Fish Tank Direct
- Thread starter Born7
- Start date
I appreciate all your help. I've been in the hobby for 3 years, but as a child. We've always had aquariums, reptiles etc. My children has a house full of reptiles now. As for me 4 aquariums. [2] 55 gallons [2] 125 gallons. I'm housing African and Central American Cichlids. I've got a real nice Flowerhorn and a nice sized Fire Eel. I would like to setup my 350 gallon with my cichlids. I'll post some pictures soon.There are quite a few threads on Ultimas here on MFK. Here's one:
Ultima 2000 + sump experiences?
Would like to hear your own experience with a combination of the two or preference over the other and what size you are filtering. Curious to see DIY ideas on how others are filtering with 800 to 3k gallons. Thanks.www.monsterfishkeepers.com
JK47 has set up a few Ultimas on his tanks. You could PM him.
Spiff44 runs Ultimas. Do a search on Ultimas here on MFK.
Family illness and multiple surgeries for me have prevented my working on my big tank, so it isn't setup yet. I will tell you that you will need an appropriately sized pump with the Ultima that you use. (I am going with ReeFlo Barracuda gold pumps to run my Ultima II 4000s and we have two 3" for drains for backwashing)
No, they send the everything you need to plumb aquarium. Durso standpipe. The thing is. I don't know if this will be enough filtration for maybe 40-50 fish. I'm looking for any and all the help I can get. Overflows are set up like this.
Wet/dry filters provide superb biological filtration. Depending on how overstocked you are, you might have to do daily changing of the filter floss. You might need more mechanical filtration. That's where the easy maintenance of the Ultima IIs really shine. There are other options for mechanical filtration.
When we set up our 300 gallon tank, we were clueless about what to do for filtration....the reason I joined MFK. The tank builder found our wet/dry filter on EBay. I saw a reef tank in a medical office and called the man who set up and maintained the tank. He actually sold us the RTL-25 filters and the Hammerhead pump we run on the tank for extreme mechanical filtration. With the exception of only one other MFK member, I've only seen RTL filters used on big reef set ups. RTLs have cartridges that have to be cleaned or replaced. I love RTL filters, and will be running six RTL-100s on our big tank. (ya kind of crazy, because I am going to use the Ultima 4000s primarily for biological filtration and not mechanical) I would not run a tank without RTLs.
Oughtsix uses Hayward DE filters which are another mechanical option for you.
Perhaps if you keep small fish, you won't need more mechanical filtration.
Here's a description of our closed loop mechanical filtration from a thread 13 years ago.
www.monsterfishkeepers.com
When we set up our 300 gallon tank, we were clueless about what to do for filtration....the reason I joined MFK. The tank builder found our wet/dry filter on EBay. I saw a reef tank in a medical office and called the man who set up and maintained the tank. He actually sold us the RTL-25 filters and the Hammerhead pump we run on the tank for extreme mechanical filtration. With the exception of only one other MFK member, I've only seen RTL filters used on big reef set ups. RTLs have cartridges that have to be cleaned or replaced. I love RTL filters, and will be running six RTL-100s on our big tank. (ya kind of crazy, because I am going to use the Ultima 4000s primarily for biological filtration and not mechanical) I would not run a tank without RTLs.
Oughtsix uses Hayward DE filters which are another mechanical option for you.
Perhaps if you keep small fish, you won't need more mechanical filtration.
Here's a description of our closed loop mechanical filtration from a thread 13 years ago.
is it alright to use pond filters on monster tanks?
Like this? http://www.pool-filters.com/pdf/Purex-Triton-Triton-2-datasheet.pdf There's a chart on the second page w/flow rates for pump sizing (then get the motor wattage), then you can calcuate electrical costs with this: http://www.fishyou.com/aquarium-calculator.php just change the price per...
www.monsterfishkeepers.com
Thanks, I'm very pleased that I joined this forum. Everyone has so much knowledge and research to back it.Wet/dry filters provide superb biological filtration. Depending on how overstocked you are, you might have to do daily changing of the filter floss. You might need more mechanical filtration. That's where the easy maintenance of the Ultima IIs really shine. There are other options for mechanical filtration.
When we set up our 300 gallon tank, we were clueless about what to do for filtration....the reason I joined MFK. The tank builder found our wet/dry filter on EBay. I saw a reef tank in a medical office and called the man who set up and maintained the tank. He actually sold us the RTL-25 filters and the Hammerhead pump we run on the tank for extreme mechanical filtration. With the exception of only one other MFK member, I've only seen RTL filters used on big reef set ups. RTLs have cartridges that have to be cleaned or replaced. I love RTL filters, and will be running six RTL-100s on our big tank. (ya kind of crazy, because I am going to use the Ultima 4000s primarily for biological filtration and not mechanical) I would not run a tank without RTLs.
Oughtsix uses Hayward DE filters which are another mechanical option for you.
Perhaps if you keep small fish, you won't need more mechanical filtration.
