Will This Actual Set Up Work?

[ANIM4L]

ok currently, i have a 60 gallon tank, set up with over 80lbs of live rock, 60lbs aragonite, 20 lbs live sand, a rena xp3 cannster filter filled with live rock, a marineland protein skimmer 100, 2 powersweep powerheads (540gph for both), and 2 aquaclear 700 powerheads (400 gph each), this coming out to 1690gph or 28x turnover. I may be removing one aquaclear to make my turnover only 21.5x. I have been making posts about building a sump, and UNLESS I CAN EITHER FIND A WAY TO BUILD MY OWN STAND or buy one and somehow move that new stand in place of the old one, i cant make a sump, becuase the best thing about it was the water changes and ease of working with it, but i currently could only hold a sump above my tank (reversed obviously) and that would mean lots of work with getting on a tep stool and what not. I know i can get a hang on refigium for around 60 bucks, which would be nice, but i wanted to build my own sump, but unless i can find a way to do all that, i guess iw ont have a sump my mian question is, with everything i have, how well will my tank do without a sump? i want to make my reef tank as healthy as possible, but i dont at the moment have the room for a sump, my stand wouldnt hold it. I am trying to get my dad to let me get anew stand because the one i have is all ready warping from the wood (obviously not a good stand). so do you think my set up will work???


ok so i talke dto my dad about the stand, and he said later on if i could find one that wont break down or warp an would hold a sump for not a lot of money, then i could build sump, but until then would this set up work?

 

[SkiFletch]

Well, hows your nitrate levels so-far? If they're not climbing out of control then yeah, you can do without a sump. You could perhaps plant a small section of chaeto or some other macro algae in your tank and stay on top of trimming it and even get the same sump effect of nitrate removal for the time being... Lots of nano users go sans-sump and so long as your bio load is low enough you should be able to handle it. Dont neglect your cleanup crew and you should be ok.

I'd be more worried about the stand if its warping . how bad is it warping? which support posts are warping and in which direction?

 

[Mr Miagi]

Tanks can run perfectly fine withought a sunmp/refugium. If you have enough biological material in your display to filter out and conduct the nitrogen cycle, then even better. And IMO you do. 80lbs LR + 20lbs of LS is cool. I wish i could have that much. Is it mature?

Another option for you, is a remote DSB. Search for the term using google or RC (if you can use their search function ) . Its basically a bucket/container, containing a DSB remote from your system for the purpose of housing anerobic bacteria for the removal of nitrates etc. You can use a huge dustbin if you wanted, that way, no need for a fuge. Unless you wanted the macroalgae etc. Then thats a whole different story.

But for the sake of removing nitrates, your system with that much biological material should be running fine, and removing the majority of badies. What are your Params?

 

[ANIM4L]

right now my params are 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and 10 nitrate. hopefully i will be able to build my stand and sump soon, but until then, this will workj then?

 

[SkiFletch]

Yeah, 10 nitrates shouldnt be anything to worry about too much. How long have they been 10? If its been steady at 10 you're in good shape. Just remember not to increase your bio load too quickly

 

[ANIM4L]

it was 5.0 for the first week, then it went to 10 for the next week, so really steady I might start with 20 inverts for cleanup and a firefish and royal gamma, then may be the week later add a couple mroe inverts. i am doing this really slow, i have a patience probelm at times so this is my practice lol and so far i am doing REALLY good
I may be waiting even longer to get anything tho (wont hurt tho, more cycling lol) cu i am ordering my 265 watts compact lights, and i may be building my tank stand soon and the sump w/ refugium i am using (30 gallon probably). So instea do fsetting up the tank then breaking it down a little bit to move everything, im ay wait till i have my new stand and sump up. im going to be busy building because i am building eveyrhting in my room so i dont have to try to fit anything through my door and find out it wont fit, then i have to drain the tank down a bit, move the tank to the floor, throw out the old stand, move in the new stand, set up my tank again and set up the sump, all in one day that plus school and work... yikes, but i am excited to do it! i got the plans to make the stand offline(thanks to those hwo helped) and i am going to be finding plans to make an efficient sump with refugium somewhere, but i might be ordering a Marineland Tidepool S.O.S. because i need an overflow, and i would rather trust them than any others, unless people knwo where i can get one cheap but a good brand?

