Acrylic or glass baffles on a 60 g sump?

[hillbilly]

hill billy, that is a horrible designed sump.
johhny, that looks good. I think ive read somewhere that u can get that peg board form lowes or something to.

That "horrible designed" sump has raised thousands of dollars worth of Discus to adulthood for years, many of which have been sold for $400 a pair, after being proven spawning pairs. It has also supported up to 25- 6" plus adult Discus in a 240 gal. It currently supports 8- 6" cichla growouts with ease. Discus Hans, one of the largest Discus distributors in the US, and winner of countless awards, has used the same design of sumps for years, except on a much larger scale. It has everything needed for wet-dry, highly oxygenated water, mech, and bio. A lot mech. and bio in fact.

 

[Egon]

That "horrible designed" sump has raised thousands of dollars worth of Discus to adulthood for years, many of which have been sold for $400 a pair, after being proven spawning pairs. It has also supported up to 25- 6" plus adult Discus in a 240 gal. It currently supports 8- 6" cichla growouts with ease. Discus Hans, one of the largest Discus distributors in the US, and winner of countless awards, has used the same design of sumps for years, except on a much larger scale. It has everything needed for wet-dry, highly oxygenated water, mech, and bio. A lot mech. and bio in fact.

It's a bad design bud..........

 

[hillbilly]

It's a bad design bud..........

OK, what's so bad about it hotshot. So, it shouldn't have worked all these years?

 

[Egon]

Just having a little fun. I agree it works. Can it be more efficient with some baffles controlling the flow? Probably. Are the baffles necessary? Most cases, no, and your design proves that. The burning question is “hotshot” ??? LOL My dad called me that back in the ‘60’s How old are you?

 

[johnnycoolxx]

You don't need baffles. This is a 55 gal. tank, with 2- 4" thick pieces of Poret foam wedged in, with 2 liters of SeaChem Pond Matrix in a mesh bag on the bottom. 2- Eheim pumps and 2- Jager Heaters complete the filter. Works like a champ!

Whoa, I've never seen a sump design like that. It seems like there's not enough bio media in the sump? It looks like there are a lot of empty spaces where you could add bio, like to the right of the matrix or even move the matrix to the right and put a bunch of bio in the middle. But if you've gotten a lot of your growouts to blow up with this sump then obviously it works. Maybe sometimes the simple design is the better one.

 

[Egon]

It just comes down to bio load (poo). The only serious issue with hillbilly’s design is the possibility of stagnant water in the sump. Maybe it was an accident or maybe on purpose but he doesn't have a lot of bio media in the low flow areas. Additional bio media in these areas could cause pockets of trouble (ammonia build up). The empty space in this design is a good thing. Bio media needs to be in the water flow column. ​

 

[hillbilly]

Just having a little fun. I agree it works. Can it be more efficient with some baffles controlling the flow? Probably. Are the baffles necessary? Most cases, no, and your design proves that. The burning question is “hotshot” ??? LOL My dad called me that back in the ‘60’s How old are you?

LOL! Let's just say over 50.

 

[hillbilly]

Presently with the pumps in it now, it turns over a 240 gal. tank around 7.5 times per hour. Plenty for what I am using it for now. That's the beauty of this thing, not the looks. I can easily change it for my needs. I can change pumps and media in a couple of minutes. I have an air line in there that keeps the water moving around. I pulled it out for the picture for a better view. At one time I had a 5 gal. bucket full of Pond Matrix bio in there, but I found that to be way, way, overkill. What I have in there now is plenty, one Matrix bucket, I think its around 2 liters. I have plenty cycled and ready to go if I need it. The Poret foam is 2 pieces that are 20" long, 13" wide, and 4" thick. So that gives me an 8" thickness. A lot of people in Europe use Poret foam and nothing else. Good stuff. It holds a lot of bacteria, but is great mech. The water stays very clear.

 

[Clay]

Actually, his design is perfectly fine. I would prefer to see the flow start at one end and go through to the other, but that's me. The return pumps dictate the rate at which it comes into and goes out of the sump. I'm not sure why you guys feel that design is poor. I personally chose to put in a couple of baffles for different reasons though - I want someplace to banish fish/critters if they are unruly.

Also, I use acrylic baffles in my glass sumps. The reason is that they are easier to work with, more forgiving if you bang into one accidentally, and lastly, I don't like the glass chips that come from cutting and smoothing the edges.

Acrylic I can cut on my table saw for an exactly straight cut, it silicones in and is removable with a bit of flexing/cutting.

 

[honda237]

Use the baffles, the water will flow more efficiently. More bang for your buck. Ideally you want some of your bio media out of the water i.e. Wet/Dry. Baffles make that possible. Use the Jcardona design.

I used his design:

OP, i can honestly say after using this design, i will probably never use any other design because this one was so easy to setup.