DIY background

This background is for my 30l planted tank. I made it with 4 sheets of expanded polystyrene, some aquarium sillicone (to stick the polystyrene sheets to each other and the complete background to the tank) and some cement (regular cement from Mica).
First i stuck the polystyrene sheets together and cut it to size ( about a half cm shorter than the length of the tank and about 3 cm taller than the tank as it will be an open top tank).
Then i drew on the planned shapes of the rocks. Then i cut out sections on the back for the filter uptake and the heater ( In hindsight i would have made a space for the CO2 difuser as well), remembering to leave enough flat sheet to stick it onto the tank. Then i carved out the shape of the rocks and the holes through which water will flow into the filter and out/over the heater. then some further holes for the filter intake and the heater I then took my girlfriends hair dryer to it to get rid of any bits and pieces and to smooth out the texture. The first layer of cement was quite thin. after that i put on 5 more layers about 2mm thick each except on the sides (otherwise it wouldn't have fitted in the tank, all i wanted on the side is for them to be the same colour). After it had cured ( i kept it wet and in the shade for the most part) i stuck it to the tank with aquarium silicon and tet that dry for 24h.
I let the lime leach out for one week doing water changes every day and i had the heater and filter going heating and circulating the water. I stopped the "leaching" as soon as the ph remained stable for 24h. the final result...

 

Looks damn good, ive been thinking on buyin some ready made ones from our lfs. Prefer your plan.....

Nice post

 

I must say i prefer it too, the ones u get from the lfs are nice but u don't have as much flexability with them ie adding a recess for your filter/heater/CO2 etc. I also think it can be a lot cheaper, the whole thing cost me about R100.00 if recall corectly and about a total of 5 hours work.

 

Thanx Jaguar Cichlid, Here is my current thred of this tank http://www.tropicalaquarium.co.za/showthread.php?t=557

 

Sailing Derrick I think this is a brilliant idea and I love the way it looks so natural, I'm so impressed ! I think i'm going to give this a try and see whether I can make it look like yours I'll start out small with my goldies and see how it turns out.

 

Good idea starting small, i just did one for my 1.2m tank, the most important thing is good planing. My favorite thing is that it becomes a huge biological filter keeping your fish and plants happy.

Regards
Derrick

 

Pics please... I'm very curious as I want to do the same thing.

 

Sailing Derrick,

Just a few questions....

You leave space at the BACK for filters and heaters etc, and then you glue the backgrount to the tank? How do you service the equipment behind the background?

Doesn't the background get all algae and "gooiey" with gunk and funk behind there?

I LOVE the idea... just going through the practicalities in my head. I'm trying to work out a way I can make one and introduce it to an established tank already?

 

All the equipment can be removed for service, it can be used with either a hang on back filter or a canister filter. If you plan the inlet and outlet there should be sufficient suction on the inlet to keep gink from building up and the same for the outlet where claen water should be coming out from the filter.
As far as putting one into an established tank, i dont see why it cant be done, you would have to get the size almost exact. I was thinking that if you have euro bracing you can use that keep it from popping up and gravel/sand to keep it in place at the bottom. Using a design like that you can use another sheet of polystyreen seeled behind the background to make sure the water flows in the desired direction and not round the back of the background.

Derrick

 

wow very cool DIY project

 

WOW that is impressive. You have now inspired me to try something similar.

 

Alls well and impressive.Now please tell me how do you get the cement to "stick' to the polistyrene???

 

And, how you manage to skuur down that polystyrene and shape the rock protrusions?

(btw, offtopic, slojo, that 10kg bag of sand of yours is arriving tomorrow at my work, if you wanna swing by and pic it up)

 

Will do.Thx

 

Just cut down the rough shape with your better half kitchen knife then use sand paper to smoth things down, baring in mind that the cement will make the end result less "bumby" than the polystyreen below because more cement will settle in the "cracks" than on the top(when it is lying flat).

Before applying the cement i used my better halfs hair dryer to melt the surface of the polystyreen, the hair dryer also blows away loose bits of polystyreen. After that it pretty much just sticks on there once its dry.

On another note to all that want to do their own version - The shaping of the polystyreen is very messy and if you want to stay out of trouble its prob best to do it in the garage or spare room where the offcuts can easily be vacumed up. I did mine on the back porch which resulted in hours of cleaning in the garden for me.

 

LOL i can imagine running after the teeny white balls...........

 

Really looks good

 

Hi there. Fantastic background. I just have a couple off extra notes regarding some of the q's posted. I am a Fine Artist and have worked with sculpting polystyrene blocks many a time. ( I made these life sized pigs, covered them with acrylic resin..http://paintedblack.weebly.com/fine-art.html )

1. Dura-latex can be mixed with the cement to make it stick to pretty much anything. (have no idea about the toxicity if any)
2. Standard files (semi-circular, rough and rat-tailed files best) and varying degress of sandpaper are easiest, along with bread/steak knives.
3. Heat and acetone (nail polish remover) dissolve polystyrene into interesting forms.
4. If sanding please wear a mask. The fine dust gets into your lungs and can get painful.
5.Once you have cast the front with concrete you can actually melt out all of the polystyrene to make a thinner and less cumbersome form.

Hope this is usefull.

 

Hi ... interesting read on the web link

 

@sailing_derrick: So you did not use any pigments or paints, just the plain concrete?