Reptile & Amphibian Forums

So far I have constructed the base and walls of my enclosure. It is 6 1/2 ft by 3 1/2 ft by 6 ft. I have foam sandwhched between 3/4 in plywood and 1/4 in or so luan. The base is sitting on 18 in 4 x 4s. It is already heavy.

I am wondering if it wood be better to make rock walls out of plaster or foam. I want to build the walls with ledges and possibly planters, but I am not sure if the foam would be rigid enough.
I was going to attach scrap pieces of wood to the walls, cover it with hardware cloth, apply the plaster and then seal it.
I guess one idea would be to make a frame on the walls where the ledges and planters will be to attach the foam to make it more rigid. And then seal it.

What would you suggest?

here is a pic of what it looks like when u make fake rock out of great stuff foam. its painted with stone fleck paint from home depot. after it cures its stronger than i thought it would be and could easily support itself it you made a ledge out of it. its kinda like a foam football and its kinda hard to tear.
it doesnt look like regular rock, but rather like the rock found in caves and caverns

is fleckstone paint very safe? could water run safely across this without wearing it down or polluting the water? just wondering cause i think that looks awesome and am considering it for some of my tanks

You simply sprayed Great Stuff all over and let it dry? Huh! Did ya? Did ya, huh! That sounds sssooooooooooooooooooooooooo simple! It looks fantastic! Any tips on using this method cuz I'm gonna do it. That looks awsome!
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DZ

well this is an old project i did that i have since scrapped, but the way i did the foam worked. i scrapped this one because it was in a mesh reptaruim cage.

i took chicken wire and formed it how i wanted, and covered the back with paper.

then i simply covered it with foam, let it cure and painted it.

because it was made out of the cage and then added in i had problems with space behind that something cound get stuck in.

recently i have been using this method in glass aquaria(im saving for woodworking tools to build my own stuff)I spray the foam directly on the glass but instead of painting, i use brown silicone covered in coco-bedding.i smear the silicone on small areas at a time and sprinkle the coco bedding on. it dries and has a great texture and hold up well to moisture since the coco bedding wont break down.

for the question about how safe fleck paint is in the water.. if you look really close at the fake rock pic, you can see that where the small pond is i siliconed in plastic. i wasnt sure how well it held up under water. i posted that question on here last week but had no response.

i have posted this pic before but this is what it looks like when the foam is covered with silicone and coco-bedding. i used black silicone here as it was before i so very happily found the brown silicone.

Man, that was sooooo easy! I decorated a hide with it for my ball pythons. The only trick is, the Great stuff expands even more as it dries. I used "Space Invaders" before for sealing air leaks but it expanded right away. With this project I tried to form it after it started to set. It pulled away from the wood a little but I was able to slop it back on. It roughened the surface but when I got up this morning, it expanded more and smoothed itself out. Oh well, it's my first attempt and it looks way better than a wooden box!

Thanx for the help man!
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DZ
1.0.0 Burm, Moses
0.0.2 Ball, Chico & Chewy (rescue, many scars)
0.2.0 Cats, Merideth & Hannah
1.0.0 Dog, Pivo (tumor in liver, will uethenized Oct 23)
Lotsa fish
1.4.0 Rats
0.2.0 Humans (a little obnoxious though)