Now accepting brilliant ideas!!

[Aquattro]

For partitioning my sump. It's 5ft long, 2ft tall, and 18" wide. I'll want to use a filter bag for input, my Euroreef sits in there somewhere, a float valve for auto-topoff and a heater. And I guess a small power head to feed the reactor.
I've always done various baffles with chambers, but this is a clean tank, never baffled ,so I'm wondering if someone has better ideas than me (no cheap shots on that, k? :) ) Thanks

[mr_alberta]

What's the footprint of the skimmer?

[Aquattro]

What's the footprint of the skimmer?


roughly 9x12 with all the plumbing and pump

[mr_alberta]

Here's my submission:

http://members.shaw.ca/harvwong/sump.JPG

Basically water flows in a "U" shaped pattern. I put an elevation sketch so you can see how the center baffle/partition works. The skimmer in theory could drain back over the center partition and back into the filter sock chamber. I use to run a sump just like this when I had my other tank set up. Works very well and can handle a lot of flow if required.

[Jason McK]

Why not skip the baffles all together and just use a filter sock defuss the bubbles from the return and the skimmer

J

[zulu_principle]

Why not skip the baffles all together and just use a filter sock defuss the bubbles from the return and the skimmer

J

Thats what I would do :)

[Aquattro]

ya, with 10 feet of travel, baffles might not be required. Maybe some eggcrate chambers for media or other misc. Certainly something to consider. Thanks

[Zylumn]

A few more questions for you reef_raf before I give my 2 cents worth.

1) How big is your display tank
2) What GPH are you pumping back to the main
3) Are you considering making this incorporate a refugium
4) Do you have an UV sterilizer
5) How many gallons can you evaporate before it considerably effects your salinity
6)Do you have automatic water changing capabilities and how many g's do you water change at a time.

My first thoughts are 24 high and 18 wide try not to split the tank in half unless you want a refugium and utilize as much as possible the 24" high.

Kevin

[Aquattro]

1. Display is 90g
2. Ideally 1000-1200 GPH return
3. No
4. No
5. Evaporation will be handled via float and a bank of 5g water jugs (already have this stuff)
6. No, water changes will be done manually. The sump is housed in an enclosed area under the stairs with no drain.

I may want a frag tray at some point. I'll need to consider this.

[Zylumn]

reef_raf I am just going over the drawings I made for the sumps I have done. That is a nice size tank you have a ton on possibilities.
Kevin

[Der_Iron_Chef]

Interesting to me that people are recommending you ditch the baffle idea!! It seemed standard to me, but now maybe I'll have to re-think my own future plans and just buy some filter socks.

As you were....

[Zylumn]

reef_raf I am a little surprised that you would run a 110 g sump just to put a skimmer, a couple of heaters, and a return pump in??? A 33g would probably suffice but this is not the answer to the question that started this thread.

1st chamber to hold the sock 10 inches with a baffle across the tank 1" off the bottom with the next baffle 1" in and 4" from the top. This would hold your skimmer if you planned to utilize the middle chamber yet now alow you any filter sock configuration.
2nd chamber 30" long with baffles going opposite of the first two. This would give you a chamber with 47g capacity. Down the road it would be great for refugium or DSB and would nicely fit a 24 or 30" pc light. But now can be for your skimmer and heaters.
3rd your return would be just under 20" giving you a return chamber of around 30+ gallons. Nice size and you could go a week without top ups.

With this sump you would have close to 20g free to hold overflow from the main tank in case of power outage. Also you would nearly add the same volume of water to your display.

I hope I helped in a small way with my 2 cents worth. I would definitely look to the future when building this as you have a sump a lot of people would love to own as a display.
Pics please when your done.
Kevin

[Chin_Lee]

Bigger the better for a sump IMO. I have a 180g sump :)

[Aquattro]

reef_raf I am a little surprised that you would run a 110 g sump just to put a skimmer, a couple of heaters, and a return pump in??? A 33g would probably suffice but this is not the answer to the question that started this thread.


Well, I was looking for a 75g sump, but this came up at a good price, and well, more water is better in my mind. The display tank did come with a 33 sump, but I figure if I'm putting it downstairs, I might as well go big. It is a really nice tank though, it would make a nice display.

[Zylumn]

agreed

[christyf5]

I run my sump baffle-less. Just use a filtersock to reduce bubbles going into the tank as well as clean any particulates. I have my euroreef modded with the gate valve and it doesn't release any fine bubbles into the sump at all.

[SeaHorse_Fanatic]

Bigger the better for a sump IMO. I have a 180g sump :)

Agreed. I have a 75g sump for my 210g reef & if I knew earlier I was going to be tearing down the fw setups, I would have set up the 6' 110g as my sump instead. Even with a 48" by 18" footprint, I find I run out of room in my sump/refugium.

[Snappy]

What are you planning for an auto top-off, gravity or pump? My RO/DI res is about 25 gallons and I don't use a calcium reactor so I had an issue where my float swtich from the dosing pump would sometimes stick in the on position and as a result had a few floods. What I did to safe guard against this was I simply hooked it up to a timer so it only runs for a few hours at a time. I have it set for an intermitent 7 hours per day maximum so it keeps up nicely with the evap but can never overflow.
I don't know if this is relevent in your case but it's an idea some may not think of.

[Aquattro]

Greg, I have a bank of 5g containers that drain thru a float valve (gravity)