Building a bio reactor, couple questions...

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
D

davenmandy

Peacock Bass
MFK Member
Feb 1, 2012
1,781
459
122
Going to build a bio reactor to add onto my sump next weekend. Actually pretty excited, read the whole MBBR thread in the stingray section and now I'm a believer. I think I am going to make it out of roughly a 35 gallon garbage can type container, something like a sump pump container. I would go bigger but have no room unfortunately. My plan is to put the container right beside the sump, T off my output pump that goes through my UV sterilizer into the container, and drill a bulkhead and have it gravity drain back into the sump. Few questions though:

Why does everyone have lids on their drums? Moving bed filters inside an actual sump don't have lids on them, is there a reason why people keep lids on the garbage can reactors?

I run 2 1800 gph mag drive pumps, each have 8-10 feet of head, so my turnover isn't spectacular. I want to T off the output going through my UV so as to give the water more exposure under the bulb. What kind of gph do I need to pump into the tub to make any of this worth it? About half of that? Just worried it will effect the turnover more than the good it will do.

I was thinking of having the water coming into the container go through a filter sock first within the unit. Has anyone had a problem doing that, in terms of traffic jams or otherwise?

Can anyone recommend good air pumps (that won't break the bank, not a CEO quite yet, but I got a bit I can spend) and air stones/diffusers to use? Links would be good too, I want to start ordering this stuff.

Finally, only real part of the desing I am confused about is the drain at the bottom of the unit. My unit will sit on the top tier of a 2x4/plywood shelf where my sump sits right now. The tank is on the level above, hence the pump head (unfortunately). How would I go about building a drain to get the bad stuff out of the bottom while still being able to have it sit on a flat surface? I was thinking of putting the drain as low as I can on the side and simply tilt the unit when I am ready to drain? I guess I could cut a small hole in the plywood and have it drain that way, but I would prefer a more versatile option.

Thanks in advance, this is going to be fun, if all goes well I'll add pics here, if I am too ashamed with its function I won't haha.
 
davenmandy said:
Going to build a bio reactor to add onto my sump next weekend. Actually pretty excited, read the whole MBBR thread in the stingray section and now I'm a believer. I think I am going to make it out of roughly a 35 gallon garbage can type container, something like a sump pump container. I would go bigger but have no room unfortunately. My plan is to put the container right beside the sump, T off my output pump that goes through my UV sterilizer into the container, and drill a bulkhead and have it gravity drain back into the sump. Few questions though:

Why does everyone have lids on their drums? Moving bed filters inside an actual sump don't have lids on them, is there a reason why people keep lids on the garbage can reactors?

I run 2 1800 gph mag drive pumps, each have 8-10 feet of head, so my turnover isn't spectacular. I want to T off the output going through my UV so as to give the water more exposure under the bulb. What kind of gph do I need to pump into the tub to make any of this worth it? About half of that? Just worried it will effect the turnover more than the good it will do.

I was thinking of having the water coming into the container go through a filter sock first within the unit. Has anyone had a problem doing that, in terms of traffic jams or otherwise?

Can anyone recommend good air pumps (that won't break the bank, not a CEO quite yet, but I got a bit I can spend) and air stones/diffusers to use? Links would be good too, I want to start ordering this stuff.

Finally, only real part of the desing I am confused about is the drain at the bottom of the unit. My unit will sit on the top tier of a 2x4/plywood shelf where my sump sits right now. The tank is on the level above, hence the pump head (unfortunately). How would I go about building a drain to get the bad stuff out of the bottom while still being able to have it sit on a flat surface? I was thinking of putting the drain as low as I can on the side and simply tilt the unit when I am ready to drain? I guess I could cut a small hole in the plywood and have it drain that way, but I would prefer a more versatile option.

Thanks in advance, this is going to be fun, if all goes well I'll add pics here, if I am too ashamed with its function I won't haha.
Click to expand...

Not much input. But on the subject of flow loss vs gains. It's been talked about on here many times that high turnover is only beneficial for mechanical filtration. Biological filtration usually works better when the water has some good contact time with the media.

