How to make your own reef rocks
- Thread starter Chrisshoup420
- Start date
Yes, I would think it is not that easy to make your own rock. You would want rock that are somewhat porous or have a lot of nooks/crannies to maximize your surface area for bacteria to grow. If it is one solid piece of cement, I don't think it would be very good to host bacteria.
If cost is the issue, then it is better to just scavenge the classifieds or start a WTB thread on dead rock that people are getting rid of....and then glue these together using E-Marco cement to form your own scape. But starting with real live rocks shortcuts a lot of time to maturity.
If cost is the issue, then it is better to just scavenge the classifieds or start a WTB thread on dead rock that people are getting rid of....and then glue these together using E-Marco cement to form your own scape. But starting with real live rocks shortcuts a lot of time to maturity.
This a 1000%! Just bleach the rock to get rid of organic material, maybe acid wash briefly if the outer layer is filled with crap, then seed it with AquaBiomics reef rubble and sand. This is the only way (besides using my own ocean live rock) to seed fresh or uncured rock. There’s no need to wait an entire year on dry rock to mature. That’s the biggest mistake noobs make with dry rock, not cleaning it properly and seeding it.
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What is the goal of going this? Save money? Make custom shapes sizes arches etc? Too much time on your hands? lol j/k. Seriously though, working with cement is not like working with clay. It's messy and it weighs A LOT more by volume compared to natural reef rock. If you had rubber molds that might work but you still won't get the porosity of natural rock. I have seen people use cement to plaster the back wall to create a wall effect which seems like a more applicable use case. But like others have mentioned cure time, contaminants etc are all considerations. I agree the others, stock up on "used" rock.
None of us know how to make artificial rocks. LOL.
You will have to experiment and probably get some fancy equipment to make similar rocks as the big company. I feel like they have moved onto not using only cement. And some must have introduced a reaction based or air bubble into their rocks as some are very light (i.e. QM eco rocks).
If you know what you want, you can create it yourself with dead rocks (break them into smaller pieces) and then use glue/e-marco 400 to glue all the pieces together into your dream structure. At a fraction of the cost for someone else to do it for you. But if you want someone else to make it for you, then yeah, you gonna have to pay a premium.
You will have to experiment and probably get some fancy equipment to make similar rocks as the big company. I feel like they have moved onto not using only cement. And some must have introduced a reaction based or air bubble into their rocks as some are very light (i.e. QM eco rocks).
If you know what you want, you can create it yourself with dead rocks (break them into smaller pieces) and then use glue/e-marco 400 to glue all the pieces together into your dream structure. At a fraction of the cost for someone else to do it for you. But if you want someone else to make it for you, then yeah, you gonna have to pay a premium.
Totally get wanting to make it custom, but note that a company is likely to not be molding them but rather breaking up pieces and gluing them and using rods and stuff. Not making with Portland cement (probably, but please correct me).
I'm guessing if your estimate is 2k you're in the 120 gallon range, give or take 25 gallons. my suggestion assuming 100 gallons == 100 pounds: 75 pounds from breakdown/garage sale at say ~3$/pound = $225. Bleach & dump in a brute (drexel's advice), this is relatively dead rock so feel free break apart & cement as desired to make your structures. This makes base structure, then get ~15 pounds of live rock from your favorite clean LFS at say $10/lb = 150 and another 10lb of good ocean farmed stuff like the Aussie rock from Tankstop for like $30/lb = 300. Attach this onto your base structure with superglue or whatever, boom, custom structure for total $600 = average $6/lb and you get a mix of good rock types. Boiling that down, get most of your rock cheap and put it together yourself like the company would do, then use savings to get good live rock.
To Discotu's point, cement is SUPER heavy so you will find volume-wise, unless you like extreme NSA, that you need more lb/gallon. and suddenly your tank is a lot heavier, more weight on bottom glass, etc. Some things you could try (haven't done in aquariums but have done in other cement projects):
* negative molds / voids (put in small balloons, ping pong balls, etc that you can remove later or don't care about (ping pong balls) to lighten it up
* Cement needs aggregate, so you can use lighter aggegates than sand. I like those little styrofoam ~2mm balls - imagine shredding hard styrofoam board. To not look super ugly and have escapees floating around your water looking like the pacific garbage patch, you would need to basically do a plaster coat on top.
edit: underscoring how long you'll need to cure it with vinegar / other weak acids to make it safe for organisms, then remember the extra weight of cement vs porous aragonite rock is a tank safety consideration
I'm guessing if your estimate is 2k you're in the 120 gallon range, give or take 25 gallons. my suggestion assuming 100 gallons == 100 pounds: 75 pounds from breakdown/garage sale at say ~3$/pound = $225. Bleach & dump in a brute (drexel's advice), this is relatively dead rock so feel free break apart & cement as desired to make your structures. This makes base structure, then get ~15 pounds of live rock from your favorite clean LFS at say $10/lb = 150 and another 10lb of good ocean farmed stuff like the Aussie rock from Tankstop for like $30/lb = 300. Attach this onto your base structure with superglue or whatever, boom, custom structure for total $600 = average $6/lb and you get a mix of good rock types. Boiling that down, get most of your rock cheap and put it together yourself like the company would do, then use savings to get good live rock.
To Discotu's point, cement is SUPER heavy so you will find volume-wise, unless you like extreme NSA, that you need more lb/gallon. and suddenly your tank is a lot heavier, more weight on bottom glass, etc. Some things you could try (haven't done in aquariums but have done in other cement projects):
* negative molds / voids (put in small balloons, ping pong balls, etc that you can remove later or don't care about (ping pong balls) to lighten it up
* Cement needs aggregate, so you can use lighter aggegates than sand. I like those little styrofoam ~2mm balls - imagine shredding hard styrofoam board. To not look super ugly and have escapees floating around your water looking like the pacific garbage patch, you would need to basically do a plaster coat on top.
edit: underscoring how long you'll need to cure it with vinegar / other weak acids to make it safe for organisms, then remember the extra weight of cement vs porous aragonite rock is a tank safety consideration
I think (but not 100% certain) that some of these companies use molds to cast aragonite and or coral sand by soaking in a low ph solution so all the material binds together. Once cured they can pull the cast out of the mold and voila you have rocks made essentially of natural rock. You can't get all the nooks and crannies due to the limitations of undercuts etc but it's super porous which is want you want.
