My first nano-paludarium (femto would be more correct) being quite successful, I'm building another one, a little bit more complex... I definitely like this idea of "bonsaï paludarium"!

The main idea is to make it just a little bit bigger, while still keeping it aesthetic. Here are the specifications for this baby :

• Background made of extruded polystyrene foam (like Styrodur©, or Styrofoam©) with a waterfall,
• Pump and filter integrated into the background,
• Allow background disassembly for easier pump/filter maintenance,
• Fogger integrated into the background,
• Not a single visible wire.

The pump is obviously necessary for the waterfall, but by adding a filtering system, I should keep the water clean... So I expect I'll be able to add some fauna : one or two shrimps, maybe a Betta... Well, this will be a much later concern!

Here we go, first step, building the background. I've made a test with some spray-can expansive foam, but the result was just crap (intern structure way too heterogeneous)... Grand cleaning of the tank, and starting again from scratch using several polyurethane isolating 40mm thick panes glued together:

Sculpture :

The tough job, you guessed it, is carving the form out of the extruded polystyrene foam, making it as realistic as possible.

I've tried using several different tools, but looks like only two of them actually do work fine : first, a cutter with a brand new blade (important), second, a piece of aluminium tubing on which I filed sharp one end, using it as a die cutter. This is very efficient to make round holes (for cabling, water input/outputs, etc...), but as well to dig the larger holes for the plants.
Beside the littles pieces of foam sticking to you fingers because of static, this is a pretty pleasant to work with material, it even gave me a lot of ideas for future projects...

Whatever the method you use, the final objective is to get a natural aspect, i.e. a chaotic surface, without any flat part from the original polystyrene pane left... In my case, this process took me more than 4 hours of work! Don't hesitate gluing more blocks onto your background, adding more relief to it, making the whole thing more irregular and natural..

Paint job :

Now that the form is carved out, let's paint it. It allows having a background color, and making the whole thing "cleaner"... Acrylic paint, a brush, and go!
Well, on my side, I over-did it : reflections, highlights, shadows, etc... But finally all this will disappear with the final step!

Resining :

Next step is resining : the whole form is coated with epoxy resin (do not use polyester resin, the extruded polystyrene foam would melt). Three to four coats of resin will be necessary to avoid water from getting in contact with the foam : indeed, when in presence of water, this later releases styrene, a toxic compound for fauna and flora in the tank...

Sanding :

Last step : sanding.
When I brush the latest coat of resin, and before this is dry, I cover it up with sand. It will stick to the resin, the sand giving a "natural stone" look to the realization.

I did two successive sandings, as I was not satisfied with the result after the first one. I sift my sand for the second sanding process, in order to keep only fine sand. Then, you let everything dry, and here it is :

Result :

Here is the final result, dropped into its tank... Phew, looks nice, I did not screw everything!


Well, now, let's wait a few days for the resin to deeply dry, so that there's no toxic fumes getting out of it... Next, let's integrate all this into the tank, silicon gluing the lower part, building the dividers for the filter...

More to see on next episode!

A Nano Paludarium... What the hell is that??

A paludarium, from the latin Palus (swamp), is also named aquaterrarium. This is a tank with an aquatic part, and a terrestrial part, aiming at reproducing a whole ecosystem.

I discovered paludariums when I found the "écosculptures" of Paul-Louis Duranton (make sure you don't miss the "Vulcan Island").

Most of the paludariums reproduce a tropical ecosystem, or mangrove swamp like. It allows growing plants that require lots of humidity and heat (orchids, mosses, ferns, epiphytes...), and eventually associate to them the related fauna : fishes, amphibians (tritons, salamanders), invertebrates (crabs, shrimps), batrachians (dendrobates)... In brief, some kind of a small bit of jungle at home!

I've got in mind some "serious" tank for a while... But just for fun, I made a planted nano-tank (well, due to its size, I should probably say pico-paludarium, or even femto-paludarium!), and I'm pretty happy with the result! The tank is a vase (25x15x15cm) bought at the local superstore... The stone, I found it 3 years ago while walking around the Cap d'Antibes (already thinking about such a usage!)... 2 cm of river sand and loam to feed the aquatic plants, 2 more centimeters of bigger sand for the aspect...

For the look and hygronometry, I added an ultrasonic fogger. It's the little chromed cylinder hidden behind the stone... It automatically starts every 4 hours, and during 15 minutes. Beyond the aesthetics, it increases the hygrométry in the tank, as well as the water temperature (the fogger heats up while running).
Isn't it lovely? Lighting is done with a low tension halogen lamp, mounted on an homemade aluminium U shape, clamped on the tank's side...



Here we are... I'm really happy with the overall look of it, and for now it looks like the plants like it as well... Some Java moss (Vesicularia dubyana), and some duckweed (lemna minor) will come later to finalize it...
Next step? Hummmm, well, I'm not sure yet, I could have something more complex in mind...

Just a few pictures of my latest realisation...

I had those two headlights getting dusty on a rack for a longtime...

Then I got inspired, and putting together some spare parts I had under my bench, I built this lamp within an hour... And I'm kind of proud of it!

The chromed base has been hacked from a lamp I wasn't using for years... The switch on the bigger headlight is functionnal, selecting high/low beam... A 6 volts transformer behind, and here we are!

I still have to finalize it, adding a general switch, cleaning the cabling stuff... Maybe replacing the smaller light with a chromed one, or even polish this aluminium one...

But it's already on my desk, and I like it a lot... Nice, uh?

Click on all of the 4 pictures to see them full size...

I had this idea in mind for quite a long time. I had seen such lamps in an American series, can't remember which one... Friends maybe?

After month staring at eBay to find a pair of headlights with the correct aspect, chromed, and for an affordable price, I finally found those babies for 30 euros at a scrap merchant at 5 minutes driving from home! Don't know the origin of these, probably Renault during the 40's...

These 2 headlights are exactly like I wanted them, with only a few rust spots on their back. The building process can start!

Here we go! My workbench gets covered with some fine wood dust... I keep on cutting pin wood for the tripod...
3 parts parts per foot, 3 feet per lamp, 2 lamps... It makes 18 parts to cut, sand, drill, adjust! The only tricky part : the tripod's "head", just under the headlight. Well, tricky, but not that much neither... Here are all the parts needed to assemble a lamp : the 9 parts of pine wood, the tripod head, some screws and bolts... And 12 aluminium plates to cut, grind and drill! First assembly, just to double check... OK, I'm happy with it! I still have to put some varnish on these babies... I decided to use a mahogany colored varnish which looks nothing but superb. On the other hand, it's bothersome to brush : 3 coats with fine-sanding all the parts (18 parts!) between each layer... That's long...
Here, the first batch is quietly drying... The tripod's head receives some varnish as well... These are the aluminium plates used to adjust the tripod's feet length. The process is fucking boring, but it's worth it! Isn't my first foot beautiful?? Carry on, 5 more to do... Finally, assembling the first lamp... And... Let there be light!
I used some shower chromed tube to put around the alimentation cable, which sticks to the vintage overall look...

And here is the result! Achieved in a few hours of woodworking, plus some patience, I've got great vintage styled lamps! I Love'em...