DIY background project

[ou812pezz]

Starting a background for a fish only tank. The foam background will be painted with a aragacrete mixture and cured to give it an aged look. Got the idea from a freshwater tank.

[hobogato]

cool! keep posting update pics, im definitely interested to see the finished product with some fish around it. is it gonna be a predator tank?

[ou812pezz]

I have a trigger waiting for a bigger home. I'll build from him.

[hobogato]

yeah, that background kinda has an ominous look - like some underwater statue you would see when you fell in a river just before the school of pirhannas (sp?) ate you.

[ou812pezz]

I originally wanted to do it as a planted tank with schools of silver pacus and black fin tetras. But I have a 40gal breeder filled with plants and bali sharks.

[jc]

What kind of foam are you using? Something like this would look great in my brothers green terror tank.

[ou812pezz]

styrofoam of variuos thicknesses. I'm cuttin it up on a band saw. Then I'll glue everything in place. Hit it with a heat gun to round out the edges and create depressions. Then I'll paint it with a thin layer of concrete. Add another layer on that. Then sculped some areas of detail with a thicker mixture. then a final thin coat. Thinking about adding some dyes in between layes for depth.
The pic below was my inspiration.

[Ping]

very cool. How about a shelf for a hawkfish to swoop down on its prey, while the trigger patrols below.

[ou812pezz]

possibly. I haven't glued anything down yet. I'm looking at pics of the ankor temples and some shots of tolum I took for more inspiration. I want to create cracks and breaches. Distort the symetry a bit. Any Ideas on how I should stock this 65 gal tank with a trigger? A hawk fish looks cool. This tank will be a backdrop for a bar I want to build.

[klondike4001]

It looks great and I think you just gave me my next idea for a vivarium.

[ou812pezz]

seen most of these. It's where I initailly found the above idea. I've seen some really nice vivarians aswell. I might try one after this. Thout about a frog tank.

[klondike4001]

if you decide to start one, call me, I'll talk you out of it, honestly even set up properly they're more trouble than they are worth.

[Flobex]

ive always loved those backgrounds... i think i may have to do something like it for my 58 gallon im setting up...

[ou812pezz]

Ok, after being at Mike's yesterday I got inspirited to continue this project. After the basic shapes where cut, heat gunned and silicon ed into place, I painted the 4 pieces with a cement sand mixture. I used a 1:3 cement to sand mixture and painted it on with a brush. This is the fist coat. After it dries I'll mix a 1:2 cement to sand mixture and paint again to get what eve I missed. I'll post the results when I reach that point. I don't like the head design, so I'm going to sculpt a posedin type head. I also want to add detail to the walls and finally use some stuff to add dram to portions of the walls.

[lhoy]

Looking great!!! Glad to see you got back on it.

Lee

[FireWater]

Looks awesome. Can't wait to check it out in person on Wednesday at your house.

[ou812pezz]

I finally got a little time between projects to work a little more on this. I put the second coat of cement. It was mixed a little thicker than the first coat. It filled in a lot of gaps. Then I siliconed all three panels into place. Next I'm going to fill the bottom edges with great stuff. once everything is cured then another thin coat of concrete over everything. Once that drys then the water curing begins.