Vivarium/3d background setup

[mr cyclone]

I have trauled through lots of vivarium builds and 3D background threads , but still have some questions.
I plan on building a 3Dimensional aquaterrarium/paludarium to house some crocodile newts, I plan to incorporate slate and bathroom Tiles with expanding foam and polystyrene .My idea is to create a rock surface with multiple levels including hides and platforms to accomadate rising water levels and include shelves and planted areas
My questions are based around water sealing the polystyrene.
I don't want to use cement or pigment or anything.
I would like to hand paint the foam and coat with a sealent
Would painting the foam with Epoxy resin suffice?

 

[Chinadog]

To seal the paint in, you mean? If so, I'm not sure about the epoxy as I've never used in aquariums, but you can certainly use polyurethane varnish. I've used it to seal bogwood and stop it turning the water brown in tropical fish tanks. I'd forgotten about it until I read your post, I had to stop doing it because I realised my Pleco's were eating it!

 

[mr cyclone]

Would this mean the ramshorn snails would be eating it also?, I've never used the epoxy resin or the polyutherine stuff , obviously I want the safest robust product

 

[Chinadog]

Good point. I don't know if the snail's mouth parts would be strong enough to rasp it off, but it's a possibility for sure.The varnish itself isn't toxic once its cured but if the snails rasp through it the whole lot will go white when water gets under it.

 

[mr cyclone]

I think I am going to shape my rocks,slates etc and paint it using non toxic model paints in rock effect ,Not unlike wargames Terrain. Then I am going to use pond sealer.That is the plan at the moment. All viable links online argue between Epoxy/Cement/Silicone all of which have conflicting opinions, Also have been recommended to use Plastidip but its all so confusing

 

[BabySinclair]

Envirotex lite!!

I'm currently working on a 3d waterfall for axolotl tank. Aquarium hobbyist, especially salt water reef tanks use this stuff. They take and mix it with sand to make permanent sand beds that are easier to clean. This is usually done in small nano tanks. I had a small shrimp tank with the sand resin mixture on the bottom. It had been running for over a year with no issues. It was easy as heck to clean. Now all the shrimp are in a 20 gal, so the tank is no longer up and running. But I have yet to read about aquarist having issues with the stuff

As far as the waterfall I'm working on. I used the GS expanding foam. Carved my rocks, and what ever else. I rattle canned the entire thing with Rustolium in the colors I wanted my rocks in (non toxic when dry) I brushed on one coat of envirotex lite, dusted it with super fine white sand (super fine white sand when dusted onto wet resin kinda goes transparent and has an awesome natural stone affect) At the end of 24 hours I repeated the entire process. I did this 4 times, and then touched up the paint and crevasses and added more colors for depth. Once dry, repeat all those steps with the envirotex. I won't be finished until I have 7-8 coats of envirotex. I can post you some pictures do what I've got going on?

 

[sde]

Well, I don't know about mr cyclone, but I would love to see some pictures!

 

[mr cyclone]

I've went away and read loads of threads on several forums and I'm still neither here nor there
I've thought of expanding foam painted with acrylic model paint then coated with either pond seal (G4 pond sealer) or using epoxy resin
I have also looked at using grout for bathrooms or cement then dealing with epoxy resin.
I did want to avoid the cement option so I have decided to do two prototype rock walls both which shall be submerged in aquariums to see what happens

 

[sde]

Expanding foam can be trouble. It does shrink a bit over time, which can obviously lead to problems.
If I will ever do a background, it will probably be with Styrofoam and acrylic paint.