 

[ANIM4L]

Ok i made this diagram, it isnt anything nice, i did it quickly, but WOULD THIS WORK for a "sump". I love the idea, but would it work since the canisters are level with the sump, would they still be able to suck anything up? tell my your ideas and whatnot, i have two cannisters now that i could use and a tank to do this, this would save me an overflow and dealing with everything, so tell me what you think please, and ask questiong if you need to!

 

[superman]

That will not work, both your canister filters would have to be exactly matched (which would be impossible) and over time you would have flooding. Sorry, you're going to have to use a siphon overflow box (I wouldn't recommend them) or have the tank drilled if you want to incorporate a sump below the tank.

 

[ANIM4L]

o crap ok....

 

[SkiFletch]

Yeah, the only way to use a multi-containered sump is with multiple overflow boxes, not powered filters. I'm actually toying with this design currently with my space-constricted stand. The system will first drain from the display tank via an overflow box into a container with slats in it for carbon filtration in case of necessity, then flow through an overflow box down into a standard 10g aquarium as a refrigium with a deep sand bed and macro algae, and then to complete the run, it will go through another overflow box into a 5g tank which houses a few baffles, some float switches, and the pump to be sent back up to the display tank. The setup is extremely complex and I'm sure good old Murphy will be laughing at me and cackling his laws as I screw things up, but I'm crazy enough to try it. Since you're designing a stand, I'd just make sure that the base is wide enough to fit a larger tank, say a 29g or 30g long. That way you can chamber up the tank and have a nice refrigium. Oh, and dont even think about custom building a tank. The time and cost invested are prohibitive in my book.

 

[Aquascaper]

This could work if you removed the first cannister labelled 'Empty Cannister Filter for Flow' and replaced it with a feed from the main tank directly to the refugium; either an overflow box, drilled weir or 'U' pipe would do it with varying levels of sucess and reliability. The 'U' pipe would be the worst option out of the three but is do-able, you would just have to start the syphon manually and make sure that there is a safety measure in place so that if the water level drops the syphon cuts (as you have no weir). The pros and cons of the other to methods have been discussed before in other threads. This would leave you with what is pretty much a standard sump/refugium setup, just using the second cannister filter as your return pump instead of a stand alone return pump.

Also, why would you require flow and a spraybar in the refugium anyway? Unless you are putting live rock in there the flow will be sufficient just from the 'draw' of the second cannister filter. The only area where good flow is required is in the cannister filled with live rock which is sorted anyway.

The 'Empty Cannister Filter for Flow' could be plumbed into the main tank as a closed loop to increase flow if required and still give the option of an area to put carbon, etc. if needed.

HTH

 

[ANIM4L]

hmmmm ok, well then i will build my stand and sump in a couple of months and have an overlfow to the sump/refugium and to the cannister with LR and back into the tank, that sounds easy and simple enough

by the way, how much flow do i want in the tank to have it good enouhg for fish? what about for reefs?

 

[SkiFletch]

20 times the tank volume turned over in gallons per hour. So if you have a 100 gallon tank you'd want 2000gph worth of flow or more. My 45g will have 2 maxijet 1200 powerheads (300gph), one penguin 300gph pump, and the return from the mag 5 in the sump at around 300gph (after head loss is calculated) as well for a total of 1200gph nominal but probably closer to 1000gph actual. Try to set them up in varying orientations to create multiple currents and even better, get a wave timer if possible

 

[ANIM4L]

ok well i have about that right now, i am trying to find a way so they collide to make different currents, but i dont like how the sand builds up somewhere and out of other places, i have sand that is 4 inches high in one place and 1 inch high is others, ... any ideas?

 

[SkiFletch]

Heh, wish there was a straight up formula for that, but the best I can suggest is play with it