Sump plans, how to improve

[joshee]

hi all! im new here and first of all, great board, ive founf lots of usefull info here.

im currently building a sump for my FW 6' x 2.5' x 2.5' filled with american cichlids, the sump will be made from a standard 4' tank with some glass baffles cut.

i wanted like to incorporate a refugium into my design for plants, shrimp and possibly breeding smaller fish, but i i didnt want the filtration stealing nutrients before it entered the planted section and i also didnt want the filtration stealing nutrients from the plated section before it entered the display, so my only solution was to have the return section in the middle of the 2.

there will be 2 inputs going into each side of the sump regulated via the ball valves, because i want to be able to slow the flow to the planted section in the case i had fry/small shrimp in there at the time, and also to stop all the co2 leaving the planted area so quickly, the overflow will be syphoning at approximatly 1100gph,

ive also made a bubble trap on the right side simply to stop all the bubbles that falls so high from the planted area from entering the return pump, as i have to keep the water level in that section relativily low so all the bioballs arent fully submerged.

incase your wonder why ive made the return so big its just because thats the section that will lower due to evaporation and i dont want to have to top that part up every 3 or so days.

also the baffle in the planted section is low just because i want the water flowing through the plants not just on top (not sure if this is necessary)

will this work?
does anybody have any suggestions for improvement?
also does anybody know a good strainer that i can put in small enough to stop fry getting sucked out but big enough not to be constanly blocked?

thanks in advance

i know my graphics skills could be better haha.

 

[BadOleRoss]

Unless you are really determined to have your pump in the middle of the sump, move it too the end. I just finished up a 7' long sump for a 315G tank with a pump in the middle and wish I would have moved it to the end. Anyway, after you redesign and move the pump to the end, have water enter the refugium, rise and the fall throught the bioballs and then on to the pump. Between the refugium and the rise to the bioball, place a block of Poret foam to deep fry from moving on beyond that point. If you want to keep the design you have, which does look pretty good, you can replace the strainer with Poret foam between the panels where the strainer is. How this all makes sense! Good luck! And your graphics are just fine!

 

[joshee]

thanks for the quick reply! may i ask what was the reasoning why you would have changed the return to the end? do you think 1100gph would be to much flow for the refugium? as it will have a co2 diffuser in it also, and wouldnt the filtration part take out most of the nutrients from the plants? or is my understanding about plant wrong, do they even release nutrients or just there to convert ammonia into nitrate/nitrite.
also do you think the poret foam would clog up alot getting the all of the overflow before the filtration?

 

[fox3]

I have used that layout in the past, got good results but you need to maintain the fuge or you will foul the pump well. Well if you use hornwort or similar anyways.

I did something different in that instead of a screen lower in the watercollumn I fabbed a toothed weir outta versatop plastic and placed it at the waterlevel of the fuge.

I split the drains and let 3x's turnover go thru the fuge and the rest go thru the bio chamber. I have a pic up now of another design I am using in another thread, I can post it if you would like.

 

[Pharaoh]

I would swap the refugium and the pump areas and them have all of the water entering over top of the wet/dry portion. You really don't want to have all that waste from the aquarium in your refugium.

 

[Weaksrt]

Yea make it a stage to the refugium. I had a 35gallon tote, 19qt trash can with holes in the bottom (small holes and alot) filled half way with bioballs, and a 12qt trash can with holes about halfway up that inside the 19qt on top of the bioballs and filled with filtering media like 100 micron filtering. and the overflow is piped to that so when the 12qt fills up it will spill over to the bio balls and then in the other half of the 35gal tote i bought another 12qt can filled with gravel and a couple rocks for Java Moss (its cheap) to grow inside of and put holes through that about halfway up so the water in the tote will flow around and through the refugium. I can add another if needed too.

 

[BadOleRoss]

thanks for the quick reply! may i ask what was the reasoning why you would have changed the return to the end? do you think 1100gph would be to much flow for the refugium? as it will have a co2 diffuser in it also, and wouldnt the filtration part take out most of the nutrients from the plants? or is my understanding about plant wrong, do they even release nutrients or just there to convert ammonia into nitrate/nitrite.
also do you think the poret foam would clog up alot getting the all of the overflow before the filtration?

I placed the pump in the center to simplify my plumbing beacuase I had an overflow on each end of the tank. What I have discovered it that it is difficult to get the flow balanced in the sump so close to an even amount of water flows through each side. I dont think 1100 gph is to much for a refugium, I had a higher rate on my 220G SW tank but I know nothing about the world of freshwater plants and CO2 so I cant speak to that. As far as the Poret foam clogging, I have my sump designed so the water passes through a 200 micron filter sock as it enters the sump and there is also a drip plate covered in a 100 micron filter pad to keep stuff out of the foam. Here is the thread of my DIY sump.....
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=304002&highlight=talk+sumps

 

[joshee]

thanks guys, been a bit busy with my gt's spawning, but the plans still in action, ive taken in your suggestions and im adding to this design, ive purchased a food grade 120liter (30gal?) drum, which will be used along side my 4ft sump, the drum will be half filled with ceramic rings and other submerged media, and the top half will be filled with bioballs, there will be a bulkhead placed at the bottom of the drum with piped set up so it keeps the drum half full of water then overflows into a T with half the water going straight into the refugium than the other half will be running down an algae scrubber. should have pics up soon. just purchased most of the things i need today, im making a diy 3d background for it atm, start drilling tomoorow hopefully

 

[joshee]

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pretty much what im thinking now, 120litre drum is to the right, micron filter will be run 1 hour per week

 

[JakeH]

Wow. Thats over-complicating the fuge concept impressively. It looks pretty sweet though & it would certainly make an impression on anyone who sees it! BTW, you're probably gonna want to pick either the fuge or the algae scrubber... They both will do the job, but the scrubber will suck up the nutrients much faster than the plants & you wont get much new growth in the fuge. Adding ferts would probably just make the problem worse. My fuge is not planted very heavily & it still sucks up close to 20ppm nitrate per week.