Keepin' It Simple -- What do you think of these simple sump ideas?

hulk181

hulk181

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I want to make a huge 180 gallon sump. I want to keep it as simple as possible though. I want to use a regular 6x2x2 180 gallon acrylic tank and I don't want to silicone or drill anything.

I made some drafts of what my sump might look like. They're going to filter a 600 gallon tank. What do you think of these designs? I plan on keeping 5 12" Datnoids, 5 8" Clown Loaches, 1 12" Flagtail and 1 19" Arowana. Would this design do the job for that stock in this tank? How could I improve on these designs and still keep it simple?


Here's a plain 180g sump.



And here's a 180g moving bed filter sump.
 
D

dogofwar

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The simplest possible "sump" actually sits on top of the tank...you pump water from the tank to it and it drains - "dumps" (via gravity) back into the tank.

I have one as the primary filter on my 180g that's fed by the outflow of an FX5. It's a simple 18g clear rubbermaid with a few holes in the bottom. In the rubbermaid (from bottom to top): a couple of pieces of egg crate (to keep the holes free from being plugged), bio-balls and other bio media, two layers of Poret foam, and (on the top) a basket full of fluff for mechanical filtration.

Matt
 
ragin_cajun

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brich999

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On my old 500g I ran a similar setup to sump 1. Just socks dumping into a chamber with heaters and bags of pond matrix and then pumped back to the display. Worked fine and I was feeding up to a pound of shrimp at a time and never saw ammonia with 20L pond matrix.
 
rodger

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aldiaz33

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Your design would work well. It's pretty much how I have my sump setup and it's worked great for me.

If your drawing is to scale though, that's probably over ten 5 gallon buckets of Pond Matrix = way more than you need. That'll set you back about $1,000 just for the Matrix.

Instead of having so much bio-media I would try to use some of that space for more filter socks. Didysis has one of the best designs for socks that I've seen...he T's his drains off so that he runs 4 socks instead of 2...it's pretty slick the way he did it. I think you'll find that running 4,000GPH through just 2 filter socks will clog them fairly quickly (assuming you are using 100Micron or smaller) with the stock you are planning.

I know some people just use Pumice stone from their local landscape supply yard because it's super cheap (word on the street is that it's the same as Matrix). The difference is that Seachem will guarantee that it's "fish safe" whereas you can't be 100% sure when it comes to stone from the landscape supply yard.

IMO if you use as much Matrix as you have pictured, it's just going to make cleaning your sump a royal pain and will really not provide any benefit. You can get by using just a single 5 gallon pail (perhaps two if you plan to go bare bottom).
 
hulk181

hulk181

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Jul 23, 2012
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Thanks for the replies everyone.

rodger said:
Your MB sump is exactly how I did mine. With K1 it can process ammonia fast! Your first design with Matrix would cost a fortune to put all of that in and not be as efficient as an MB that is self cleaning. I suggest you read this thread on filter socks. http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?406140-A-Filter-Sock-Thread-(1-Viewing)
Click to expand...
You're right, I probably over did it with the Matrix lol. I'm leaning more towards a moving bed filter because I have a trickle filter now and I get tired of cleaning it. From what I've read, moving bed filters are much cleaner.



aldiaz33 said:
Your design would work well. It's pretty much how I have my sump setup and it's worked great for me.

If your drawing is to scale though, that's probably over ten 5 gallon buckets of Pond Matrix = way more than you need. That'll set you back about $1,000 just for the Matrix.

Instead of having so much bio-media I would try to use some of that space for more filter socks. Didysis has one of the best designs for socks that I've seen...he T's his drains off so that he runs 4 socks instead of 2...it's pretty slick the way he did it. I think you'll find that running 4,000GPH through just 2 filter socks will clog them fairly quickly (assuming you are using 100Micron or smaller) with the stock you are planning.

IMO if you use as much Matrix as you have pictured, it's just going to make cleaning your sump a royal pain and will really not provide any benefit. You can get by using just a single 5 gallon pail (perhaps two if you plan to go bare bottom).
Click to expand...
Yeah, I think that's a good idea. I'm going to look at how to tee off the drains and make it a 4 filter sock style instead of 2 socks. I just know for sure right now that I want to use filter socks instead of filter pads, and a K1 moving bed seems just as easy to set up and more efficient/clean than a Pond Matrix style sump.
 
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