Starting over - first planted with sump & Co2 setup - please help

[lingi]

I used to raise fish all throughout my teens but have been out of the hobby for well over ten years, always yearning for the right moment to jump back in. Decided to pull the trigger on this secondhand tank and just set it up at home. Waiting for new plumbing that I ordered to arrive before I test to see if it holds water then proceed to start, can’t wait!

Although I’m an experienced fish keeper, this is going to be my first planted tank with soil substrate, Co2, plant lights, and a sump, as when I was a kid this was way out of my budget. So this is a lot for me to take in and I’m sure I’m going to make plenty of mistakes, so I greatly appreciate all your input.

I suppose the tank is made to be run bare bottom as there’s a hole in the bottom corner where you can drain it from to carry out water changes. Never had anything like that, seems like a really cool feature which I want to try and keep. After the water test, I plan to drain it then use some leftover pieces from the background, silicone, and wire mesh to build a wall around that hole so then I can still pour substrate in, and I would have elevated it by 2 inches.

I basically bought new everything and am just using the original tank and cabinet. I still need to get a lid made as there’s too is currently wide open, and I like naughty fish. I’m still a month away from introducing fish though unfortunately, so time is on my side.

What I got so far:

• sicce syncra 2400L/h pump
• 4L Co2 setup from Aquapro with solenoid valve and a supposedly intelligent regulator (I have no idea how to use this yet, a bit intimidating)
• activated carbon, ceramic cubes, bio balls
• two different grades of sponges plus filter wool
• a 500w Sensen heater
• really fancy plant lights I can control from my phone for both the main tank and sump (in case I want to keep moss balls there, breed shrimp, or whatever) that I haven’t even began to figure out what ranges I need to optimise for, also quite intimidating
• a range of water treatment chemicals I have also yet to begin to read about and understand how to use (got a package deal when looking for dechlorinator and just bought them all) - I know, I’m stupid
• I got two 25L jerrycans to pre-fill and pretreat the water to do 50L water changes at a time (need to figure out how to empty just 50L or not much more than that)
• 4 9L bags of black brown soil from Netlea. Yet to find out if that’s too little or overkill.

Right now my main question is how to set up the sump, as I never ran a setup with one before. As you can see there are 3 main compartments. For those 3, left to right, I plan to have the first one filled with sponges, first starting from most porous and finishing with least porous and then filter wool. Second compartment I will have the charcoal + ceramic + bio balls. Third compartment is the only place I can have the heater and pump, which is worrying me a bit since I fear any shrimp fry will be immediately sucked in, how to solve this? That’s also where I plan to add Co2 from (seller told me that should be completely fine, but what else would he say when he saw me itching to buy?). As you can see there is a low overflow of sorts for water going from the middle to the last compartment, I don’t know what that’s for and if anything should go in it?

But apart from those three, there is also a small 4-5cm one on the far left where I suppose the pipe from the main tank should be attached and water comes into the sump from. I’m also uncertain about what that’s supposed to be. Should I put anything in it? If so, what? What about filter socks and so I need one? Should I get a longer pipe for water coming into the sump so I take it all the way to the bottom of that first 4-5cm compartment?

I also got those plastic bottom grids/crates/dividers and I'm wondering how to use them exactly? The reason I got them was so I can put the slate/rocks on them and not have them touch the glass directly and also to create different levels when aquascaping the tank, Now I'm wondering should I cover the entire bottom of the tank with them? And if so should I fill them with soil? Since soil is inevitably going to get into them anyways and I don't want to leave pockets of water under the substrate which could lead to a build up of ammonia. Should I also use them in the sump?

I plan to go for a heavily planted setup, all or nothing, think monaco carpet, amazon sword, buce, java fern, anubias, banana lilly, rotala reds, ludwigia, and alternanthera. If you’re facepalming now, I beg you to take a quick moment to talk some sense into this fool before more obscenities are committed.

 

[danotaylor]

I have no experience with this sump question for planted tanks, but I have read several times over the years plant tank people discourage running a sump w CO2. The theory is that all the water movement and surface tension break points will cause most of your CO2 to gas out of your system.
Perhaps with the overflows set up so they don’t gurgle and enter the sump at the bottom instead of the top, and with deep return outlets vs surface you could mitigate of the CO2 loss perhaps?

 

[HUKIT]

What are you using for drain set up? A Bean Animal or Herbie should off gas far less CO2 than a Durso standpipe.

 

[lingi]

What are you using for drain set up? A Bean Animal or Herbie should off gas far less CO2 than a Durso standpipe.

I searched those 3 terms and am still not sure exactly which one mine is. I'll try to explain as best I can. I have this part installed underneath my tank:
The threaded part goes into the tank from the bottom through the hole in the tank, and then from the inside the pipe carrying water from the sump pipe into the tank screws onto it, which is then covered by another pipe which is the overflow. The overflow brings water into the tank through the pipe you see on the left of this exploded image. And the pipe on the right with a faucet is to drain the tank or carry out water changes, it takes water from the bottom part of the 'column' inside the tank when you open it.

 

[lingi]

I filled it for the first time last night. I plan to let the bogwood soak in some water for a couple of days, then empty it sometime next week to attach the background, put the substrate in and start aquascaping it. This is how it's looking like set up. Sorry I was leaving home in a rush this morning and forgot to take a picture of it completely full, just the sump part.




You can see I have a lot of bubbles coming into the sump from the overflow pipe, so I'm very concerned whether this is going to defeat the purpose of CO2. I tried to wedge the overflow pipe, the part of it which is in the water, to create a U shape, but there's not enough length in the pipe and not really enough room to manoeuvre, best I could get was an L shape, and it didn't affect the amount of air/bubbles coming into the sump one bit. I will cut the pump pipe to size later when I empty the tank after this trial.

One concerning thing is that when I was filling the tank, although there were no leaks from the plumbing or sealing anywhere, as I was filling the tank the overflow pipe started to trickle some water into the sump way before I had reached the overflow level. It was just a small trickle but still. I couldn't for the life of me figure out where that water was coming from, but my best guess is that the overflow pipe is just loosely placed on the the pump pipe (the part of them in the tank) and water is just going into the bottom part of the in-tank plumbing by pressure. I can't really explain it any better. I will disassemble everything again when I empty it, and I'll seal all the connections with flex tape since once I fill it with the substrate and plants in, it's never going to be emptied again unless worst case scenario!

So apart from that my biggest concern is still oxygen vs CO2, I'm concerned I have to much bubbles coming into the sump from the overflow. Then I'm still uncertain about how to set up the sump. Can anyone tell me based from my pictures if there's anything wrong with my sump setup? Another concern is that I feel there's not much flow from the bottom of the tank to the overflow, I can already see some debris from the wood starting to settle in the bottom.