how to stand up pukani rock towers

[hoooop54]

I have 3 beautiful pukani rock towers that I want to have standing tall. I have cut the bottom of each so they are flat. I want to make sure they will stay standing up. I was thinking about putting egg crate on the bottom of the tank and then zip tying the rocks to the crate. If I had a large egg crate piece and 3 rocks attached, I think that would hold them. Any thoughts? What are people's thoughts of having egg crate on the tank bottom. I will have a 1 - 1.5" sandbed. Are there any concerns with the egg crate in the sand?

[jerpa]

You can use egg crate under your sand. It is a common practice. I would look into attaching a piece of pvc pipe or acrylic rod to the egg crate, drilling a hole in the bottom of the pukani, and setting it on the pvc or acrylic. This will make it much easier to remove the rock if necessary. Your original plan will work as well.

[mc-cro]

I would be afraid the egg crate would break too easily. I would get a piece of starboard or sheet pvc or something else that wont get brittle and break if the rock is pushed or manhandled while messing with frags.

I used large flat heavy base rocks, drilled holes down into them, and then drilled holes into my pukani, and used rods

[ACBlinky]

Same here. Cut fiberglass driveway markers, small-diameter PVC pipe or similar material to the right height, drill the rocks, thread them onto the rods, and either seat them into a large, flat rock drilled partway through or a platform made of HDPE, plexi, slate, etc.

[Dbondaruk]

Is it safe to place PVC trim boards on bottom? Will they leach anything

[pciscott]

I have used both Acrylic rods, and fiberglass shaft of reflector from Home Depot. In my opinion both flex too much for large rock pieces. If you use 3/4" PVC you can drill your rock with a hammer drill and a 1 1/16 to 1 1/8 hole saw without the center bit. It will go through live rock like butter and when it bottoms out use a flat head screw driver to break out the center and then go in deeper if you need too. PVC is much cheaper and tends not to bend as easy, for really big rocks you could bump up to schedule 80.

Anyways the main tip here is a standard hole saw on a hammer drill cuts through live rock quickly and PVC is cheap compared to other composite rods.

[ashish]

Send me a picture of your base rock.
I am a aquascaping master...! =)

[ashish]

If your towers are safe and secure (which they should be). I would not worry about anything else. Don't you have a base structure supporting the pvc?

[RocketEngineer]

I used five pieces to make one structure at the end of my tank:

Piece 1:
http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/Piece1.jpg

Piece 2:
http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/Piece2.jpg

Piece 3:
http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/Piece3.jpg

Piece 4:
http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/Piece4.jpg[/QUOTE]

Piece 5:
http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/Piece5.jpg

[RocketEngineer]

Resulting Tower:
http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/RockColumn1013.jpg

http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/RockColumn1014.jpg

http://i299.photobucket.com/albums/mm289/RocketEngineer/125G%20Setup/RockColumn1015.jpg

Being free standing, I was able to move it once I had it in my tank. This helped when I place the rest of the rock in the tank and came up just a little short.

Hope that helps.

[ashish]

You got the right idea...the pukani rock you have is far more easier to aquascape with then the rock I removed and bleached from my tank.,.(aiptasia covered). Just make sure you get it right. I am still not happy with mine as I don't have enough room for corals on the bottom. But it's still provides a nice ledge for sps corals with high flow and lighting.

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[ashish]

Pukani rock is awesome; blends in easily and easy to drill. One of my customers just gave me a 18lb piece of base rock.. Unfortunately, he was 1 month to late =( this rock would have been perfect for me. This rock has an awesome overhang if I used a rod. I don't have enough space in my 120 for all these rocks & definately don't want to start moving corals again. I plan on saving it for next tank..

I would play around with the pukani rock some more, take pictures from different angles. You might find something you like better after reviewing the pictures. Though I think you can't go wrong with what you've done, theres always room for improvement.
I like your first picture the most (but all 3 look to much alike). On the second picture, I would switch one of the bottom (flat pieces) with the top piece. You'll get an awesome overhang and less rock on the bottom. You could even have one rock (flatter piece) with hole towards the right side (not drilled in center) - Creating a longer overhang. Don't hesitate to cut some of the rock to make it fit better "Make sense?"
give it a try


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[ashish]

From your first question you don't need to use eggcrate, You have enough PVC support on the bottom. if you are scared the structure might tumble buy tube of epoxy from wal-mart (aquamend or loctite) It's safe its in my tank and I did a lot of annoying research to make sure it was safe. Glue some of your rocks to the PVC pipe, this way you have a little more piece of mind. I am using heavy duty Plastic hangers (which are also verys trong), but not as strong as PVC

[hoooop54]

The two towers I am going to use are two big pukani rocks, one 15lbs, one 25lbs. They are top heavy, but have a flat bottom. I want them to be on the bottom, no additional rocks below. I can definitely drill a hole and put PVC, I am just not sure what to anchor them to.

[ashish]

This 3 part articles are great and I think you'll get some good ideas (assuming you haven't read it). The last link uses the same rock and PVC structure(wider pvc base) your using.

http://www.reefsmagazine.com/forum/reefs-magazine/100520-aesthetics-aquascaping.html
http://www.reefsmagazine.com/forum/reefs-magazine/111388-aesthetics-aquascaping-part-2-a.html
http://www.reefsmagazine.com/forum/reefs-magazine/119589-aesthetics-aquascaping-iii.html

[hoooop54]

Thanks Ashish, I have not seen these. I am thinking I will try the pvc to hold the structure.