Well I've been a member here for awhile, and haven't contributed much so I thought I would share my setup. I keep only African cichlids, mainly mbuna but also some tank, and peacocks. The bulk of the fish have been in my possession since they were juveniles. I have around 40 or so fish In the tank. My current setup has been set up about a year and
I have never had any issues with the sump, or with my overflow. The fish are all flourishing, and my socolafi breed like crazy. The water is typically crystal clear, but I just did a water change before I took these pics. My tank has a piece of 3" pipe inside and 4" pipe outside with two 1" overflow pipes inside. On each overflow pipe I have a tee with a valve so I can start the suction. FYI I have never lost suction. The water then travels to a three compartment drawer with filter media in the top, and a mix of bio balls and pot scrubbies in the other two drawers. The middle drawer has water trickling on it but it is not submerged, the bottom drawer is completely submerged. The water then travels past a refugium I have set up for any fish that need to be removed from the main tank. The pumps ( I have two for redundancy) are sitting in a weighted bin and return the water back to the main tank. The reason for the bin is so the water can never flood the main tank if I were to lose suction. The water has to flow over the top of the bin. Also in my sump I have an algae scrubber and it works well, I have very minimal algae if any at all in my main tank. For the lighting I have a led strip, and a t8 actinic on the main tank, and two led lights on my algae scrubber. All of the lighting is on timers. Also on the sump I have a Rena xp3 stuffed with filter pads with a whole house filter on the outlet piping to act as a water polisher. Filling the tank is simple I have a mixing valve set at a certain temp, and supply lines running over to the tank so I basically just turn on a valve to fill the tank. I am currently designing a ss coil that will sit in the sump, with a hot water return pipe and pump hooked up to my water heater, with a temp controller.
I have never had any issues with the sump, or with my overflow. The fish are all flourishing, and my socolafi breed like crazy. The water is typically crystal clear, but I just did a water change before I took these pics. My tank has a piece of 3" pipe inside and 4" pipe outside with two 1" overflow pipes inside. On each overflow pipe I have a tee with a valve so I can start the suction. FYI I have never lost suction. The water then travels to a three compartment drawer with filter media in the top, and a mix of bio balls and pot scrubbies in the other two drawers. The middle drawer has water trickling on it but it is not submerged, the bottom drawer is completely submerged. The water then travels past a refugium I have set up for any fish that need to be removed from the main tank. The pumps ( I have two for redundancy) are sitting in a weighted bin and return the water back to the main tank. The reason for the bin is so the water can never flood the main tank if I were to lose suction. The water has to flow over the top of the bin. Also in my sump I have an algae scrubber and it works well, I have very minimal algae if any at all in my main tank. For the lighting I have a led strip, and a t8 actinic on the main tank, and two led lights on my algae scrubber. All of the lighting is on timers. Also on the sump I have a Rena xp3 stuffed with filter pads with a whole house filter on the outlet piping to act as a water polisher. Filling the tank is simple I have a mixing valve set at a certain temp, and supply lines running over to the tank so I basically just turn on a valve to fill the tank. I am currently designing a ss coil that will sit in the sump, with a hot water return pipe and pump hooked up to my water heater, with a temp controller.
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