DIY Background

Any ideas on safe fiber-glass resins to use in fishtanks.

I have just got my first 500l freshwater tank.
I would like to add a 3D background, the normal paper backgrounds does not do it for me.
I looked at the normal polystyrine background that you stick to the back of the tank, this will not do. I would like to have the benefit to remove it when I get bored with it.

Epoxy is a option but will require me to make a mold first, before making the final background. If I am in the background selling game this might be an option, but not really.

I am looking in using glassfiber cloth and resin to shape a background to my liking.

My tank is 1500x740x600 big with cross brasing on top, this will require me to make four background pieces. I have seen the use of magnets to keep the background in place will incorporate those.

Anyway, hope there is some info out there to assist me.

Deon

 

Why not make the mould out of syrene, and then use the fibreglass resin to make it thereafter. Just a silly question, how are you going to paint it to look natural?

 

Hi Ashley,

Thanks for the replay.

You are right using syrene would be good to help with the shaping of the fiberglass. The problem I have is to set the fiberglass with some sort of resin, the normal fiberglass resins may be toxic.

To give the fiberglass a more natural look:
I was aiming to go for a rockface texture. A layer rocklike slab structure.
Covering it with gravel and resin mixture, hoping the resin is cleartype.

But first problem for me is still finding a non-toxic fiberglass resin.

THX

Deon

 

@deondupreez, I used to be in the fibreglass game, and yes there is a water safe resin, that is what most of the decorations and rocks are made from these days.

Contact a gent by the name of Jim Kinman from Niser and tell him that I told you to contact him for "non-whitening sater safe resin" he will be able to assist you with everything that you need to make up the backgrounds. Niser's No is 011 847 4800 and they are based in Midrand.

Just a heads-up, Polystyrene has a bad reaction to resin, so if you are thinking of doing it that way, just make sure that you cover the polystyrene properly in cement before overlaying it with resin. An alternative would be to make the basic design out of chicken mesh and news paper and once you have a few layers on and it is stable you can then look at removing the paper and chicken mesh. Your only problem with doing a 'reverse mould' is that you will land up with the matt look facing outwards instead of it being nice and 'smooth', but that can be overcome with doing a final thick layer of resin to seal up the matt. It is also possible to lay sand and gravel into the resin, but that must be done in the last layer and then it must be sprinkled over and 'pressed' into the resin so that it sticks in the resin.

Hope this helps, and feel free to contact me if you need any further advice or help.

Kim

 

Hi Kim,

Thanks for the help,

I will contact Jim at Niser for help.

Will keep you posted.

Best regards,

Deon

 

hi Deon

Did you make any headway with your project? i have a corner pentagon tank and require 1.6m of 3D background

 

Hi Neon,

I have done some enquiries and contacted AMT Composites.
The guys gave me advice on the products to use, here is an excert of the reconmendation:

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it is very important is that the epoxy is fully cured before use. Perhaps even wash the surface with something that isn't toxic to the fish and rince off.
I have a few customers using our epoxy sysyetm in aqueriums already and they seem very happy.

As a rule of thumb, the weight of the fabric is about the same thickness in microns.
So a 163 gram glass would be 0,16mm thick, while 410gram glass would be 0.4mm thick.
To get 2mm thickness with glass alone you would need about 4 layers of 410gram plus two layers of 163 gram.
Then the resin consumption is about the same as the weight of the fabric.
So 1 square meter of the glass fabrics above would weight a Total 1.966Kg (410grams x 4 = 1.64Kg Plus 163gram x 2 = 0.326Kg)
For that you would need about 2Kg of resin
You could substitute some of the Glass fabric with core material which would reduce the resin consumption somewhat.
A 2mm Coremat has a resin uptake of 1kg/cubic metre. So 1sqm of 2mm core will need 200grams of resin.
With a layer of 280gram glass either side it would be just over 2mm thick and would need about 760grams of resin.

163gsm x 1000mm wide Twill Glass
280gsm x 1250mm wide Twill Glass
410gsm x 1270mm wide Biax Glass
1Kg Ampreg 21 Reisn
0.33Kg Ampreg 21 Hardener
2mm Coremat 1000mm
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I put some thought into it and also looked at other alternatives. In the end I decided not to go forward, there is still some risk in the project for me; I have not done such a project before, and ensuring that the mix ratio between epoxy and hardner is perfect I may kill all my fish. Epoxy and Hardner on their own as you know is deadly.

The project may have to wait until a later time.

Deon