Non glass replacement for back panel of tank?

[Lucid Fish]

I had an unfortunate incident picking up a tank. It's 1.2m x 45cm x 45cm. The back panel needs replacing and I'm wondering, are there any non glass materials that I could use to repair it? I am mostly looking to keep costs down and as the panel doesn't need to be transparent I thought I would investigate other alternatives... 

It would appear that a replacement piece of glass would cost more than I could pick up another tank for second hand.

Thanks in advance!

[Shilo]

I think the main problem would be gluing the material to the glass.  Acrylic doesn't silicon well and you of course can't weld the acrylic to glass.  Epoxy sealed plywood may work but there is not much seam along the edge of the glass to silicon the ply to.  I would glue 2 layers of thick ply together with the inside ply cut so it fits the inside of the glass and the back ply cut a bit bigger to fit along the outside of edge of the glass.  This will double up the amount of seam.  Coat the ply with a couple of coats of coloured epoxy to seal.

If the back of the tank is only cracked and not completely smashed then you could get some glass cut to cover 2" either side of the crack and silicon it in place, an internal background will hide the fix..  

[Ira]

A new pane of glass really shouldn't cost that much,  maybe you can save some money DIYing something with ply, but it's going to take enough work that you might as well just use glass.

[Lucid Fish]

Thanks for the ideas! I have found someone who will replace the glass and reseal internals for a very reasonable price. Definitely the easiest way to go