Second level material help?

[Sunflowerparty420]

Hey guys, so I have a 40 gal breeder and two eccies. One of them has just come up from molting, the other is still underground so I wanted to get everything prepared for the reset so once she comes up it's ready to be installed.

I want to do some kind of a second level, but one that's a little more hut-like and can be crawled on from every angle. I had a second level made of eggcrate but they could only walk on the top and I want to make it a little more extravagant this time (also the command hooks stopped supporting it after a while). I was thinking of molding it with some kind of crab safe wire and wrapping it with moss all around, but I need it to be able to support itself and I don't know which wire will be safe for them. I've thought about using foam and cement like reptile owners use for their tank deco but is that safe for them?

Does anyone have any ideas? Anything is appreciated!

[PinchersAndShells]

Many people have used Great Stuff foam covered in 100% Silicone for backgrounds in crab tanks. One of the admins worked with making a cement background and could probably explain that better than I could. @aussiejjdude

[aussieJJDude]

Many people have used Great Stuff foam covered in 100% Silicone for backgrounds in crab tanks. One of the admins worked with making a cement background and could probably explain that better than I could. @aussiejjdude

Thanks! It's not really that's complex after reading a few articles! The hardest part is actually doing it on your own tank, since if you stuff up, it's a little to perment to change easily.


Basically, with expanding foam and cement, what you want to do is use eggcrate to hold it into place. I was going to silicone my eggcrate into place, but I found cutting it to the internal dimensions of the tank and wedging it did the trick.

From there, you'll also want to make some levels. Could words of advice, plan the levels roughly 1.5x bigger than you want, the foam will cover a lot of useable space and its something I would do differently if I plan to so it the second time. I found ziptie-ing peices of (scrap) eggcrate is the best thing to ensure structural integrity. Be creative with this, and you can ziptie eggcrate at various angles to create ramps, or even 'lips' for second levels, areas for EE 'planters' or moss ledges.


FOAMING is the fun part. Be careful, expanding foam expands a lot. While you do want to carve it, you dont want to carve a lot of it (my poor wrists still feel it!). You can always touch up areas that didnt foam well after you carve it (the smooth surface doesnt bond well... hence the reason why you want to carve, cement will not bond to the smooth surface!


Cement layer goes on next. Depending on the thickness, you'll want to do at least a couple of coats to ensure its properly covered. On mine, I did around 3 coats all over to ensure it was covered well, and in the problem areas I had to do an additional 2 or more coats.... I found mixing small amounts of gravel, rocks and sands also add a bit of texture and dimension, especially in the later layers.

(Do want to stress, first layer - or more - should basically be water like cement, and then every additional layer on top build up the viscosity until the cement feels like cement. This ensure it bonds well to the foam, getting in all the pores.)

After cementing, I washed mine with vinegar to remove the majority of the carbonates in the cement. This was purely my additional step, and not really required. But it helped extract a large amount of the calcium carbonate (which is a whitish powder) which could then be dusted off. Once it was dry, I I siliconing a mix of coconut fiber and bark to various locations for texture (and was planning on growing mosses in these locations, I later found out my crabitat is too dry for mosses to thrive, since they really do enjoy moisture (basically saturated).

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

[Sunflowerparty420]

Thanks! It's not really that's complex after reading a few articles! The hardest part is actually doing it on your own tank, since if you stuff up, it's a little to perment to change easily.


Basically, with expanding foam and cement, what you want to do is use eggcrate to hold it into place. I was going to silicone my eggcrate into place, but I found cutting it to the internal dimensions of the tank and wedging it did the trick.

From there, you'll also want to make some levels. Could words of advice, plan the levels roughly 1.5x bigger than you want, the foam will cover a lot of useable space and its something I would do differently if I plan to so it the second time. I found ziptie-ing peices of (scrap) eggcrate is the best thing to ensure structural integrity. Be creative with this, and you can ziptie eggcrate at various angles to create ramps, or even 'lips' for second levels, areas for EE 'planters' or moss ledges.


FOAMING is the fun part. Be careful, expanding foam expands a lot. While you do want to carve it, you dont want to carve a lot of it (my poor wrists still feel it!). You can always touch up areas that didnt foam well after you carve it (the smooth surface doesnt bond well... hence the reason why you want to carve, cement will not bond to the smooth surface!


Cement layer goes on next. Depending on the thickness, you'll want to do at least a couple of coats to ensure its properly covered. On mine, I did around 3 coats all over to ensure it was covered well, and in the problem areas I had to do an additional 2 or more coats.... I found mixing small amounts of gravel, rocks and sands also add a bit of texture and dimension, especially in the later layers.

(Do want to stress, first layer - or more - should basically be water like cement, and then every additional layer on top build up the viscosity until the cement feels like cement. This ensure it bonds well to the foam, getting in all the pores.)

After cementing, I washed mine with vinegar to remove the majority of the carbonates in the cement. This was purely my additional step, and not really required. But it helped extract a large amount of the calcium carbonate (which is a whitish powder) which could then be dusted off. Once it was dry, I I siliconing a mix of coconut fiber and bark to various locations for texture (and was planning on growing mosses in these locations, I later found out my crabitat is too dry for mosses to thrive, since they really do enjoy moisture (basically saturated).

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

Oh wow thank you!!! I'm pumped that that'll be safe for them, I was really hoping it would be I'll have to read up on it for sure!! And luckily I have a LOT of eggcrate left over lol