Hey there. I am motivated to make some DIY background materials for my 30 gallon Half Moon Tetra Tank. it has a flat back and I painted the outside of it black. There are some really cool ready to buy fiberglass backgrounds to insert inside the tanks. But they are so expensive. Especially the modular individual rock formations I want to use to create a really nice effect.
Here area couple by Aquaterra. They have a flat back and you silicone glue the flat portion to the back of the tank. The cool thing about it is that you leave space in between them. So if you paint the back of your tank black it gives the illusion of cracks that seem down so far and deep that it fades into black. Basically it does not look like glass. You leave about one inch or so between the cracks.
They also do this on the bottom of tanks that eliminated the need for substrate. However I cannot find a photo to show you all how cool this looked. I am not going to do plants so I am fine with this. The image I saw was such a cool simple and modern clean look.
I was wondering if any of you can recommend fiber glass resins that I can work with over Styrofoam that will allow me to sand in certain areas to help me get very sharp angles and be able to create slate like rock formations. I want to be able to dapple the fiberglass while I work with it and then sand it smooth in certain areas to create a very unique texture that looks very natural.
I will create the pieces to my liking and then use several nontoxic paints to color them and then I want to use an epoxy to seal it. Once cured I want to glue it on the back of the tank using aquarium safe silicone.
Here is a photo of the look I want to create:
The picture above is not exactly the look I am going for but these are the rocks. I want mine to almost look like a solid stonewall. However, there will be gaps in between the rocks and since my tank's back will be in black it will look like they are shadowed and deeper than they appear to be.
Here is another:
This one has several pieces glued together and if you notice that blue tube opening
is an intake to hide a filter.
So my questions are:
What names of brands of fiberglass can you guys recommend so that I can start googling and order? I assume that, regardless of what paint I use that after I epoxy seal it than the paint job should be safe?
Hope to get some input from you all.
Thanks!
Adrien
Here area couple by Aquaterra. They have a flat back and you silicone glue the flat portion to the back of the tank. The cool thing about it is that you leave space in between them. So if you paint the back of your tank black it gives the illusion of cracks that seem down so far and deep that it fades into black. Basically it does not look like glass. You leave about one inch or so between the cracks.
They also do this on the bottom of tanks that eliminated the need for substrate. However I cannot find a photo to show you all how cool this looked. I am not going to do plants so I am fine with this. The image I saw was such a cool simple and modern clean look.
I was wondering if any of you can recommend fiber glass resins that I can work with over Styrofoam that will allow me to sand in certain areas to help me get very sharp angles and be able to create slate like rock formations. I want to be able to dapple the fiberglass while I work with it and then sand it smooth in certain areas to create a very unique texture that looks very natural.
I will create the pieces to my liking and then use several nontoxic paints to color them and then I want to use an epoxy to seal it. Once cured I want to glue it on the back of the tank using aquarium safe silicone.
Here is a photo of the look I want to create:
The picture above is not exactly the look I am going for but these are the rocks. I want mine to almost look like a solid stonewall. However, there will be gaps in between the rocks and since my tank's back will be in black it will look like they are shadowed and deeper than they appear to be.
Here is another:
This one has several pieces glued together and if you notice that blue tube opening
is an intake to hide a filter.
So my questions are:
What names of brands of fiberglass can you guys recommend so that I can start googling and order? I assume that, regardless of what paint I use that after I epoxy seal it than the paint job should be safe?
Hope to get some input from you all.
Thanks!
Adrien