Paint for aquarium hood?

[peter1209]

Hi

So I have been trying to find some infomation with regards to suitable paint for inside the aquarium hood. As I understand it people have been using Polyurethane but the only stuff I can find says its not good for aquatic enviroment and could cause harm to fish. This might be a silly question but does this mean when using it but will be ok once completely dry or does it give off some kind of poisonous stuff over a period of time?

I have also seen enamel and some sort of radiator paint but again these all warn against using in aquatic. I would also like to try and use some form of spray paint if possible so I can paint easily in some of the harder to get to parts of the hood.

Any other advice with reguards to a suitable paint to use would be most helpful. I have made a custom hood for my new tank as it didnt come with one, its built now just stuck on a suitable paint to use.

Many Thanks.

 

[Convict2161]

Hi

So I have been trying to find some infomation with regards to suitable paint for inside the aquarium hood. As I understand it people have been using Polyurethane but the only stuff I can find says its not good for aquatic enviroment and could cause harm to fish. This might be a silly question but does this mean when using it but will be ok once completely dry or does it give off some kind of poisonous stuff over a period of time?

I have also seen enamel and some sort of radiator paint but again these all warn against using in aquatic. I would also like to try and use some form of spray paint if possible so I can paint easily in some of the harder to get to parts of the hood.

Any other advice with reguards to a suitable paint to use would be most helpful. I have made a custom hood for my new tank as it didnt come with one, its built now just stuck on a suitable paint to use.

Many Thanks.

Just curious why are you wanting to paint the "inside" of the hood? Also many many people use Krylon Fusion to paint things that have been submerged in the water like filter intakes, many paint then black or whatever color to blend into there background.

 

[peter1209]

The hood is made from plywood so need to be either painted or sealed in some way to make it waterproof.
I dont think krylon fusion is available in the UK, correct me if im wrong but I have looked for it and cant seem to find it.

 

[Ian086]

The hood is made from plywood so need to be either painted or sealed in some way to make it waterproof.
I dont think krylon fusion is available in the UK, correct me if im wrong but I have looked for it and cant seem to find it.

First of all, I want to stress I am not recommending people do this, I done it at my own risk and it worked for me....
Hey Peter, i'm was in the same position you are. Couldn't find the 'correct' paint. My friend is a painter and I had a word with him. He recommended using just regular gloss paint. After thinking about it for a while, I decided to try it and he painted it with 3 coats of white gloss. He left it to dry for two days between coats. I use a condensation tray on the inside of my tank, so NO evaporation comes from the tank, hit's the paint and drips back in....

 

[peter1209]

This is my hood so far:

I gave the whole thing a few coats of white undercoat/primer and so far sprayed the inside with a white gloss, off the top of my head I cant remember the paint I used but the company said its waterproof and also will not harm the fish if left to dry/cure for a reasonable amount of time.

I made my hood slightly bigger so I have to option to install suitable lighting should I go down the real plants route, for now I have ordered some waterproof LED strips from ebay which should be here next few days. Once all completed i'll post some pics and build process ones as well.

 

[Convict2161]

Looks good!!

 

[Ian086]

I got waterproof LED strips. Are they like these??

 

[peter1209]

The only picture I got of the LED's from ebay is this one, they should be arriving monday or tuesday so as I have installed them i'll post some pics.

I also started with a 90 liter tank and started the fishless cycle, it seemed to stall for about 2 weeks, no change in amonia or nitrites after it started showing nitrites. I have since bought a 250 liter tank and swapped everything over, been going about a week now and amonia is falling, nitrites are through the roof and nitrates are arnt far behind, will be time for water change soon and my new hood should be ready about same time as the fishless cycle completes.

 

[Ian086]

I also started with a 90 liter tank and started the fishless cycle, it seemed to stall for about 2 weeks, no change in amonia or nitrites after it started showing nitrites. I have since bought a 250 liter tank and swapped everything over, been going about a week now and amonia is falling, nitrites are through the roof and nitrates are arnt far behind, will be time for water change soon and my new hood should be ready about same time as the fishless cycle completes.[/QUOTE]
Hey, i'm no expert when it comes to fishless cycles but I would do a very large water change now. Are you still dosing with Ammonia??

 

[peter1209]

Ok let me see if I can explain it a little better. After about 3 weeks or so doing the fishless cycle in the 90l tank it seemed to stall at about 4ppm ammonia, 0.5ppm nitrite and 5ppm nitrate. It just wasnt changing the ammonia to nitrite etc. I also used some media from an established tank to speed up the process so im not too sure what happened.
After changing all the equipment to the new 250l tank it seemed to kick start the process once again, in a week its gone from 4ppm ammonia, 0pm nitrite and 0ppm nitrate to 2.0ppm ammonia, 2.0ppm nitrite and 20-30ppm nitrate so the process is well underway again. Just waiting now for the nitrate to increase a little more and then do a 90% water change, its close but not quite established enough yet to turn ammonia to nitrate in a 24h period.