The Ultimate DIY Rocks!

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12343237#post12343237 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Insane Reefer
Hey Kinghokus :)
Limestone sand and Calcium Carbonate grit/scratch sand might be more difficult to find. I can't find limestone sand locally (which is sort of stupid as we sit on some of the largest limestone mines around), but can get the carbonate sand at the "real" feed store - the places real farmers go to get their stuff.
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after 10 minutes on the phone sounding stupid trying to explain what exactly i need and why, i guess i just have to go to the feed stores in the city and look. its not sounding promising though.
 
I'm lucky that I have an outdoor electrical tap, though mostly this winter what rock I kured was done indoors. I think most people can find a place in the garage or utility room, or even the basement, where they can put the kuring bin so they can have access to electricity, if they want to use heat to speed the kure. My only caution is to keep in mind that shocking the rock temperature-wise is a bad thing (as with any crystalline like structure), so when you drain warm kure water, either fill with warm water or allow the rock to cool down for a little while before adding cold water.

And I know how you feel about feeling stupid - wait until you do it face to face and they look at you like you've grown a new head - that is always fun.
And don't give up hope. I've had places that I've bought the calcium carbonate at tell me that they don't have anything like that (and never have) when I show up to get more. I got tired of it, so I keep an empty bag and a receipt in the car that I can use to "prove" to the help that they do in fact carry it...

I did have one old boy tell me that you can sometimes find it at places that repair farm tractors and other large equipment - I think he said it was used to fill the tires to help prevent them from getting punctured.

You might try calling it "Aglime" (I just saw it referenced as such on a site) - and it isn't just used to feed chickens, but most livestock, especially lambs and calves. It is also spread on pastures and farmland as a soil amendment, but make sure they don't just send you over to the lawn care section - what you want won't be there.

Good luck on your hunt and let us know how it goes - if you find any, and what it was called so others might have an easier time of it.
 
Whelp, I just finished one of two rock structures for the 58 I'm setting up. I chose to go with diy rock mainly because it's tough to find just the right rocks to do what I wanted in such a small space and it's easier to create one solid structure than to dig through a bunch of rock bins and hope what you brought home fits together to amount to what you imagined. This one is going to have a flat bottom and then branches out and about to form one structure for the most part. I used a similar mix and method I used to create the rock below about 5 years ago. I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out :-)

8543DIY_rock-med.jpg
 
diy rockkk

diy rockkk

heres some of my DIY nano rock.

100_2596.jpg



rock is all softballsize or slightly larger or smaller.
mock up aquascape.


took about 2 days of being submersed in steaming hot water to dissolve salt, then another 2 weeks in freshwater dunk.

not its in a new saltwater aquarium waiting to cycle.
FTS pics to come.


adding another batch soon(made but not steamed)
 
Hey guys, thanks for posting pic's and Welcome to the Thread :wave:

So kentrob11, these are the one's you made a few years ago? Where are they now? When do we get pictures of the new rocks?

You have to love nano sized rocks, seagul - they kure out so quick! Post us some pictures once it is all setup, won't you?

:D
 
Yeah that's the one I made wayyyyy back when....It weighs a ton :-) It colored up very nicely and was indistinguishable from the other 200lbs in my 240 but it enabled me to open up the aquascape a bit. This is a pic from back when I threw my tank back together- this rock was the one the orange cap was on top of....It's not the greatest pic and the tank didn't look too hot but it's the best I've got at the moment.

8543andre_tank_rc-med.JPG


The only pic I've got of what I made today is this one:

8543IMG_5488.JPG
 
That box is 12" tall by the way. The rock structure goes to the bottom and has multiple ledges and whatnot. It sticks out about 2-3" from the top so the total structure height will be about 14" or so and about 16" wide....I'm a little concerned that I might have made the mix too dry so I'm gonna leave it in there for a few days before messing with it...
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12343237#post12343237 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Insane Reefer

Impur, that sort of stinks :(
A couple of thoughts.
Winter is a cold time, and if the kuring bin water freezes, leeching pretty much ceases. Granted, where you are at, you probably never actually froze over, but even if the water didn't freeze, the temps are cold enough that very little is going on in the bin as far as leeching goes.
Ditto for salt - if you used salt in the rock, it has to come out before leeching will finish, and salt won't come out very easy if the water is cold.
And the rain water for kuring is great, however, unless you had frequent torrential storms, you probably never had an actual "water change", but more of a "top-off". Most rains we get here only fill the bins about 2 or 3 inches (which is why I've got a barrel under a leaky section of gutter), and unless the bins are overflowing for a while during each rain (to spill off the old water), that collected rain isn't really going to do much for the kure process.

