My new 150g...new aquascape (3/1)...looking for comments...

[dachsieholic]

Finally...the fish have their new condos!
Many, many thanks to my wonderful husband who spend 12 hours doing most of the work!
We still need to finish out some rocks on the back, move two off the sand in the front, and add some small pieces to cover pipe. We are hoping that coral growth will one day completely hide the PVC, but we'll have to wait and see. My other Tunze is mounted to the PVC at the top of the arch on the right side.
Shrimps are in heaven! Mr. Goby loves the new real estate...

Looking for comments and ideas...

I bought acrylic rods, but ended up not using them. All shelving is made out of 1" PVC. My hubby bent the PVC by putting it in the oven and using welding gloves to bend it while it was hot. Holes were drilled in PVC and rock was attached with zip ties. Most rock had holes that we could use and only a few pieced had to be drilled. My husband used his rechargeable battery operated DeWalt drill - no electric cords.

Here is a before picture: (yes, that is Air Jordan - starfish - hanging off the back glass by the wire that was not tacked up on the outside).

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My tank is a room divider tank, so we built two sections for each side, but they do connect.
First level:

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Half of arch:

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Full arch:

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Both sides, looking from backside:

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Finally, we decided to try an arch in the front. Not sure if we are going to keep this...it seems a bit cluttered, but I'm trying to imagine it with corals. It looks more cluttered than in person because of the flat picture:

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One side in the tank (yuck...don't look at the water and the glass):

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Same side with rock attached:

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Other side with rock (yes, that is my Tunze 6101 that is now on its way to Austin to receive a replacement motor):

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New rockwork.

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[erikbaker]

Very interesting idea

 

[v320]

I like the arch on the right better than the left.
However, it may look different after some coralline has covered it...

Are you going to add more rocks to cover the pvc later?

 

[fejus]

I like it. Are you adding rock to the bottom area to cover the PVC above the sand?

-Paul

 

[Guest]

Did you ever look into the hook and plug method? I believe it involves drilling holes into LR pieces, attach them to some kind of hook with putty, then drilling holes into your PVC frame, and hook the LR pieces to the frame. I guesse the advantage is that it is easier to frag rocks and you can swap them with other rocks in the tank. Has anyone tried that? I would be afraid PVC would crash down from all of the holes drilled into it.

 

[dachsieholic]

@v320 wrote:

Yes, still working on tweaking. Most of the pipe will be covered by rock and then the little spots left, hopefully, by coral

 

[dachsieholic]

@fejus wrote:

Yes, still working on getting the PVC covered. I'm thinking about using some type of epoxy or glue (if I can find some that will work :lol: ) to adhere some small pieces of rock along the edges of the shelf rock and/or pipe.

 

[dachsieholic]

@200mfromocean wrote:

I have not heard of this method. I'll have to do some searching to see what I can find. Hmm...I'm thinking about pros and cons. Of course, I don't know that I want to redo the rockwork, but you never know. It is hard to get it exactly like you have in your mind

 

[Guest]

@dachsieholic wrote:

I have not heard of this method. I'll have to do some searching to see what I can find. Hmm...I'm thinking about pros and cons. Of course, I don't know that I want to redo the rockwork, but you never know. It is hard to get it exactly like you have in your mind "]

I think found the hook and plug on a link on Reef Central a few months ago. I will be sure to put it up for you when I come accross it again. I am sure it is probably the last thing you want to see after you have your aquascpaing completed. :wink: Downside is you probably have to take everything out of the water, but I imagine it would not take longer than 3 or 4 hours to mount the plugs to LR and drill PVC once you have your PVC structure assembled.