Sent from my SM-N900W8 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
 
Yup agreed, I personally feel a good balance should be found because mechanical is obviously important as well, however I have a bit of a unique situation in the sense that when I moved the tank is sitting in the walk-out portion of my basement on the concrete floor and I plumbed the sump into the actual basement, so unfortunately I have a lot of output head on the pump as well as a decent chunk of horizontal run on my drains, so it is pretty finicky (my water level in the tank will drop about a cm when the pre-filter sponge on the mag drive is gunky). I don't want to take too much away from my turnover into the tank, but I also want to make sure I put enough into the reactor as well, so I guess I wanted to know how many estimated GPH would be decent enough for a ~35ish gallon reactor to make it effective. I was planning on putting 1 1inch drain from the reactor into the sump, maybe thats a mistake and I should put two just in case...
 
davenmandy said:
Yup agreed, I personally feel a good balance should be found because mechanical is obviously important as well, however I have a bit of a unique situation in the sense that when I moved the tank is sitting in the walk-out portion of my basement on the concrete floor and I plumbed the sump into the actual basement, so unfortunately I have a lot of output head on the pump as well as a decent chunk of horizontal run on my drains, so it is pretty finicky (my water level in the tank will drop about a cm when the pre-filter sponge on the mag drive is gunky). I don't want to take too much away from my turnover into the tank, but I also want to make sure I put enough into the reactor as well, so I guess I wanted to know how many estimated GPH would be decent enough for a ~35ish gallon reactor to make it effective. I was planning on putting 1 1inch drain from the reactor into the sump, maybe thats a mistake and I should put two just in case...
Click to expand...

In my opinion 35 gallons doesn't mean anything. It's going to depend on the surface area of the media and container your using. I have a 35 gallon garbage can at home. It's pretty big. Maybe 20" diameter at the bottom and 30" at the top. Filled side to side top to bottom that's at ton of surface area. You can probably pump a considerable amount of water through it and still have great contact time. Personally I would make a bakki shower. (I believe that's how you spell it)

Sent from my SM-N900W8 using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
 
Great, don't care about the noise because its in the unfinished basement, so if that's the only reason to have a lid I can go ahead and look for a container that doesn't come with the lid. I read all 33 pages of that thread, good stuff, and yes what I want to build is very similar to yours. Any input on the bottom gunk drain or prefiltering it before it gets into the reactor somehow? Maybe I should just bulk up my mechanical filter before the trickle tower and not worry about a pre-filter into the reactor?
 
davenmandy said:
Great, don't care about the noise because its in the unfinished basement, so if that's the only reason to have a lid I can go ahead and look for a container that doesn't come with the lid. I read all 33 pages of that thread, good stuff, and yes what I want to build is very similar to yours. Any input on the bottom gunk drain or prefiltering it before it gets into the reactor somehow? Maybe I should just bulk up my mechanical filter before the trickle tower and not worry about a pre-filter into the reactor?
Click to expand...

The current owner of the reactor I believe is pre filtering before it gets to the reactor and after with socks. In the time I ran it I never had an issue with gunk at the bottom. Maybe because the air stones sat on the bottom. So there was never any drain. Each setup is different though.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
 
Interesting, I would have thought that was the point to have all that dead bio media fall off in the bottom of the reactor and have a quick way to drain it. Right now all that gunk builds up under my bio tower and I have to siphon it out, PITA. Maybe I'll build one without a drain, see if there are any issues, and then build a drain to fit should I need one, problem is though that I honestly don't see where all the dead bio media would go if not there, wonder if its mechanically filtered out somewhere. Thanks for the input, care to elaborate what pump and airstones you used and how many gph you liked to run through it?
 
davenmandy said:
Interesting, I would have thought that was the point to have all that dead bio media fall off in the bottom of the reactor and have a quick way to drain it. Right now all that gunk builds up under my bio tower and I have to siphon it out, PITA. Maybe I'll build one without a drain, see if there are any issues, and then build a drain to fit should I need one, problem is though that I honestly don't see where all the dead bio media would go if not there, wonder if its mechanically filtered out somewhere. Thanks for the input, care to elaborate what pump and airstones you used and how many gph you liked to run through it?
Click to expand...

How many people do you know that have drains in their glass or acrylic tank reactors? I never noticed anything floating in the tank from the reactor. Tank was in the garage and I did not run super bright lighting so I never noticed it. Could be the reason the new owner of it runs socks after the reactor. I don't think Trevor does either and he has the same version.

The tank was run with 2 Hydrive 4800's. One was T'd off to the reactor and ran at about 600-900gph. Air pump was an Easypro EPW4. Reactor can was about 30-35 gallons. 2 cuft of media. Airstones where about 1" square by 3" long. Check back on that thread for how the stones had been plumbed.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using MonsterAquariaNetwork App
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
MonsterFishKeepers.com
Top Bottom