Looking for DIY Plans/diagrams for sump/refugium 40 GAL LONG

[1brent1]

Looking for [acronym:0a7c77b891="Do it yourself"]DIY[/acronym:0a7c77b891] Plans/diagrams for sump/refugium with pic's.

Anyone have any links or know of any? Seeing pic's of yours will even help me out.

Its going to be 40 [acronym:0a7c77b891="Gallon"]gal[/acronym:0a7c77b891] long 48x12x16 Want to have my heaters in part of it too. Also some type of pre-filter because my over flow will be draining directly in to one end. I have a submersible pump for the out-take back to the tank.

probably going to be something like this but I need to know how long I should have the dividers cut to. I also like to know some other options?-
http://jjgeisler.com/reeftank/55g_sump-refugium2.htm

GREATLY APPRECIATED

[czcz]

http://aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=53046

[1brent1]

Originally Posted by czcz

http://aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=53046

yes, I say that one. I was thinking something more in the line of something that has 3 compartment, Intake (pre-filter & heaters) > fuge > outtake (pump)

but I don't know long I should have my baffles and how to do the pre-filter?

[JProx]

i would suggest you divide the 40gallon like this...
1ft (12in) for the prefilter/intank, 1 ft (12in) for the pump/output and then the 2ft (24in) for the refuge, thats assuming your 40L is 48in in length. i would suggest you keep the heater in the biggest portion of the sump, for best performance though.

the prefilter should contain some sort of mechanical filtration, it is usual practice to use filter floss here, you might also want to include a bag of carbon in here for chemical filtration, you will need to have this in your filter setup somewhere, and it might as well be before the refuge. it can be nothing more than some granulated carbon placed in a Mesh - filter bag, placed after the filter floss in direct to semi - driect water flow.

hope that helps.

[czcz]

in regards to the prefilter, if animals cannot enter the drain I do not think you need a prefilter. Better to have that stuff in the sump anyway. I think cleaning a prefilter on the intake pipe is unnecessary maintenance, and I worried about it clogging and lowering drain rate. You can put whatever mechanical filtration you want in the first compartment. Lots of biomedia, and I would think liverock for sw, is a pretty good (not great) mechanical filter. Just my experience and maybe we have different definitions of prefilter

A couple more links:
http://www.melevsreef.com/sump.html
http://www.kingvinnie.com/aquaria/[acronym:ba5a21084b="Do it yourself"]diy[/acronym:ba5a21084b]/

[JProx]

i have always believed a prefilter to be something of a mechanical filter, to catch large particles, and remove them from circulating through the tank before any other filteration is done, and usually the best mechanical filter is filter floss and if it is kept fairly clean there is little disturbance to the flow rate from my experience at least.

it was my idea brent wanted a combo refuge/sump so you would want to put chemical and mechanical in place where it will get the highest flow of water, and since he wants a refuge it would make sense to do both chemical and mechanical before the refuge. Since he wanted a refuge to begin with, i would suggest putting the [acronym:44e432c788="Live rock"]lr[/acronym:44e432c788] there, where it will get the most contact time with water.

but your probably right, we have slightly different definitions of a prefilter.

[czcz]

Yeah: when I messed with stuff like floss at the intake to the drain I thought of that as the prefilter. In the sump I think of it as mechanical filtration. Your definition makes sense, especially if there was some other stage of mechanical filtration before the pump. Semantics I guess

[1brent1]

sorry on the delay but here's what I came up with.

Input please, since this is my first setup.

I'm going to have aprox. 250 lbs of cured live rock to start in the tank.

[JProx]

it looks good to me, only thing i would change is the air trap baffles. you really need 3, instead of 2. the air needs to be 'sealed' off from the sump and given enough time for the air to rise to the surface and pop. with only 2 baffles you aren't really ensuring time, and the air will just get pushed around with the current and run into the refuge, or pump area. a third baffle will stop that from happening.

just remember: air will always rise to the surface of water, and water will always follow a path thats been layed out for it.

i would have the [acronym:e02c75d9c9="Ultra Violet"]uv[/acronym:e02c75d9c9] sterilizer dump back into sump, and not push the water back into the tank but thats just me.

[1brent1]

I have updated the diagram and move the thread to a better category-

HERE- http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=67739