Here's a description of our closed loop mechanical filtration from a thread 13 years ago.
is it alright to use pond filters on monster tanks?
Like this? http://www.pool-filters.com/pdf/Purex-Triton-Triton-2-datasheet.pdf There's a chart on the second page w/flow rates for pump sizing (then get the motor wattage), then you can calcuate electrical costs with this: http://www.fishyou.com/aquarium-calculator.php just change the price per...
How many drains and what size are they? What about the size of the return lines and where are they at?
The lifegard 5000 pumps will be wimpy for a tank that size. I would recommend using at least two pumps 2-3x more powerful than those.
Nothing wrong with the sump you pictured, but i prefer a large open sump layout. If it was me i would use a couple old 75s or maybe a 125 and diy a sump. If you are stocking heavily, the extra water volume a large sump contains is a great benefit.
I agree with
pacu mom
the wet dry is a very efficient filter. Depending on fish type it will take care of the biological side of the filtration without a doubt. I use filter socks as a means of mechanical filtration and I change them every 3 days. If you change your mechanical filtration regularly the stuff it catches doesn't have time to break down and start to add to the bioload. To me it sounds and looks like you got the start of a nice system. Only thing now is to decide how you are going to handle the nitrates. If you plan on just doing waterchanges you won't know until it's up and running as to how frequently or how much water will need to be changed. Look at setting up a drip system now to help automate that part of the hobby. I set that up on my last system and it's really nice. I still did water changes but less frequently and mostly I did them because I like the interaction time with my fish. Most of the fish I have or have had seem not afraid of the water changes, I think some even liked them and we're curious about what I was doing and liked the interaction also. I am slowly getting everything set back up from a move so will be back on a drip system soon also. I also use a lot of plants to help remove nitrates floating plants and terrestrial plants like pothos. Three of my tanks have enough plants to really not need waterchanges to remove nitrates as they don't ever climb higher then 20ppm but I still do weekly on them at about 30% just to refresh minerals and help remove any hormones that may have built up. Once every 3-4 weeks I will do a much larger waterchange on these and harvest half or more of the floating plants. I have found these things to help reduce overall maintenance on a tank/system and it's really nice to know if I don't have the time to do a waterchange it can wait without much of worry on how it will impact my finned kids. I change the mechanical filtration which litteraly takes 2 minutes on my way out the door to work on Thursdays Saturday and mondays.
pacu mom
the wet dry is a very efficient filter. Depending on fish type it will take care of the biological side of the filtration without a doubt. I use filter socks as a means of mechanical filtration and I change them every 3 days. If you change your mechanical filtration regularly the stuff it catches doesn't have time to break down and start to add to the bioload. To me it sounds and looks like you got the start of a nice system. Only thing now is to decide how you are going to handle the nitrates. If you plan on just doing waterchanges you won't know until it's up and running as to how frequently or how much water will need to be changed. Look at setting up a drip system now to help automate that part of the hobby. I set that up on my last system and it's really nice. I still did water changes but less frequently and mostly I did them because I like the interaction time with my fish. Most of the fish I have or have had seem not afraid of the water changes, I think some even liked them and we're curious about what I was doing and liked the interaction also. I am slowly getting everything set back up from a move so will be back on a drip system soon also. I also use a lot of plants to help remove nitrates floating plants and terrestrial plants like pothos. Three of my tanks have enough plants to really not need waterchanges to remove nitrates as they don't ever climb higher then 20ppm but I still do weekly on them at about 30% just to refresh minerals and help remove any hormones that may have built up. Once every 3-4 weeks I will do a much larger waterchange on these and harvest half or more of the floating plants. I have found these things to help reduce overall maintenance on a tank/system and it's really nice to know if I don't have the time to do a waterchange it can wait without much of worry on how it will impact my finned kids. I change the mechanical filtration which litteraly takes 2 minutes on my way out the door to work on Thursdays Saturday and mondays.
I would recommend doing some more research on the return pumps if you haven’t already purchased.
I’ve had the quite one pumps and they do not hold up to the name. Loud and as far as efficiency goes, not very.
I prefer some of the DC pumps that are out there.
Run on very low power and flow rates are adjustable.
I’ve had the quite one pumps and they do not hold up to the name. Loud and as far as efficiency goes, not very.
I prefer some of the DC pumps that are out there.
Run on very low power and flow rates are adjustable.
Thanks for sharing. In your example shown, I see only one durso pipe. Will that be the case with the new tank and 1 standpipe in each overflow? You may want to have one additional bulkhead in each for an emergency drain (and go with Herbie).
As others have mentioned, if you don't have bulkheads for returns, then you'll want to plan to go over tank. You may have this covered, but I'm just going off the picture you had provided.
On the topic of overflow and/or drain noise, the one thing not to overlook is the pipe going into sump should be submerged by around 1-2" AND the pipe is pushed up as much as possible to the bulkhead leading to the sump (if you are using PVC). I forgot to push up to tighten and was scratching my head why so much noise in the sump. It's dead silent now.
