Re-configuring My Sumps with Poret Foam

[Ulu]

Four of my tanks are currently running low tech DIY sumps. All of these started as floss over scrubbies over lava, and 3 also have a flow-thru gravel bed.
2 of them also have big bags of Fluval bio-rings. Several tanks have foam filters too.

We've had much discussion about lava as effective media, & clearly it's not the media of choice, but the thing I wonder more about than the lava is the effectiveness of mattenfilter & foam filters as sump bio-habitat? Do they make sense?

I have poret foam filters in many of my tanks as prefilters or in place of just airstones, but they're ugly and take tank space. Now that they are well cycled I have started moving them all into the sumps.

In 3 of my sumps I replaced the pot scrubbers with sponge filters in the pump chamber. I was already running airstones in the sumps, so the air was there.
I hated the pot scrubbers. Too soon to tell if the foam filters work better or not. The pot scrubbers are all over a year to 2 years old now.

Anyhow, I clean the foam by squeezing right in the sump, then I flush the sump. Much easier than lifting out of a deep tank & into a bucket to clean.

I keep bio-rings and (in some cases lava) in bags, but I usually just rinse everything in the sump and flush it all out.

Anyhow I copied this from the web:
from http://www.swisstropicals.com/library/swisstropicals-poret-foam/



Unfortunately nothing here about lava or Fluval , Eheim, Hagan etc media.

 

[PYRU]

I think you're trying to make it more complicated than it really needs to be

Here's what lm doing which isn't a new idea

 

[TexasMFK31]

I think you're trying to make it more complicated than it really needs to be

Here's what lm doing which isn't a new idea

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Oh ****, so, do you just fill those full of poly-fil and replace it each week or so? Very interesting design......makes me want to redo my sump now........ Can you get an actual pic of this?

 

[esoxlucius]

There's always lots of discussion on the best media for bio and to be honest it makes me laugh that some hobbyists empty their pockets on a product that claims to have umpty quad zillion micropores per whatever and that BB prefer it to anything else.

I don't have anything fancy in my sump, nor do I have great quantities of it. And I have quite a large bio load on both my tanks. I don't have any water issues at all.

So, as PYRU said, you might be over thinking it and trying to make it more complicated that you need to. I take it these "low tech DIY sumps" have served you very well? Maybe there's your answer. Keep it simple.

 

[TexasMFK31]

There's always lots of discussion on the best media for bio and to be honest it makes me laugh that some hobbyists empty their pockets on a product that claims to have umpty quad zillion micropores per whatever and that BB prefer it to anything else.

I don't have anything fancy in my sump, nor do I have great quantities of it. And I have quite a large bio load on both my tanks. I don't have any water issues at all.

So, as PYRU said, you might be over thinking it and trying to make it more complicated that you need to. I take it these "low tech DIY sumps" have served you very well? Maybe there's your answer. Keep it simple.

I agree with this, I have gone back from having multiple baffles and chambers to a very simple setup. PYRU's setup there is making me thing of going even simpler.

 

[PYRU]

Oh ****, so, do you just fill those full of poly-fil and replace it each week or so? Very interesting design......makes me want to redo my sump now........ Can you get an actual pic of this?

Yeah basically. You just rinse them out every few weeks. You can run carbon, bio, etc in with the floss if you want.

I literally just boxed mine up this weekend...but just when you think you're a pioneer you find pics of someone else's. He did these in 2013 I've been doing since 05 just for the record lol...notice he uses a reducer where I use a drilled cap on top. Make sure the piece your drain goes into is bigger than your drain so if it clogs it will just overflow into your sump

I'm moving after the 16th, but I can document my sump etc right after that.

 

[TexasMFK31]

Well I'll be damned, I may just have to redo my sump with this concept and maybe using just a tote so there is no baffle at all. Going to think about it. You you pack the pipe full of poly-fil I would assume?

 

[PYRU]

Well I'll be damned, I may just have to redo my sump with this concept and maybe using just a tote so there is no baffle at all. Going to think about it. You you pack the pipe full of poly-fil I would assume?

I do or you can make a tube out of the blue filter matte then shove it down in the bottom

 

[Ulu]

So nobody using poret in the sump?

I think you're trying to make it more complicated than it really needs to be. . . .

Have you never heard that, "If an engineer doesn't have problems to solve, he will invent them."

It's part of our creed, to relentlessly search for greater efficiency . . . of . . . whatever . . .
I mean, whatta ya got? There's an engineer for it.

When I built an experimental electric boat I had to do lots of fiberglass reinforcement. Then I had to modify the trailer, seats, top, build a casting deck, battery compartment, locking hatches, etc. My best friend told me, "Most guys woulda just bought another boat!" He knows I have the money, but he runs a grocery store & cannot grok engineers.

I reduced my 10 tanks to 9 recently, and yesterday to 8 when a sick fish passed away. But all the systems are different experiments with different results. Here is my first ever sump, which has been running two years:


This is a schematic of the first sump, which does not use foam, except on the pump intake sponge
Nothing is to scale. The tank is 30 and the sump is 7.5 gals. The return water goes under the gravel.

There is lava in the various chambers, just because the room exists, and for ballast, as plastic floats.

I am using a "nested vessels" design for my latest 2 sumps, because it requires no baffles.
This was a real quickie I threw together from spare junk. It's had numerous improvements.
This was mt 10th tank until I realized that I needed sump filtration NOW, plus my goal of operating 10 tanks at home was a ridiculous notion intended mainly to annoy my wife.

Anyhow this is my first use of poret in the sump, and there are two 5" dia filters. The tall white canister is a floss-on-grid over lava. It drains out the bottom & up thru the blue gravel. The pump shown is an old 200gph powerhead.

I replaced that with a 265 gph pond pump, and added a bunch of stuff I don't have pics of yet.

 

[esoxlucius]

It seems to me, as an engineer, you've got it all sorted. And any problems along the way, you'll find a solution using your engineering skills. I looked at your "schematics" and compared it to PYRU's little drawing and chuckled to myself. But that's the engineer in you, attention to detail and such.

Don't get me wrong there's nothing wrong with your attention to detail approach but I think most of us just like to keep everything practical and very simple, less stuff can go wrong that way. I think that's why we've eluded to the "over thinking and over complicating" thing.

But in answer to the question I think you're asking. Yes, poret foam is fine to use in your sump. I use it for mechanical filtration only though, in conjunction with polyester floss. I've always been happy with water clarity in my display tank by doing it this way.

I've never used it as bio filtration simply because I have other stuff in my sump that is serving that purpose very nicely.