Vivarium build progress

[Tankfull Tropicals]

Hi all, just wanted to share a few photos of my progress on my Huge Vivarium build/ 48cu ft. I am really enjoying the build as much as anything and plan to take my time/ months not days. When I had my initial design down in my head I drew out a scale plan on a large piece of plywood; that is where I am also doing the prebuilt rock walls so I can move them to the Frame piece by piece. The funny thing is that since starting to build I have pretty much changed my building plan 3 or 4 times now. As I go I come up with better and better ideas about the layout. Here are a couple of shots of the rough Faux rock walls and the finished carving of the waterfall which I have since painted with "Drylock" for ponds. A zero oder and VOC latex waterproofer that is designed for concrete ponds. I tested it out on many different surfaces like wood, styrofoam and rubber. It seems to have stuck really well to all three. The rubber I scuffed up with some 40 grit sand paper as much as I could anne the bond is great. When this Drylok dries it feels like real stone and looks awesome to. It is tintable so I got a very light brown mixed and now am changing that to the other colours I want with Acrylic artists paints. Working great so far. More updates to follow. I just started a long twisted tree limb with reinforced spray styrofoam/ looking better than I hoped.

[Tankfull Tropicals]

​Here are the pics. I'm slow sometimes haha. Attachment 67966Attachment 67967Attachment 67968Attachment 67969

[deranged chipmunk]

I like the progress so far. The pics in the second post didn't show up .
Can we see a pic of that planted tank in the background too???

[Tankfull Tropicals]

April 28th. 2014 progress. Finished with all the foam applying, now comes the fun part of carving and painting. I built the rock wall background in three prefab sections rather than in the actual Vivarium itself. This allows me to place them any way I want for carving and painting and to test the water flow on the waterfall before I install it. The tree branches still need some foam work as well.

[deranged chipmunk]

Excellent progress! That's a buttload of carving!!


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[Tankfull Tropicals]

Thanks Bill. I have been breeding endangered fish species for yrs. and have just given it up for a Vivarium. Time to slow down and enjoy the Jungle a bit. That tank in the background and another 135 gallon are all that is left of the 42 tanks I had set up in my living room haha. Here are a few pics of these last two tanks and a bucket full shot of some Chocolate Zebra > Plecostomus I was breeding too.

[deranged chipmunk]

I did the same thing. Kept aquatics for about 30 years. Had about 20 tanks going at once (mostly for shrimp) but needed the slower pace of the vivariums. I still keep a planted tank, just to keep the skills up lol

The Goldie's look very happy having all that vegetation to lunch on. and I love the chocolate zebras. Awesome!!


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