2x 240 Gallon Setups

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slimbolen99

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Aug 14, 2009
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Shawnee, KS
Currently in the planning stages of putting together two "show" tanks. I've always wanted a couple of large tanks, but I can't get permission to put two big tanks upstairs, so...

The first, a 240g Wide (72" x 30" x 25") which will be upstairs in the living room. Our living room is 25 feet long, so we need something to separate it a bit to make it into two rooms. The 240W will be right over a 2 ton I-Beam supported into the basement foundation.

The second, a 240g Long (96" x 24" x 24") will be downstairs, perpendicular from the above tank in the "office". Underneath that will also be a 100g sump (72" x 18" x 18").

Both the 240g Wide & 240g Long will be drilled with overflows. The upstairs 240g Wide upstairs will flow downstairs into the 240g Long downstairs, and that will flow into the 100g sump. The water will be returned via pump back upstairs (almost 12' up). All filtration will be inside the sump, as well as the heater(s).

Here's a vague schematic (looks like the image might be too tall, forum is skewing the scale)

livingroomtank.jpg


Still working through a few potential challenges...including:

1. Finding a pump that will pump the correct flow up that high (any suggestions on GPH?)
2. Figuring out a way to keep the temperature between the two tanks somewhat consistent between the three tanks.
3. Figuring out how to keep the return flow from back filling if there was a loss of electricity. I would assume the pump would have an anti back flow gadget in it, but not sure?

Both tanks will have either T5 or metal halide lighting. I'm thinking the upstairs tank will have T5 so that I can hide it in a hood, and the downstairs tank will have the metal halide for rigorous plant growth.

As far as tank setups go, I'm leaning towards smaller fish in large schools from South America, with a heavy emphasis on wild fish. Also looking to heavily plant both tanks.

Looking forward to this build. It will be probably be a year in the making, depending on the job situation. The most important part is that the wife has signed off on the deal, so the hard part is done. :)

Thanks for the great forum.
Bb
 
SLIM, welcome to the forums of MFK,

To overcome 12 feet of head, with a working GPH for adequate filtration, you'll need a unit that is going to be a noisey, astronomically expensive to secure as well as to operate, huge ass pump that will need to be plumbed with pipe, that alone will hold more water than the 100gallon sump could handle in the event of powerfailure/service/catastrophic failure etc... Even with a series of checkvalves, you'd need to be still larger to overcome the pressure for them to operate.

This isn't a good idea for reasons that you might not have calculated.
I know this project is in the dream stage, but remember, the more simple the design, the more reliable the system, as well as cost effectiveness. The more likely it can come to realization...

However if you have the money to BURN in this economy, ANYthing can be done. It's all about the "benjamins"

What do you have now for tanks and filtration?
 
I currently have 46 tanks ranging from 10 gallons to 75 gallons in a "fish room", which is moving to a soon to be finished part of the garage. I use an Alita air pump to run sponge filters for that setup.

The sump being in the basement with noise isn't much of a concern, but the lack of pumping power could be. I may have to run a couple of pumps to get anything up that high. I haven't researched that part of it too much yet, but I do use an Eco Plus pump to pump out waste water from my fishroom up to 9', and it runs virtually silent, with pretty dang good flow (I'd estimate 800gph based upon it takes about 3 minutes to unload 40 gallons up and out of the fishroom).

The pump I've been looking at is the [FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]Mag Drive 24 Water Pump, but I will probably need something larger. I will probably go commercial. Luckily, my step dad is a plumber extraordinaire, so his input will be used extensively.

Each tank will have undergravel filtration. The sump will be heavily filtered using canister filters. I don't think I made that clear up above. The sumps will be just for moving "clean" water.

Thank you for pointing that out though and for the welcome.
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Why are you using UGf with planted tanks? From what I've read, thats not the best filtration system.

And 12' of head is tall as heck. Probably better off running canisters right out of the tanks, IMO.
 
As Duffey pointed out, a UGF ( which would be a viable option otherwise) is not a good option for a planted tank.
Your idea will work in concept but it breaks my cardinal rule .
KISS = Keep It Simple Stupid
 
Slim like the idea, but if I were you I would just run 2 separate sumps cause one is blackwater the other i dont think is unless I missed that part and both tanks will be blackwater.
 
While it would be better to run the tanks on separate systems, if this is how you want to do it, it can be done.

As far as pumps, I would use an external pump rated for high head applications. You'll probably want something rated for 2,000-2,500gph (after accounting for head loss).

For the plumbing, you will probably need to install at least 1-2 check valves in the vertical return to prevent back siphoning. You'll also need to make sure that your sump can handle the overflow from both tanks in case of a power outage.

I also agree that UGF's are probably not a good idea (at least for the planted tank).
 
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