180g FW with 65g sump/refugium

[Jimothy]

I have a thread running in the DIY section, please visit and participate.
Plumbing 180g FW to 65g sump
I am interested in using my sump as a planted refugium. There are destructive turtles in the display tank so I am assuming I cannot have anything up there...

Advice, hardware and livestock recomendations?

[jacigia]

Hey Jimonthy,

thats great stuff, I was just wondering, if I had a 135g tank, how big of a refugium/sump would i need? Also would it make any sense to have the overflow going into a wet/dry and then having water pumped form that to the refugium? I was wondering if having the bioballs would help with the refugium.

[Jimothy]

I think the conventional wisdom is the bigger the better. Buy/build one that is as large as possible that you can still work around under the tank.

Wet/dry with a trickle seemed too hard to figure out for me, and it smells. I have some bio media meant for a canister filter at the bottom of my baffle after the foam media. Having plants will help as well but that will be later for me.

As far as pumping water around, from what I have read you don't want to rely on pumps to move water through your sump, have a gravity fed IN pipe and a waterpump powered return line.

Post pics in DIY section, I am curious to see other options and design.

[jacigia]

Thanks man,
I running on a wet/dry right now but want to convert it into a refugium, from what I read, I think it was greatly improve my tank. I wanted to keep the wet/dry in use, anyhow awesome diy you have there posted.