What is the status of the freshwater aquarium?
 

Hey Jim,are you still working on the freshwater aquarium?What are you working on now?What things have you already finished for the freshwater aquarium?

Thanks for the info,keep up the good work.

Most of the work I had done on the Freshwater Tank will have to be re-done when I come up with a new 3D format. This is necessary for the more complex fish and invertabrate animation which will be necessary.

But I'm currently preoccupied with designing our Oregon house. This is an enourmous job. For example, right now I'm researching how thick glass will have to be in order to withstand the pressure of water 6 feet below the surface of the pool, for the window into the game room. There are thousands of details like this to be sorted out, but I've got a crew waiting to start work, so the plans have to be finished ASAP. After I get them started, I hope to be able to devote my full attention to the Freshwater Tank.

Jim, you might check into Acrylic for the window. It is more clear than glass and you can get it thicker. PM me the dimensions of the pool, and the size of the window you want, and I can get you an answer quick. Or if you want I can give you a phone call.

But in a permanent installation where people may bump into it with hard objects, won't glass be easier to maintain in the long run?

Yes, I agree with Soc - Glass is forever, and I'm trying to build the ultimate maintainance-free house.

Yes and no, there are many newer materials that have much better properties than what you are probably familiar with. The AR ( Abrasian Resistant ) sheet is used in many applications where this is a concern. The optical clairity of acrylic is much better than glass, its about half the total weight of glass, many times the impact strength of glass, and this coated material has many many times the abrasion and chemical resistance of standard material.

I'm with Jav, I used to work in a plastics factory and the new stuff now a days is incredible.

Michael sent me a message with more info, and I'm looking into it.

:drool: I've got a dream design with that goal in mind floating around in my head for many years down the road... I take it you won't have grass in your yard then? ;)

Well, I will have about 4 acres of grass. But I'm buying a tractor with a 6-foot-diameter mower from my neighbor. He says it mows at the rate of about an acre every 10 minutes.

Hopefully, the micro-robotics industry will soon live up to its promise of molecular-sized robots which will climb each blade of grass, and cut them off at 2 inches :)

(Without doing the same to people, or anything else standing on the lawn.)

My dad mows his 3 acres with a bush hog, and it takes no time at all... Those things are great, and having a tractor is always useful... Make sure you can rig it up with a plow, bucket, and forks, you'll want to eventually...

Anyway, back to on topic...