Another, Bow Front Canopy Help page!

[ssm05rsx]

Hey Guys, I have been looking everywhere for help on how to build a Bow Front Canopy, and I barely know where to begin.

I have a Oceanic 90 Gallon Bow Front Tank. And it is a huge pain, trying to do work in the tank.

So I want to mimic
http://www.thereeftank.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=63428&d=1213540533
This guys canopy, just paint mine all black, like a Satin or Semi Gloss Black

Now, What primer do I use? Do I use a Sealer? What Black Paint? And what White paint for the inside of the Canopy?

What type of wood should I look for? Do I have to water proof it? or will the paint be enough?

How do I Make the Curved part for the front of the canopy? What thickness wood should I use?

I'm going to just relocated the lights I have in my Oceanic plastic Canopy, until I have enough money to buy new 175's and new T5's as I have 2-175's and PC's right now.

I will upload pictures of my Design soon. I have a crappy drawing I made, and will make one on AutoCAD for easier display.

http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/2006/canopyi.jpg
These are the quick dimensions from my Oceanic Plastic Canopy, now I know I need to base it off of the trip around my tank and have it resting on that, But I'd like to have a little over hang in the front and sides, this way I don't see the black trim on the tank.

-Dan

[ssm05rsx]

Ok so i Went searching, and found some of my Answers, and will post in here for people to find, I think Everything should be in one location and not 6-7 locations lol


A very good example

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p288/ordy_03/DSC01829.jpg

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p288/ordy_03/DSC01826.jpg

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p288/ordy_03/DSC01825.jpg

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p288/ordy_03/DSC01824.jpg

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p288/ordy_03/110806_12311.jpg

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p288/ordy_03/46bowedhood1.jpg

Here is the canopy for my 46 gallon.
It is 1x2 frame, skinned with some thin plywood I had lying arround.
The Bow is done with 3/4" plywood. I just traced the curve of the tank onto the plywood and cut it with a sabre saw, then hand sanded to get the curve smooth.
http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/500/1526046_Canopy.JPG http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/500/15260DSCF0002.JPG




Noodles, explaining his Bow Front.

I made a bow front stand and canopy for my 90 in October 06. I basically traced the tank and made 6 pieces that were 1/2 the length of the tank. In my case, I made 6 pieces that were 2 ft long. The back of the pieces were flat. I used a jig saw to get the curve on the front of each piece. Then, I screwed and glued all of these together and sanded them so that they would all have the same contour as the tank. In other words, I made what you would commonly call a "jig".

I made 1 jig for the left side of the tank and 1 jig for the right side of the tank. Each jig was about 4 1/2 inches thick. I also mounted each jig to a larger board so that I could place my work pieces against a flat surface.

With the jigs in hand, I took 3 pieces of 1/4 inch thick oak and placed then on to the jig. I applied glue to one side of each piece so they would stick together. I placed wax paper between the wood and my jig and I clamped all of that together against the jig (with about 15 clamps) and let it dry over night. Because the pieces were 1/4 inch thick, they were super easy to bend. And, because these were oak, they are very hard and strong.

The next day, I removed all of the clamps and with the glue dry, I was able to make curved rails for the doors. I repeated this several more times to make a top rail and bottom rail for each door. Once the doors were complete, I used the same "jigs" to make a much longer "jig" that I could use to make the canopy.

I slotted the back side of a piece of 3/4 in plywood. I cut a grove in the wood about every 1/2 inch, so that I ended up slotting about 100 times across the wood. I recall the wood being 56 inches in total length. I used this slotted piece along with 2 more 1/4 inch pieces and glued all of that up and let it dry. This time, I had to use every clamp in the house and some from my neighbor. I think I used about 40 clamps on the front part.

After all was dry, I now had a new "jig" that I could clamp against to make the front of the canopy. I saved my jigs (although I don't know if I will have a need for them in the future). It sounds like it took a lot of time, but really spreading some glue and screwing down clamps only takes a couple of minutes.

I hope this helps.

the wood (like the pictures in the other persons post). . The longer Jig I made was used to make the canopy. Instead of

I discovered this thread from a link to it from a different bowfront thread.

Here is a picture of my 155 gallon bow front hood under construction. I skinned the frame with thin plywood.

http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/503/30010701Reef_003_sm.jpg

[ssm05rsx]

A nice example on a Corner tank.

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=561262

[ssm05rsx]

Still need to find out what wood and paint to use so I do not encounter any warping.

[pleasants9]

You were asking about the curvature of the wood, two ways to do it that i know of, you can use a steam box, or use thin ply-wood and layer it how you want. Paint wise i would use a varnish, and i think the wood choice is more personal, since you want to paint it black I would reccomend a cheaper hard wood since your not gonna give it a clear varnish and worry about the color of the wood.

[luv951]

here are some pics of mine. I was lucky, as I bought a tank and stand used together. But, the finish was butt, so I did a lot of work to make it look nice.

I used kills primer and sprayed it with satin finish black, just the rustoleum stuff that has the trigger nozzle from HD. My neighbor is a painter and he recommended that stuff.

Also my canopy is made from pine. The curved front is made by butting 1 x 3s against one another slightly offset to create the curve. Problem with the pine is that after painting it, there are spots where the pitch has started to come through and messed the paint up. Luckily, those are in spots you dont see. Overall, I would probably rule out pine, unless someone can post a good way to stop the resin from coming out.

How it looked when I bought it
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/Atpurchase13.jpg

I broke off the original trim piece and made a new one. The original stuck out too far from the face of the tank.
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/100_0102.jpg

http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/100_0109.jpg

filled in all the imperfections with wood filler before priming
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/100_0109.jpg

http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/100_0110.jpg

Also reinforced it
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/100_0107.jpg

All primed up
http://i238.photobucket.com/albums/ff1/cornroller/100_0112.jpg

Sorry, I don't have any pics of painting it. By then, I realized no one really wanted another build thread, so I stopped posting to it and let it fade away.

HTH

[Misled]

The curve of mine is plexi.

http://i133.photobucket.com/albums/q68/jllndmb/DSC_6547.jpg

[luv951]

[QUOTE=Misled;15901826]The curve of mine is plexi.

That's slick.

[ssm05rsx]

hmm, I like the idea of plexi, I just wrote up a design on Graph paper, as I don't have my laptop, (Gf is using it to do HW, where I am fixing hers at the moment lol)

here is my design
Tell me if you think I should keep it, or make some changes.
http://img24.imageshack.us/img24/5166/designsmaller.jpg

[Xtreme Audio]

Two ways that I would go at it is:

1) Make your frame and then use thin would 1/4" or 1/8" and nail it to the frame.
2) Using thicker material 1/2" or 3/4" you will need to put relief cuts on the back to allow the flex. If I was using 3/4" I would run slits done the board with a table saw leaving about 1/4" material left. This I refer to as Kerfing. Here is a link to a car audio website that I frequent and this is done a lot for box building.

http://www.fiberglassforums.com/showthread.php?t=10706

[ordy1]

That's a pretty good drawing.

The piano hinge will cause the front to hinge all the way back and rest on the canopy.

I used an all weather paint for the canopy. Same stuff you'd use on your house. Most do it yourselfer's paint the inside white. I completely lined it with reflective material from a canibalized canopy reflector.

I did not open the back, except for the holes for access to piping. I have the fans turning on when my lights come on.

Hope this helped.

[Tigfish]

I was looking at a old post of yours and there is a photo of a stand that has 2 doors open and the Canopy is part of the stand. I would like to know if could tall me were you got the photos from. I would like to build a stand like it with out the canopy.

Thanks
Bill