Cement Reef Take #2

By the way, my tank temp has dropped from 82* to 79* since removing all of the extra powerheads.
 
dugg, very very cool. Thanks for taking the time to go through my Q's point by point.

Do you think a 16 gallon is too small for a design like this? Or would the foam and cement take up too much room? BTW, my 16 does not have an overflow, I'd have to design and build one into it.

Thanks again, more pix!!

Russ
 
The cement takes up about 3/4 inch wall and floor space including the foam. I think a small nano would be cool and you could really be creative not having to worry about weight issues. There is a thread here somewhere about drilling and creating an external overflow by siliconing a box on the back and using a diamond dremel to cut a row of slots in the back glass for an overflow. that would be easy to do and save a lot of room. Just bring the foam right up to the bottom edge and then up both sides of the row of holes. You could even build a ledge around it to control the waterlevel better and the corals in Wayne's tank thrive right at the ledge he has at his overflow.
 
Thanks MS!!

See that is why I'm here... so y'all can keep this Dumb Jarhead in line. Ya know Marines have a knack for breaking things. ;)
 
Schmit said:
Thanks MS!!

See that is why I'm here... so y'all can keep this Dumb Jarhead in line. Ya know Marines have a knack for breaking things. ;)
Click to expand...

:thumbsup:

YW.....We've all made mistakes. This is a great place to try to help others (if they're open to it) avoid the mistakes others have made before. And, it can help save a $hitload of money. Maybe get that Lamborghini a month or two sooner! ;)

Russ
 
RamManOK...

Hey... as a Marine you KNOW we are taught to break (destroy) things! :D

Dugg (or anyone)

Here is a question for y'all.

Now, I know I have to start with live rock.

Could I not construct a cement "cave" of sorts (think cement tank building) as a center piece for my future tank. Then let it grow into a live rock somehow? (isn't live rock only rock with things growing on it's surfice?) (put into a tank with live rock and let it mature)

If possible, wouldn't this work as live rock but for less poundage? (per coverabe area) (i.e. X% of live rock weight is rock with the live stuff only existing on the outer surface). Could not this method cut the weight of the live rock while still providing the same "live" area?

What I'm thinking of is making a "cave" by drapping fabric over a bowl or something... getting it stiff and then building additional layers on top of it to provided a "surface". The cave would be considerably thinner then making it by stacking rocks on top of each other but provided the same surface area for the live portion of it.
 
The cement will not be as good as live rock. While it will be live after some time, it is not near as porous as real live rock. You will still need to buy live rock for your sump for biological filtration. 1 to 1 1/2 lbs per gallon. Buy mostly dead base rock and a few good pieces of live rock to seed the tank with. Wayne's dead rock is $1.69 per lb. live rock is $6.49 per lb. He has a real nice live rock in the display sump right now that has clove polyps all over it. That one piece and the rest base rock should be a real nice start for you. It looks like it weighs around 20 lbs. roughly.

While the cement does have some biological quality to it, don't even consider it in as live rock at all, just a bonus.
 
Fabric? That may not be the best of ideas.... How about several layers of wedding veil?

Yes, many people use a large % of base rock to live rock and over time the base rock becomes live rock. It's not so much the "stuff on the surface" as the "stuff in the pores" of the rock -- the bacteria is what you really want. But, you need to use nice, porous, safe base rock. I've been *very* happy with the base rock I bought from reeferrocks.com.

Dwain
 
That is what I thought but wanted comformation (i.e. stuff in the "surface" pores. Oh well, I'm still going to build a small cave outa cement for the fishies.
 
Just posting a few updated pictures now that everything is in it's place. I also got a few frags of Montipora digitata from Wayne today and mounted it to the walls and rocks using his acseterator and portland cement. Now that is how to mount a coral. It took seconds to mount and blends right into the rock. The cement had almost no effect on the ph at all. It maybe raised the ph by .01 if that. The cement had no effect on the corals at all either. A few of my green mushrooms closed for about 3 minutes, then opened right back up.
46077100_0548.jpg
46077100_0545.jpg
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46077100_0542.jpg
 
Holy cow......
Now I think I may have to look into the plywood tank setup with this as a liner? This would hold the water in would it not? If on coat 2 you add a sealer to it then add the third layer and dye it..

May be worth a shot.

Semper Fi brothers, glad to see others on here!
 
No the cement wouldn't hald the water. You would need to build the wood tank, seal it with a marine epoxy and water test it, then do the cement treatment to it. I would still use the foam, even with a wood tank, and put the plastic liner under the cement floor, on top of the epoxy. Cement is very porous. My grampa built cement inground swimming pools, and until they coat a pool with plaster, the water runs right through it.

Here is a page with a few links to some DIY plywood tanks i have looked at. Let me know how it turns out for you. I have always wanted to try this too.
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/diy_list.php
 
Dugg,

I am building a 245 gallon L tank out of plywood. I have a thread about it on the Albama reefers forum on RC.

speakeraddict
 
not in progress yet. Still debating the fact that 140 is alot of water and would drill every hole with a drill press, mine is currently inop.
But maybe during the winter I will try this out.

Thanks
 
Things are starting to come around. It has been one disaster after another so far for my tank. First i had the flood that smoked the MH ballast, then a bad pump that heated the water to 89*, then the ph monitor problem and the snow storm, then just recently another pump gone bad with another heat problem. I have recently changed to a smaller return pump, and added a few powerheads to the display for current. Things are looking up now, but i have lost a lot of my stock over all of the disasters. Hopefully everything will come around over the next month or so, and i will post some new pics. As far as the cement goes, everything has worked out great. No nitrate issues with the foam, and the polyps and coraline are starting to take off if i can just go a while without having something blow up.
 
Dugg is one of my heroes. Have not seen this in a while. Very nice. I certainly wish you were in town to assist in building my stand. :)
 
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