The Ultimate DIY Rocks!

[thriceanangel]

I saw a bag of the pellet type salt that I'd like to use in part, but it had rust remover in it? I figured that it must be safe to drink, so it can't really hurt too bad, especially since it's going to dissolve. Has anyone used this?

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

The pelletized version of the salt that I use isn't 100% Sodium Chloride. It's 100% Potassium Chloride. I doubt it's safe for aquariums.

 

[speckled trout]

I wouldn't worry about dyes, your rock will have the real stuff on it soon enough. As long as you have at least a little real rock to seed it with, anyways.

If you can't wait, just spray paint a few patches with burgundy or purple. You won't be able to tell the difference after a little while, though.

 

[Rhodophyta]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9548411#post9548411 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Insane Reefer
For those of you having trouble releasing your salt...

Try boiling water, or at least the hottest water you can use. I find the bathtub works well for this - just use a strainer in the drain, or really rinse the rock well outside first.

Water Softener salt is really, really dense, and used because it does Not dissolve very quickly in cold water - thus it makes a brine that "softens" the water as it flows through the softener. it can take weeks for salt to release in cold water. I can get most of the salt out in about 36 hours, with 3-4 hot soaks...

HTH

Insane's short explanation of water softening is easy to misunderstand. The brine is always separate from the house water supply. During recharging, the resin bed is also taken offline from the water supply and it is immersed in brine. The sodium ions in the brine replace the calcium and magnesium ions that have "stuck" to the resin bed. Fresh water then rinses out the remaining salt and the calcium, magnesium, and all the chlorine ions. All this rinse water is dumped. Only then is the resin bed put back into service. So the salt is never in contact with the water supply, only the sodium ions from the salt. Now the salt in the brine tank has plenty of time to dissolve before the next cycle, so it doesn't matter if the softener salt takes a long time to dissolve or not.

 

[goldmaniac]

tagging along..

Actually, I bought Morton's rock salt over the weekend - BIG question:

The rock chunks in these bags of water softener salt (99.5% pure) are HUGE chunks, mostly 1/2" , 3/4", or 1.0" or more. Is this feasable? i was picturing driveway-snow melt-size, 1/4" chunks. I imagine these size chunks won't create nice looking rock.

Any good way to break down the size of this salt? Anyone have this problem?

Otherwise, i'm ready to try this on my own this week -

thanks,

-G.

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

There was someone really early on in the thread that could only get the large pieces because they lived in Canada and didn't have access to the stuff that I've used. They ended up breaking it up with a hammer.

 

[Azazael13]

4 plastic bags and a hammer did wonders for my frustration that day and the salt!

 

[goldmaniac]

ok, I was thinking of some "brains over brawn" solution, as I have 200 lbs of the stuff, but I'm not opposed to violence to solve my problems.

Travis - my compliments on your research and methodology (sp?) on this. Rock Salt's a genius idea - sometimes the simplest solution is the best one -

Maybe some sort of grate with 1/4 holes to separate the small stuff from large stuff..I already tried using eggcrate last night, squares are too big.

hmm....

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9574395#post9574395 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by goldmaniac
Maybe some sort of grate with 1/4 holes to separate the small stuff from large stuff..I already tried using eggcrate last night, squares are too big.

Have you tried two layers of eggcrate offset from each other?

 

[goldmaniac]

Travis - good suggestion:

I went out last night to Home Depot and bough 1/2' metal square grate, what I grew up knowing as Chicken Wire, although real chicken wire is the ping pong ball circle-type fencing. cheaper than eggcrate, $7 for a roll of the stuff.

I will first make a seive with this stuff, and then i plan on cutting a 2nd piece and laying/ziptieing it onto the 1st piece, effectively making 1/2" x 1/4" holes. think that's small enough to create a nice effect when molding?

With the metal wire, I'm planning on really pounding on the salt while it's sitting on the wire with a mallet, speeding up the "conforming" process. Yesterday, I learned that an 8 lb tamper, a sledghammer, and a 5-gallon bucket really doesn't do much, except create mostly salt dust in the bucket.

but my 3-year-old had a ball helping me smash the 'white rocks'!

 

[LarryW]

cool idea, tagging along too.

 

[goldmaniac]

trying to contribute what i have:

The Morton's 99.5% pure water softener salt bags (40 lb bags) have salt rocks up to the size of 1", so I need to crush any salt that's larger than 3/8", IMO. So I've hit an obstacle with starting my DIY liverock. But I'll add my progress to this thread, a little more contribution..

Went to HomeDepot and bought the 1/2" aluminum garden fencing, and I miter saw'ed a frame out of 2x4's to cover a bin. Put two layers of this 1/2" 'small animal fencing' over it and stapled it down. So now I have a seive for the rock salt. One bag went thru pretty quickly, I have about a 1/3rd of the original bag left to crush. Anyway, the metal wire screen works well.

A detour, probably about a week's worth of delay, I'm expecting. But it's producing nice size chunks that I think will be significantly better than using marble-sized chunks of salt during the project.

My $.02 towards the thread so far.

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

One bag went thru pretty quickly, I have about a 1/3rd of the original bag left to crush.

I say take that last bag, bundle it up in a heavy duty flexible container, and run over it with your car

 

[goldmaniac]

you know, I was just thinking about the logistics of that last night - i'll need to slice a couple slits on the side, somehow I can picture the plastic bag popping if/when i run it over w/ the Wife's Pathfinder if I don't.. rock salt IED.

I think i'll take your suggestion today, after work, and run over a bag a couple times and see what's the result. then I can try my seive and see what's crushed.

 

[goldmaniac]

My Experience, yesterday:

running over rock salt that i put into heavy garbage bags with my Pathfinder (4 times) doesn't do squat.

-- still looking for efficient way to smash 1/2"-plus chunks of salt into 1/4" chunks of salt. I have a postal crate full, whereas I have 3 full 5-gallon buckets of the good-sized salt.

Attempt #1 last night on DIY rock!! will wait 72 hours or more to take out of bucket.

 

[RandyStacyE]

Perhaps you can run it over with a hefty lawn roller if you have one

All of the weight would be focused over a much smaller area ... it could work.

 

[RandyStacyE]

You could poure some of the salt into a trash bag (like you did before) and spread the salt out flat (within the bag). Now lay a 1' - 2' long 2x4 on top and wack it with a hammer. It shouldn't take too many wacks before you break up all of that salt in the bag.

 

[goldmaniac]

good idea with filling a large bag with only 2" of the stuff, so large surface area but not deep. I'll try that.

hah hah no i don't have a lawn roller.

 

[drauka99]

maybe try a cloth bag with some of the 2" peices and a nice block way, as an added bonus you get a workout

 

[Insane Reefer]

Or maybe look around at the grocery stores or Walmart for Solar Crystals instead of wasting all this effort to crush the cubed salt. I asked a manager at Walmart, and he said as far as he knows, every Walmart in the country carries Mortons Solar Crystals.