Honestly - add heaters to your kure bins, folks - especially if you've made salt rock. Heat can speed the whole process up exponentially, which equates to a faster kure. [/B]
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Trust me, in the winter we get enough rain to do the WCs :lol: But you make an interesting point regarding the temp. Its warming up here, so i'll switch to dumping and refilling the buckets every other day or so and let the sun warm the water. Hopefully the kuring will go quickly thru spring.

Thanks for the tip!
 
I hadn't thought about the temps myself in the past either. I do my Kuring in a tub that the effluent from my RO feeds through. Lot's of water change but the water is pretty cool.

Sounds like a small cheap heater might help things out.
 
Well, I tore the box apart and removed a lot of the support sand to let the rest of the structure air out and while I think the mixture may have been good after all, the structure might be too big! I was wanting an open aquascape and this might take up more room than I want so I may be doing another one. Looks pretty cool though...I'll get pics tonight...
 
Hey there guys :)
And Welcome to the thread, CMPenny and Kevin :wave:
I've used the analogy of stirring sugar into ice tea verses hot tea once before - heat makes a big difference when you want to dissolve something into solution. At this time of year, with the garage sale boom, it shouldn't be any problem to find a couple of heaters for a few dollars (but honestly, how many among us don't have a couple spare heaters?) - I personally use 200W in the large bins. I like the older type of heater better - the kind that doesn't actually have the temps pre-programmed; it seems these get a little hotter than the newer style heaters do. My bins average around 90°F - I wish it could be higher, but that is about all a tank heater can do.

Kentrob - that is a boo about the size - we will keep our fingers crossed that it does fit. Maybe you just need a bigger tank???
I had that problem with making the rock for my Biocube - I ended up using a box that was several inches smaller than the 'cube (the box fit into the 'cube) to get a rock that fit well. You might be able to sell it at the LFS if it doesn't work out for you. And thanks for the pic's - that tank looks great!

Impur, you probably don't have to do it that frequently; if the pH in the bin is 10 or less, I find that every 3-4 days is usually good. If you are in a hurry, you can try the trick that Goldmaniac used, and allow the rock to dry out over night between re-fills. The idea being that as the rock dries, a wicking action sort of takes place, helping to draw the calcium hydroxide to the surface when it can then either be flushed easily or can react with atmospheric Co2 to convert it to calcium carbonate - I'm not positive which is the case (but my reading leads me to think the latter), but either way, it seems to work.
Can we get a picture of your rock, Impur?
:D
 
Thanks for the welcome. I've actually been following the thread for some time just haven't posted. I made my first rock probably back in 96 or so after discovering the GARF site.

Right now I have a 190 and about half the rock in the display is DIY rock and the other half dry base rock.

Very few people can point out which is which.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12351464#post12351464 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by cmpenney
Right now I have a 190 and about half the rock in the display is DIY rock and the other half dry base rock.
Click to expand...

Pictures? Please?
:D
 
Thanks IR....This is definitely a great thread. The rock fits in the tank fine but only gives me 4" or so between the widest ledges and the front glass. That tank is 18" front to back. I'm just going to set it in there before I start the PH Kure and see how it looks- It's a cool looking structure so I'm sure someone would take it off my hands if I don't use it :-)
 
I'd love to- Custody battle wiped me out financially so this is it till I start my 6 figure job in July :-)

Which brings up my next major project...When I get into a house next year I'm going to do a rebar reinforced concrete tank somewhere around the neighborhood of 3000 gallons. I think the dimensions I ended up with was like 10 x 8 x 4 with a 3.5 x 8 viewing pane all done "in wall". I plan on building up rock structures inside the tank and curing them in tank as well :-) I'd probably be looking at a6 month + curing time and most likely bi monthly water changes but it would be worth it...Should be fun!
 
Sounds like a cool project. :bum:
You might consider using fast set cement for the bulk of the tank itself - you will have almost no kure time, it is impermeable, so no worries about sweating, and it is what they often make wells out of. You'd want to research it some, and maybe ask someone like Mr Wilson, but I think that might be the way to go and not have such a long wait on it.
If you use regular portland, I think you'll find that water changes will need to occur much more frequently then bi-monthly. The first few weeks will probably see the pH rising to above 10 every few days, and when it gets around that the water should be changed out, but that leads me to my next thought.

Since the tank itself will need to be made from "proper" concrete, the kure time might surprise you. Properly made portland cement is quite dense, and really only the top few millimeters will be kuring out - or at least in theory.
 
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