Prepping for a BCI - time to build a Bio Active Enclosure ...

[JibbaJabba]

The hardest bit is to dry the bloomin' substrate for the background .. It's been drying for three weeks now. Thankfully the weather picked up so the top layer dries within minutes. Even so, for two days I keep mixing it and it never seem to dry properly .. We shall see.

[JibbaJabba]

First out of five boards done prepping for silicone. Decided to pick it off by hand - a lot easier and not messy. And it gives it a bit of randomness



The good thing is that the viv is not yet in use so I put the substrate for the background into the viv and will silicone / substrate the boards inside it - leaves the mess out of the rest of the house.

[JibbaJabba]

First one covered ... holy bleep does that require a lot of silicone ... One panel = three tubs .... Glad I bought 24 or so but still .... somewhat unexpected ... and I still got gaps on this one

[Bogertophis]

Looking great though!

[JibbaJabba]

I think 98% of spots covered - pretty proud of my very first background if I am honest.

[JibbaJabba]

Oh and the sides are not covered on purpose. Once the panels are mounted in the viv I will close the gaps with foam and effectively connect the panels and viv itself in addition to the screws (and cover said screws of course).

The good thing is that I know where the screws are (in fact I will make a picture once hung up and pre-coverage) so I can take a knife to if boards need to come off.

[JibbaJabba]

Mock up time. As mentioned I want a pool area lol - maybe waterfall ... anyway ... mocked the basin up (40x50x15cm or 15.7x19.6x6")



That's 30 litres or 6.6 UK / 8 UK gallons

It will have a drain and pump with filter - assuming I go with waterfall - not 100% yet ... I got all the material but need to mock that also up to decide.

PS: That isn't the substrate for the snake - that's background soil as I am using the viv to build those.

[JibbaJabba]

Background panels done. Now time to connect them

[JibbaJabba]

Mock up time. As mentioned I want a pool area lol - maybe waterfall ... anyway ... mocked the basin up (40x50x15cm or 15.7x19.6x6")



That's 30 litres or 6.6 UK / 8 UK gallons

It will have a drain and pump with filter - assuming I go with waterfall - not 100% yet ... I got all the material but need to mock that also up to decide.

PS: That isn't the substrate for the snake - that's background soil as I am using the viv to build those.

Acrylic for waterbowl arrived. Hole for drain a bit too small so need to widen it but apart from that - looking good.

[JibbaJabba]

First time I created a background with foam. Or any background for that matter.
And at the same time potentially one of the larger ones ...

The whole thing including sides is 12' long and 2.5' high.

Took 10 Foam Gun Cans of foam and 20 ! silicone tubes.

Surprisingly took very little substrate ...

Left side:


Middle part:


Right side: