Shane's Two-Piece Coral Frag Plugs

This Thing is a coral frag plug that is used when propagating coral (i.e. "fragging") in the saltwater aquarium hobby.

The post for this frag plug has been made removable making it much easier to glue a mounted frag into place in your aquarium as you now don't have to deal with the post being in the way. Rejoice!

Coral fragments are either cut or broken off of the mother colony and then glued to this frag plug using cyanoacrylate gel (superglue). The resulting fragged coral plug is mounted into 14mm eggcrate that is submerged in the saltwater aquarium where it is left until it is either traded with another hobbyist or sold at a frag swap.

Instructions

One of my biggest problems withall of the coral frag plugs that are currently on the market is the lack of the ability to easily remove the post from the frag plug top when one wants to place their latest purchase into their aquarium. Typically one either has to live with the post or they have to use a cutter to remove it. This is my attempt at solving this problem. Squeeze the pin and remove it from the top. Simple! Save the detached post for reuse and just print out more tops.

This particular thing is a mashup of the Pin Connectors V2 by tbuser (http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:10541), the Knurled Surface Finishing Library by aubenc (http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:9095), and my other Coral Frag Plugs (http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:16982).

I have provided files for printing either single plugs or an entire 12-set plate of tops and pins. Both the top and pin plates will fit on a 4"x4" build platform.

Additional fragging tools that might be of interest:

1. Shane's Coral Frag Plugs by sgraber: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:16982
2. Joanne's Frag Plugs by engineglue: thingiverse.com/thing:16959
3. Hemostat by CaptainKirk: thingiverse.com/thing:13152
4. Tweezers - either the ones by SimonH thingiverse.com/thing:7768 or thingiverse.com/thing:638 by hoeken
5. Pliers: russrobot thingiverse.com/thing:11332, Starno thingiverse.com/thing:1091, or tonyv thingiverse.com/thing:12266

If you see other tools of interest, please let me know in the comments and I'll add links to them here.

The current features of this frag plug are:

1. The top is detachable from the bottom simply by squeezing the pin and removing it!

1. Knurled edges on all frag plug tops for easy gripping when wet
2. A slit in the pin for either:

    a) attaching a tyvek or ziptie tag for identification

    b) using a rubber band to hold down the coral frag 3. A large central depression for holding glue 4. Axial depressions for added attachment points for the coral as it attaches 5. A "pin" base that has four nubs protruding from it that allow one to lightly lock the plug into 14 mm eggcrate by turning the plug once inserted into the eggcrate. These nubs are there to keep the frag plug in place in case its placed in a high flow area.

Print with 100% infill using either ABS or PLA.

I should mention that I attempted to taper the existing base into a point. However I learned that the 1/4" of material on the bottom of the pin (below the slit) is there to give the pin some physical strength. Without it, the pin snapped in half whenever I squeezed it too severely.

Please, if you use this, leave feedback on how I can improve the design! :)

Category: Pets