painting the inside of an overflow (with solution!)
 

My tank builder gave me the remaining paint from when he painted the back of my tank black. It is an acrylic latex. I used this inside my external overflow to hide all my plumbing but after a few days of water circulation it started to peel in several lrge sheets.

Can someone recommend a material/piant to do this? I'd prefer a paint so the space looks the same as my tank back. A piece of acrylic plastic would work but def look quite a bit different from the rest of the tank.

- needs to be marine safe when it's dried
- not peel off glass
- prefer something i can brush on. getting in the overflow now is by brush only. spray paint would be VERY tough.

Thanks folks.

why bother man , after awhile the coraline will cover it

I used to just line mine with colored acylic sheets just buy the size u need and cut it to size costs just as much as paint would

Yeah I would of course that's easy.

My concern is the black looking the same as the rest of the black. A piece of black acrylic placed against glass and black paint actually adhered to glass look a lot different. I don't want that massive rectangle to stick out like a sore thumb.

Also, I'm keeping the back cleaned.

Bah, you don't need to worry about it looking all that different. Like Mike said, coraline is going to cover it .... Let's put that aside, do you think anyone looking at beautifully epic stand+setup is going to even notice the overflow box? :razz:

You guys don't BELIEVE? I will keep the back black I tell ya :biggrin:

I think at this point I'm goin to paint it again and then silicone a piece of glass up against it to keep it dry. My other idea is to apply a layer of black silicone to the whole surface so it instead matches the 'black' of the silicone outline you can currently see faintly.

The problem with a piece of acrylic is I will see all the silicone holding it in place. I am FUSSY =)

test putting silicone onto acrylic, It does not hold very well

Yeah I doubt it would.

I've already drained the overflow and prepped it for another painting. I'm going to cut a piece of glass and silicone it against the painted area. My hope is the painted parts will be sealed off from the water falling into the box.

I'll post in a few days whether I was successful or not.

actually on a face to face application silicone holds very well. I had to cut off the acrylic mounting plate that my float valve was attached to in my sump after 5 years of running. it is the edges that don't go very well with silicone.

Steve

ok stircrazy, thats good to know, I have never tried to silicone acrylic, because of what I read