Jessica's 110g Malawi Build

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AndrewsPistol said:
Sooo, I've decided to make a DIY sump for this. I drew up a sketch on my phone.... Don't laugh lol. The pink lines depict PVC tuning. The blue boxes are totes and the green box is going to be one if those plastic drawer things you can buy at Walmart ( ill include a pic of what I'm talking about) drawer one will contain filter floss, drawer 2 will contain bio balls or ceramic rings. In tote 2 there will be a pump and my heater. Need to research how to syphon the water into the first tote then over to the next tote containing the pump... Please tell me they sell something like that lol!
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Pretty clever !!
What type of heater are you thinking? A regular heater, could melt the plastic of the drawer. I have seen heaters melting plastic air pipes and hoses.
 
jetajockey said:
Don't you think it'd be a hundred times easier to just put a sump tank in with dividers for compartments?

I've been tagging along on this build, I'd really like to do a malawi build soon so I look forward to seeing how this turns out=)
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The reason I've chosen totes was because of the stands design. It's braces are like dividers. My thoughts were I could put totes in the sections and that way I would just have to drill holes for the PVC instead of knocking out the walls :) Glad your along for the ride :) start my 3d background this weekend!

Andrew McFadden said:
On YouTube there is a guy that makes home made filters. Not sure if that's where you got the idea from but you may want to try and find it. Because he has a video covering a sump filter build like that.

Imo it would probably work but the biggest problem some of us african keepers have are trates and quite honestly could make it worse. So unfortunately this will not help with that sucks right.?. Even with wet/dry sumps on saltwater they create a huge nitrate problem. I have no water issues with the way mine is set up, I built a fuge that is packed full of plants now that will help more than you think. If it was me I would put a hole somewhere in the bottom drawer that drains into a planted tank. Then gets pumped back up. Just an idea on improving it a little better.
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Yea I kinda dreamed this up lol. That's why I don't know how the syphon would work. I'll take a look at some YouTube vids, thanks! I wanted to build the sump and use my AC 110s to grow plants. That does really suck to hear it could make trAtes worse :/ great idea on the planted tank... Maybe I could do a tank in the middle a planted... The drawing isn't quite accurate because my fingers were to fat to draw it the way I wanted. The stand has 4 or 5 sections. I could fit another tote/tank in there... Hmmm need to do more research! My saltwater build inspired this... I have a wet/dry sump for it... Definitely did not like hearing that it may cause a trAte problem!!!

ejaramillo01 said:
Pretty clever !!
What type of heater are you thinking? A regular heater, could melt the plastic of the drawer. I have seen heaters melting plastic air pipes and hoses.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Yea it's a work in progress :) I'm not sure what heater ill go with yet and should probably find a better idea so I don't flood my house lol!
 
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Well finally got the day off! This is the plan for today. So I got most of the plumbing mapped out and haven't really worked out the tote situation. I really don't want more than one but the stand is built all weird with 3 dividers so there are 4 little "pockets" of space on the inside. I have to put doors on it to access what's underneath. So my thought is the 2 totes and drilling through the walls for plumbing... What do you think???? And it really won't take up that much tank space... I had to draw it big to show what was goin on :)
 

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Went on a bit of a shopping spree tonight :) background & sump comin it at $63 so far.
 

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With a pre filter before the bio balls there should be little if any biological waste that will build up on the bio-balls. Also it's not hard to clean them!

I hate that people keep regurgitating the same stuff over an over with out any facts to back them up. I'm sure they do become nitrate factories in saltwater where there's no pre filtering before them. Which is why allot of people went to the sump and Skimmer set up.
 
Mogurako said:
With a pre filter before the bio balls there should be little if any biological waste that will build up on the bio-balls. Also it's not hard to clean them!

I hate that people keep regurgitating the same stuff over an over with out any facts to back them up. I'm sure they do become nitrate factories in saltwater where there's no pre filtering before them. Which is why allot of people went to the sump and Skimmer set up.
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I think I am going to do a mix of bio balls and AC sponges. I found some really awesome gutter filters at the hardware last night that would work perfect. They are a heavy duty spongelike material... I just worry about them being clean enough, without chemicals. The box says "go green" so I'm not sure if that's a pro or con. Thoughts???
 
AndrewsPistol said:
I think I am going to do a mix of bio balls and AC sponges. I found some really awesome gutter filters at the hardware last night that would work perfect. They are a heavy duty spongelike material... I just worry about them being clean enough, without chemicals. The box says "go green" so I'm not sure if that's a pro or con. Thoughts???
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Go green normally means they were produced in a factory using green energy/ they were made out of recycled material
 
AndrewsPistol said:
I think I am going to do a mix of bio balls and AC sponges. I found some really awesome gutter filters at the hardware last night that would work perfect. They are a heavy duty spongelike material... I just worry about them being clean enough, without chemicals. The box says "go green" so I'm not sure if that's a pro or con. Thoughts???
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Go green to me would mean all natural witch means no additives as in chemicals.
 
Ok! Skipping the gutter filter then... One more question... Looking at pumps for the return. How do I calculate gph??? Could I just buy a big pump and use a ball valve to reduce or increase flow? Would that burn the pump up?
 
AndrewsPistol said:
Ok! Skipping the gutter filter then... One more question... Looking at pumps for the return. How do I calculate gph??? Could I just buy a big pump and use a ball valve to reduce or increase flow? Would that burn the pump up?
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Return pump should be less GPH than your overflow.
 
AndrewsPistol said:
K thanks! Now my problem is calculating the gph of my overflows lol. I'm fabricating 2 out of 1in PVC.
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Hook up your overflow attach a hose and let it drain for about 5 minutes. Measure how many inches you lost then plug it into this formula.

Length ( of the tank) x Depth (of the tank) x how many inches you lost, divid that by 231 and that will tell you how many gallons you lost. The multiply the gallons lost by 12.

LxWxD / 231 x12 = X

For instance if i lost 12" in my 125 in five minutes that would mean I lost 67 gallons. Which in turn would mean my Overflow is rated at roughly 808 GPH.

pretty sure that's how the math would work.
 
The stork is dropping by before the new tank is done :) she's actually quite annoyed in this pic lol notice how dark she is and her stripes are showing, it was feeding time and she was pretty annoyed by the feeding frenzy around her haha!
 

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Today I am ripping the stand apart after the overflows are cemented. I really don't want to do more than 1 tote. I feel like adding another to the equation is just more potential for flooding. I'm pulling all the dividers out and bracing the corners and sides. Ill get a pic of what I'm talking about when I get some help getting the tank off the stand. Debating on using the sump for my saltwater tank on this then totally rebuilding a brand new sump for my sw build... It definitely needs some tlc :/ I want plants in the sump BAD. Floating & planted. I could easily do lowlight plants because I have a million strip lights from Craigslist deals I had bought in the past.... Thoughts or ideas anyone??
 

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