bio tower add-on for sump

[fish head )'>]

I was thinking about trying to take advantage of the distance the water has to travel from the overflow to the wet/dry sump by replacing the small tube of the normal set up with 6" PVC pipe stuffed with bio material, such as scrubbies and/or bio bail and/or lava rock.

Would you omit the filter material in the top section of the bio tower to opt for more bio, relying on just the foam pre-filter in the over flow?

In doing research on this idea i have seen bio towers with massive amounts of bio material claiming that no pre-filtering is needed. (this was on large scale towers, but would this still apply to this small set up?)

The egg crate would be held in place by simply gluing some PVC pieces inside the pipe to support the grid.

Any thoughts, changes or suggestions or insight? Or is this not worth doing for the amount of benefit that might be achieved?

BTW: I have a 125g African cichlid tank with the existing DYI wet/dry moving around 300 g/h.

 

[milkman407]

Only thing i would worry about is if the pvc getts clogged, and restricts the flow.

 

[portabuddy]

seems like a solid idea if the tank is high enough..., and i like that you went with a 6" pipe and not a 4 or a 5...

 

[ethnics]

i wouldn't do it, if u want a bio tower it should be on the return up above the tank where only clean water goes thru it. that way it can't get clogged.

 

[WeeNe858]

well he does have the prefilter from the overflow and into the tube so it will work... but i think you should make stages or layers of bio balls rather than just a big tower... a bit more work but you get some nice water breaks in there...... you should also have a bypass so you can change the filter floss with easy and not cut the syphon....

so just Y off the overflow and have one end going to the biotower and the other to standard 2 inch and have a ball valve at the top of each set... that way you can divert the water.... and you could even Y the tubes back to get her

 

[dogofwar]

I'd be worries about the material in the "tower" clogging and restricting flow to the sump.

You could add a three drawer Rubbermaid storage container (with holes drilled in the bottom of the three drawers) on top of your sump to add some additional capacity as an alternative.

 

[ethnics]

i think the bio tower is a great idea, but theres other ways to go about it if ur lookin for more bio. what i like to do is stack rubber maid containers filled with bio media. the top container would be your filter floss section so nothing gets thru to ur bio. no need to worry about it getting clogged cuz it wont. its not just a tube off ur overflow. u have more then enough bio in a stacked style tower. i have almost 40gals of bio in 2 20gal bins stacked for bio and it works awesome.

 

[Dr Joe]

It worked for me, I've had several running for years at a time.

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i wouldn't do it, if u want a bio tower it should be on the return up above the tank where only clean water goes thru it. that way it can't get clogged.

If its after your sump there's not much left to feed it.

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I'd be worries about the material in the "tower" clogging and restricting flow to the sump.

That's what the pre-filter is for.

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You could add a three drawer Rubbermaid storage container (with holes drilled in the bottom of the three drawers) on top of your sump to add some additional capacity as an alternative.

Not enough room vertically.

Dr Joe

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