Is anyone else making DIY Rocks?

[oldbrownies]

Is anyone making DIY rocks, I'm just fishing for ideas about peoples ways of making them...

I've used to recipes, one for base rock:
1-2 Parts cement
1 Part Coral sand
1-2 Parts Aragonite
2 Parts Rocksalt

I made some by laying out 18X8-10 inch slabs of this mix about an inch thick, with areas covered in rock salt and areas that would connect to the next layer (to create short and wide caves though the rock) then smashing it into 8-12 inch chunks after it dried and it came out pretty realistic looking, half way between regular base rock and haitian rock. The with caves and stuff, before i smashed it up, it just looked like an ugly rock with slices through it, but with good flow through the rock itself... Its REALY rough.


Recipe two was for branchy stuff
2-3 parts cement
2 parts aragonite
2 Parts coral sand
1 part rock salt

Mixed pretty wet, but controllable, and piped with a plastic bag (like a pastry bag). and layered over aragonite sand, with multiple layers of branches and holes though the rock... this batch is still drying, but i expect it to be like a stiff matrix of rock, not as good flow through the rock though because of the added cement, but it should be more complex in shape


I don't have a camera, but I will see if i can't get ahold of one soon.

[H20cooled]

I tried it once, but it takes a lot of playing with to get it right. Anther cool thing to do is add rit dye to get a nice purple color...

[siskiou]

Pictures, please! :)

I'm waffling between wanting to try DIY rocks or getting cheap base rock and building nice structures out of them with epoxy.
It looks really great in Iwan's new tank (a guy from Switzerland, thread is on RC). I stumbled across his thread yesterday, and he did a great job. Of course, he's got plenty of corals to cover up his rock with, so it doesn't matter what it looks like! :D

[impur]

I'm gonna make a bunch for my tank, but need to get the tank up first. I'll probably start making my rock next month.

[siskiou]

What kind of cost will the DIY be, approximately?

I'm trying to decide between diy and base rock.

[Michael7979]

Ask Mr S, they do it for one of his class projects.

[oldbrownies]

Cement about 5 bucks
rock salt about 5 bucks
8 pounds coral "sand" 10 bucks
30 pounds of oolite (i have like 15-20 extra pounds) 30 bucks

pretty cheap, just takes some time to cure, you have to make sure that the rock salt disolves, and that the alk of the water in the cuing tank drops to a safe level

[R-3]

I think the hard part of it is getting the "shaping" down. Its not really the cost. Some people are getting really good at it though. Later Ryan

[Mr S]

We make rock at school. I don't follow any of those recipes. I use Portland Cement, Oyster shells and acrylic shavings. The acrylic shavings make the rock lighter and stronger. I just eyeball the mixture til it is the consistency I like. I then do wacky stuff with it like pouring it over an inflated rubber glove. Makes for lots of caverns and caves. You can shape it all sorts of ways. The main thing is that you need to cure it for awhile after you make it. There are several ways of curing. I am patient about this so I just put it in fresh water with a powerhead and change the water at least once a week. Some people add vinegar to speed up the process but I dont. Hope this helps. I think we could possibly do a rock making workshop at my classroom some Saturday or Sunday if there is enough interest.

[oldbrownies]

with smaller rocks i just put em in the toilet tank, so every time it flushes they get a fresh change of water

[Mr S]

i do that with frag plugs

[180Bob]

We make rock at school. I don't follow any of those recipes. I use Portland Cement, Oyster shells and acrylic shavings. The acrylic shavings make the rock lighter and stronger. I just eyeball the mixture til it is the consistency I like. I then do wacky stuff with it like pouring it over an inflated rubber glove. Makes for lots of caverns and caves. You can shape it all sorts of ways. The main thing is that you need to cure it for awhile after you make it. There are several ways of curing. I am patient about this so I just put it in fresh water with a powerhead and change the water at least once a week. Some people add vinegar to speed up the process but I dont. Hope this helps. I think we could possibly do a rock making workshop at my classroom some Saturday or Sunday if there is enough interest.

Where do you get the acrylic shavings? Also do you use the cement that I can find a home depot. Have you used the white mortar that you use for laying tile? I'm hoping to try to make some diy rock this coming weekend.

Bob

[Ronjunior]

Where do you get the acrylic shavings? Also do you use the cement that I can find a home depot. Have you used the white mortar that you use for laying tile? I'm hoping to try to make some diy rock this coming weekend.

Bob

Garf's mixture uses plastic shavings too, they say it promotes coraline growth like crazy.
I'd call a plastic shop and see if they can sweep the floor under the saw and put in a bag for you. I can't imagine it would cost anything. If you really want a DIY, get scraps and make your own shavings with a router table or saw....

[oldbrownies]

instead of plastic shavings I used a rough cheap "coral sand" from petco, it grows coralines like crazy too, alot faster than the rocks I made without the sand. if you can't find shavings its a good alternative

[180Bob]

All:

Thanks for your help with DIY rock recipes and comments. We have finished making about 125lbs of rock. Here are a couple pictures. We ended up deciding on the following recipe:
1 part type I/II cement : 3parts crushed oyster shell : ~1.5 parts H2O. This seemed to give a relatively porous yet strong rock. One thing that we found that made the rock more natural looking was to completely cover it in a mixture of crushed oyster shells and argonite sand after the rock structure was formed. This way the rocks were coated and it did not look like grey cement. Our rock has been curing for about 3 weeks now. Doing water changes twice a week. The PH started out above 12 and has now dropped into the 9's.

[impur]

That turned out great Bob!!!! I'm just gathering the oyster shells and cement hopefully this weekend to try some stuff out.

[180Brandy]

Dont forget the balloons that way you can make cool caves and arches.

[Holly]

Wow , that looks GREAT! I've saved your recipe in case I might try to do that later on. Nice!

[oldbrownies]

No rock salt for to make the rock more porus?

[180Brandy]

No rock salt for to make the rock more porus?
For to make the rock more porous I did try rock salt and pasta. The rock salt didn't seem to make much difference and the pasta made the rock mushy. Maybe I used too much pasta. As it is, it is pretty porous. If I get a chance I will try to measure the density of the rock I made and compare it with some natural base rock that I have setting around.

Bob

[oldbrownies]

I hear pasta swells and breaks the rock, and it leaves nutrients in it, I've done it with and without rock salt (about 1/3 to just under 1/2 of the mix was salt) and the rock salt stuff is doing much better in my tanks, its covered in pods, sponges, tunicates, coralines, and worms and all that stuff, but the stuff without it only has coraline, since nothing can get into it to grow