My DIY Rock/Foam Reef
- Thread starter Kannin
- Start date
Vinnie71975
New member
Wal mart Auto Dept and ask for Bondo Fiberglass Resin it comes in a liquid and a Jelly i would get the Jelly cause i got the liquid and i cant keep it where i want.
NightBreed1369
New member
Home Depot in the paint section near the glues
Vinnie,
Do you have any pics of you 55 gal rock work?
I have a drilled 55 that is in the garage collecting dust that I want use up but did not know how the 12" width would work for a reef setup. A rock wall like Kannin has showed here looks like the perfect solution if used on a smaller scale.
I want to hid the overflow and have stepped rock wall to make the smaller tank look bigger, the old model railroaders trick of forced prospective. I might even put smaller stuff at the top of the wall to make it appear farther away.
Nice work shown here. Keep it up guys, I need all the ideas I can get.
Do you have any pics of you 55 gal rock work?
I have a drilled 55 that is in the garage collecting dust that I want use up but did not know how the 12" width would work for a reef setup. A rock wall like Kannin has showed here looks like the perfect solution if used on a smaller scale.
I want to hid the overflow and have stepped rock wall to make the smaller tank look bigger, the old model railroaders trick of forced prospective. I might even put smaller stuff at the top of the wall to make it appear farther away.
Nice work shown here. Keep it up guys, I need all the ideas I can get.
Vinnie71975
New member
I havent done the rock work yet, i just did one small test piece to see how it works out and get a feel for working with great stuff and thank goodness i did cause i already learned that Black Can = Bad and that i need to use red can. I plan in doing almost like a Shelf slanted piece Shelf Here is a VERY CRUDE Paint of the Basic Idea
<a href="http://s254.photobucket.com/albums/hh81/vance71975/?action=view¤t=Rockworkroughidea.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/hh81/vance71975/Rockworkroughidea.jpg" border="0" alt="Very Rough Idea"></a>
That should give you at least a rough idea of what i want to do.
Vinnie71975
New member
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11708615#post11708615 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Kannin
Got water...
Looks AWESOME Kannin, What type sand did you use?
Vinnie71975
New member
I was considering this idea as well. I was thinking of doing the framework in all Great Stuff then mixing Cement in a 75% argonite 25% cement ratio and covering the great stuff Maybe even adding a few lbs of Crushed Oyster shell to the cement for more texture. not sure though. i really like the look of the sand covered great stuff.
ed102475
Reef Custodian
I want to use the cement to help weight the whole thing down at the bottom.I think the cement might be too heavy to be used to fill all the holes inbetween the rocks, the egg crate might collapse under the weight of the cement.I am going to zip tie the rock to the egg crate and use Epoxy Putty to help stack some of the rock work.
Vinnie71975
New member
Weight that much cement would weight way to much!<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11714946#post11714946 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by rsteagall
If you're going to use cement and the majority of rocks are tied off to the egg crate....why use foam at all? Just cement everything.Or am I missing something?
DMBillies
Active member
I've been following this thread for a while and I want to say that the build looks awesome. I've been having algae problems in my tank for a bit and after about a year I believe I have finally settled on the fact that it must be my rocks (never had algae problems in any other tank, rock was used, running a plenty large enough skimmer, only have 2 fish in a 90 gallon, and the only tank I have a phosban reactor on). That has prompted me buying new rock to replace it, taking some time to plan my moves, and trying to open the rock work. Because the tank is stocked and corals will need to go back in, I decided on just doing a build like this to cover my overflow and provide some structure to stack the rest of the rock against.
I've built a frame and started stacking rocks. Tonight I even tried using Great Stuff on the bottom of it to see what it would look like before I kept going on the project. So far, I'm very impressed with the results.
The only problem I'm running in to is finding the epoxy to put on the Great Stuff. I've found the Z-poxy Finishing Resin online but a 12 ounce is gonna cost about $20+ with shipping. The only local carrier of Z-poxy does not carry the finishing resin. He said they had other brands, but I don't know enough about the chemistry of these different things to judge whether it could cause problems. Is there anything I can be pretty assured will be available at a local HD or Lowes that will work nicely for this application? Bondo Fiberglass Resin? Anyone know a price on that? Spending $20 on top of the $10 for egg crate and $6 for the Great Stuff is a little painful when I'm already dropping hundreds to replace all of the rock in my tank (note my occupation and I think you'll understand). I also don't think I will need very much glue since I'm not doing a huge part of the tank.
I've built a frame and started stacking rocks. Tonight I even tried using Great Stuff on the bottom of it to see what it would look like before I kept going on the project. So far, I'm very impressed with the results.
The only problem I'm running in to is finding the epoxy to put on the Great Stuff. I've found the Z-poxy Finishing Resin online but a 12 ounce is gonna cost about $20+ with shipping. The only local carrier of Z-poxy does not carry the finishing resin. He said they had other brands, but I don't know enough about the chemistry of these different things to judge whether it could cause problems. Is there anything I can be pretty assured will be available at a local HD or Lowes that will work nicely for this application? Bondo Fiberglass Resin? Anyone know a price on that? Spending $20 on top of the $10 for egg crate and $6 for the Great Stuff is a little painful when I'm already dropping hundreds to replace all of the rock in my tank (note my occupation and I think you'll understand). I also don't think I will need very much glue since I'm not doing a huge part of the tank.
rsteagall
New member
Too much for what? Open rock work weighs much less than a bunch of stacked rock against a back wall. By the time the rocks are tied off..it doesn't look like much fill or at least the fill thats there doesn't have to be very thick.
I wouldn't imagine this particular project taking more than 2-3 gallons of aragonite mortar to do it all.
Then you wouldn't need to worry about epoxy and other things if you didn't epoxy....plus a more natural look from the get-go.
Lastly a few more pounds on top of the already 150lbs of marco rock won't make a hill of beans difference.
