 2004)

Yeah, that happens to me alot too!

I have used epoxy for bonding acrylic to glass, and it works ok, try to rough up the surfaces first for a better bond.

It only works so well though, if you really yank on it, it will come apart.


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## dragonfrog (Feb 16, 2006)

I have built 5 vivs now and each one has the hinge glued on with silicone and they work fine, none have come off yet. One thing not to use is hot glue. It will fall off in the first day.


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## npaull (May 8, 2005)

So I used a product called E-6000 to bond my acrylic hinges to my vert glass door. It appears to have worked well. Has a constistency like mixed epoxy.

I used E-6000 on the recommendation of a rep at TAP Plastics; where I bought my hinges. She said most epoxies will work OK for this too.

Nothing beats Weld-on for bonding acrylic to the plastic rims of tanks; but this E-6000 stuff seems to have done the trick for the hinges. I don't plan on putting too much force on them, but they certainly do hold the weight of the door when it is fully down and pulling on them.

Thanks for the help guys.


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## Steve (Apr 8, 2006)

I bonded acrylic hinges to glass with walmarts silicone adhesive. Its about $3.50 and has a much more tackier gluey sticky quality than silicone.. and less flexibility, you would know what i mean if you try it.. hard to explain at 2.30 am. Anyway its held fine for five months now with no sign of coming off. I also used it to bond metal slides for my sliding glass door on my 55gal vert to glass and again had no problems.

Steve


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## B Mack (May 11, 2005)

BUMP

How's everything holding up? 

Can anyone offer anymore recomendations?


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## Steve (Apr 8, 2006)

I accidentally dropped the hinged glass front on one of my vert's, it held fine (luckily) and is still going strong.

Regards

Steve


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## npaull (May 8, 2005)

E-6000 has worked really well in all applications for which I've used it (low-stress, low impact uses like acrylic hinges:glass doors). I've had no problems.


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