High Tide Aquatics

Frag plugs

Designed and printed up some test pieces for new plugs.

The blue ones are a little bigger, take up a square and a half in each direction so they sit flush next to each other on egg crate.

Next one is bigger so each plug covers 9 squares of egg crate and two still sit flush.

Round and square tile molds are printed.... Just waiting on material that probably won't be here for two weeks. I can get some myself if I feel like driving 4 hours to pick it up :(
 
I always forget the pictures....
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Something to think about: Frag plugs that fit the plastic lighting grid better.
Seems like the little round part is a bit too small.
And since you 3D print mold, perhaps square, not round.
 
I also don't like the thick stem because they are hard to cut.

I'm using this material because I can make thin pieces that are still strong. It's considerably more expensive than Portland cement.
 
I'm not a fan of snug fitting stems, or square stems for that matter. I've had my share of frustrations with plugs that *almost* fit in certain frag racks as well as times that I've had to get a vermetid snail shell to fit through the square hole on removing a plug that's been in place for a while. My coral transport container is designed for round stems, and I routinely use rotating plugs around to get more frags in the same space.
This is a bit in contradiction of your square plugs (I'm a big fan of that for encrusting things), but in my case I would still need to fit them in the transporter container which only grips round plugs.
 
Very nice work
Ill be testing this out and see what i get personally i want something that can have good flow and can break easily to continue to frag
 
I haven't been updating this thread enough.

So, with the masteremaco n 400 material I have found a few things. Compared to Portland or white cement, this material will break a little easier.

I talked with my buddy that owns a concrete company and does a bunch of decorative concrete work (including the universal studio theme park in Singapore) to get mixtures right.

This material sets quickly so I have to run small batches.

For plugs, I use fine grade aragonite sand as filler. For discs I use coarse sand.

I'll post recipes next
 
For plugs, I use 4oz of concrete, 1oz of fine sand and around 1oz of acrylic polymer water mixture (3:1 water:acrylic concentrate).

For discs/tiles I use 4oz of cement, 2oz of coarse reef sand and a little more than an oz of polymer.
 
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