PVC Caves, specific questions

turtlefish

AC Members
May 9, 2005
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I was looking into getting some PVC caves for the fish. Will any old pipes from Home Depot work? Alot of them have ink on the side, will that affect water conditions? How do I cut the pipe to right length without getting jagged edges?
And it doesnt sink does it? I should just slide it into the gravel bed correct? I currently have some terra cotta clay pots on their side, although it looks nice fish don't really use it much since its one way only.
 
Hi all,havent invested in spell check yet so according to some people I wont even be acknowledged,but,heres my 2 cents in question form,and even though I have read some where on this site about pvc I am too lazy to look it back up( one of my lazy about ready to go to bed nights) so here goes,I believe that I read in an earlier post that pvc reacts negitively in salt water and that there was a special plastic that can be obtained in lfs carring sw products but if pvc is going in fw then not sure at all,all of this was probly in vain but figured I'd throw it in,now for the appoligies,umm,spelling,lack of spell check,lack of personal knowledge of posted issues,probly overall offensiveness of my post and anything else I cant rember to say or not say when posting replys in attempts to provide guidence,ok Im done,have a great evening,:-)
 
basiljr, if you could dig up a link on PVC in salt water, I'd like to see it. A quick google search turned up no problems, though I did not look at every page of results. PVC is basically inert, which is a good thing since it's used for drinking water pipes.
 
PVC is INERT....if it wasnt then why do most LFS have PVC as their filtration/dranage systems....granted its all behind the scenes, but I work at an LFS so I see these things. There is a TON of PVC in out Saltwater alone....so if it reacts negativly I guess the fish have been screwed for atleast the last 10+ years (thats the amount of time this LFS has been here).
 
Instead of using silicone and covering it with rocks, how about getting some java moss to grow over it? What do you all think?
 
It would be too smooth on its own for the java moss to take hold. It would need a great deal of roughing up and even then I think you'd have to permanently attach the moss with fish line, black elastics, or black thread. Not undoable, though, I did that myself in the past.
 
I see, I just dont really want to mess with siliconing a bunch of rocks onto it, yet i dont want it to look too bland. Is it absolutely necessary to slice the tube in half? If you get a larger diameter one can you bury the bottom half in gravel?
 
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