HOW TO： Underwater Waterfall TUTORIAL

Hi everybody, Joey here again and welcome back. So today we're going to talk about the underwater sand waterfall. Now some of you guys might not know what this is, well a lot of you do. Essentially all it is, it's a waterfall underwater and you're creating that waterfall with sand. Now in this video we're going to talk about the sand to use, the type of flow you'll need, and the materials you're going to need to build it. I'm going to make sure this video is very cost effective and costs next to nothing to do. I've tried several methods and I've come up with one of the easiest methods and the cheapest method I could think of. So let's start out by first taking a look at the materials and then we'll take a look at understanding how this actually works. Okay guys, so the materials you're going to need are really straightforward and simple. I've got some one inch PVC. I found that this diameter worked the best in order to pick up the sand. What we're going to do with this PVC is really simple. We're just going to cut out a small notch that is about an inch deep at the bottom. Making sure that it sits flat and as you can see that the lip allows water and sand to enter. Second we're going to need a 90 degree elbow and that's a one inch 90 degree elbow. What we're going to do there is drill a small hole in the top. That hole is a quarter inch and that's going to allow your air hose, which you'll also need, to be able to slip through it. You'll also need a small air stone. I found that it doesn't really matter what type you use and you'll also need an air pump. Now if you're using a larger air pump make sure you get some sort of a valve on it that allows you to adjust the air pressure because you might need more or less airflow through this. Now putting this together is going to be really straightforward and simple. We're going to take our elbow and put it on the opposite end that we notched out. Just like that. Okay that's pretty straightforward. But before you do that you're going to need to take your airline hose and run it through the hole that you created at the top of the elbow. Where you put it doesn't really matter but, you know, smack dab in the center is probably going to be best. It comes right through. We're going to pull the air hose right through it. From there then we put it on the PVC. We're going to run the air hose right down to the bottom. Now once that's on you don't need to cement any of this at all. It will stay together just like that. Now where you have the notch, typically you're going to want to have it facing the same way as the 90 degree elbow. So this is facing out and so is the notch. Just line them up which isn't really... From there we're going to go ahead and attach the air stone to the bottom here. Okay just like that. We're going to pull that until it is pretty much flush with the bottom. So the air stone's right there. Okay so that's really just about it. Then of course you attach the air stone... I'm sorry the airline hose to the actual air pump. That's it. That is your underwater waterfall done. You know, it costs about 50 cents for an elbow. I only used maybe let's say a foot of the PVC which is probably around another dollar. So about two bucks. Air stones are like 25 cents and you know airline hose typically 25 cents a foot, 10 cents a foot. We're looking at another dollar and your air pump maybe 10 bucks. So in total probably about 15 dollars minus the air pump. You're looking at five bucks because you probably already have an air pump. Anyways let's put this on the tank and see exactly how this works. Okay guys so I have my air pump plugged in. What you hear right there. And what we're going to do is go ahead and insert this into the aquarium. Don't worry about how foggy this is. I just added the sand and filled this tank up. That'll go away shortly. Now what's going to happen here is when I put this in, air bubbles is obviously going to start traveling up the top of this pipe and exit through the top. What's going to happen behind those air bubbles is going to create a suction and that suction is going to suck water up with it. And what we'll see here is water's going to start raising up the tube. Now because of the how high this tube is above the water surface, we're not going to see it you know raise up too high. But the closer down we go look what happens. Water's going to start exiting. Now you're probably wondering how tall do I need to have this pipe? Well essentially the pipe needs to be long enough so that probably the top half of the 90 degree elbow stays above the water surface. Okay now what happens if we go ahead and put this into the actual sand? What's going to happen is not only is water going to be sucked up, but the sand is going to be sucked up as well. And that's where you get the underwater waterfall effect. So let's have a look. Quite messy but it works. Messy because I'm using a really fine sand. And that's what comes up next is you know what kind of sand should you be using? Well this sand is probably too fine. What I'm using here is something very similar to clay sand. Stay away from it, it's a mess. It's too fine and it takes too long to sink in the water. What you're instead going to want to use is something similar to a pool filtration sand or something like that is only you know maybe a millimeter in diameter or half a millimeter in diameter. What I suggest is get a few samples of different sands and try them out and see which one works best. You want the sand to be able to rise up the tube but also fall directly back down out of the tube. Now in this the reason why we're looking to have an adjustable valve to control the flow is because this is probably too much flow. As you can see it's coming out and pushing the water out. I want it to come out and drop down so you know I can simply adjust the flow if need be and have that flow simply drop straight down like that. So this is only half of the do-it-yourself underwater waterfall. What you're also going to need to do is eventually the sand is all going to be gathered up from below the standpipe. It's going to be sucked out and blown out throughout the aquarium. So the reason why you're going to want to have it in one place is simply so it can keep you know sucking up the sand. So what you're going to want to do is create some sort of a trap under the water. So what I've gone ahead and done is you could take some cement and styrofoam like I've shown you before in do-it-yourself backgrounds and create some sort of a barrier that's going to go in front but collect all the sand that continues to drop down in front of the standpipe. And what that's going to do is give the underwater waterfall a constant supply of sand. Second thing you could probably do is cover up this actual standpipe with you know build something else that actually covers it up. You know something like that whatever it's up to you. I'm not going to complete this as you know I want to leave this open a lot of ideas open to yourselves and create your own unique idea. Now to keep this this in place before you fill up the tank simply silicone the standpipe right to the corner of your tank or you know it'll work at any angle of your tank silicone it in place. It's not heavy it doesn't float or anything like that but as you can see it does create that waterfall effect. Of course the sand I'm using is too fine but you certainly get the idea and that this idea certainly does work. Okay guys so that was essentially it that's one way to create an underwater waterfall tongue twister. A lot of you guys might be wondering what's the point of creating one? Well it's definitely something unique and could be a new focal point for your aquarium. They're fun and easy and as well as cheap as I showed you. Only costing about five dollars for all the pieces you're going to need. Anyways I hope you enjoyed the video guys and we'll see you next time.