Yeah i got the plans for it from the "DIY OVERFLOW " sticky under the diy forums.
hybridtheory:
Here's a picture of the setup of the bucket sump.
As you can see i used a couple of 5 gallon buckets. I cut the bottom 5 inches off 3 of the buckets and used these as the baskets to hold the media. I either cut a hundred holes or big slots in the baskets depending on which media i was going to place in them.
Poly fill on the top, carbon and some zeolite in the middle basket (only for 2 more weeks until my tank has fully cycled. its a new tank and i want to keep the nitrates down until my bioload has grown). And the bottom basket i have potscrubbers that i have seeded with some filter media from an old canister filter i made a while back. I have a pond pump at the bottom with the return pipe going up through the center of each of the baskets.
I normally would have made this alot nicer and bigger but i was limited on tools. (I would have liked to use an old 20 gallon for the sump). I'm livin in an apartment at school in the city so all the powertools are back home. Oh did i mention i made this entire sump setup with only a utility knife?! Yes i cut buckets inhalf with a utility knife
. (just put a lil muscle into it). The overflow parts i actually just cut up when i was at homedepot. the guy let me use their saws to cut up the pvc piping. I tried to convince him to let me cement it all together there but he said that was pushing it so i had to buy the cement. But it just goes to show that being resourceful can make things pretty simple sometimes.
-GREM
hybridtheory:
i was 1 step ahead of you. After i posted this i put a small mesh screen over the intake and wiretied it on to keep from big stuff going down there. Which is a very good point because i give my turtle lettuce all the time and that could definitely cause some blockage in the overflow.
Here's a picture of the setup of the bucket sump.
As you can see i used a couple of 5 gallon buckets. I cut the bottom 5 inches off 3 of the buckets and used these as the baskets to hold the media. I either cut a hundred holes or big slots in the baskets depending on which media i was going to place in them.
Poly fill on the top, carbon and some zeolite in the middle basket (only for 2 more weeks until my tank has fully cycled. its a new tank and i want to keep the nitrates down until my bioload has grown). And the bottom basket i have potscrubbers that i have seeded with some filter media from an old canister filter i made a while back. I have a pond pump at the bottom with the return pipe going up through the center of each of the baskets.
I normally would have made this alot nicer and bigger but i was limited on tools. (I would have liked to use an old 20 gallon for the sump). I'm livin in an apartment at school in the city so all the powertools are back home. Oh did i mention i made this entire sump setup with only a utility knife?! Yes i cut buckets inhalf with a utility knife
. (just put a lil muscle into it). The overflow parts i actually just cut up when i was at homedepot. the guy let me use their saws to cut up the pvc piping. I tried to convince him to let me cement it all together there but he said that was pushing it so i had to buy the cement. But it just goes to show that being resourceful can make things pretty simple sometimes.-GREM
