Yayaya, I'm workin on it. :mrgreen: ETA 3 months. Time me :wink:

And go!!!

Yeah, I guess you'd have to plumb an emergency overflow if you went with an automated valve (one nice thing about the toilet flapper valves is they have that "feature" already). The thing that turned me off the automated valve idea, when I looked into it, was the cost ... "ouch" doesn't begin to cover it. I guess there are sprinkler valves but I'm not sure how big they get, or how well they'd stand up to saltwater .. the ones I looked at, at Home Depot, had metal springs and so on, so I don't think they'd be suitable.

Anyhow I'm real excited to see this project progress, I'll be watching this for sure! :cool:

tagging along...

I seen someone on Utube with a toilet flapper device. I'm interested, I'll tag too.

Do you have a pic of the proposed plan?

Not at the moment no... Soon, I'm working it out on paper and will do a full draw-up once I've got everything figured.

I will not be using the toilet flapper, mainly because it will take up waaaay more space than I can alot to the surge system. The surge itself will only be about 1 liter, so I don't need something huge... and the more compact the better. On that note, I've realized that I still will need an emergency drain on the surge tank for me to feel completely safe about it. Though there should never (EVER!) be water running through it, the piping I'll be using will be too big to get blocked by anything that would make it through the pump.

I've tried to minimize the size of the CSD siphon and surge tank(s) but even so the system is looking like there will be parts that are quite tall. Hmm... well, there's some more design work to be done, a couple kinks need to get worked out. I'm on it, don't worry.

More to come when I get the design down. Then I'll have pics of the proposed plan. Or plans. Whatever :wink:

So, I've decided to just modify the trimless 20 gallon tank that I have to produce the tank size that I need. I'm still calling it a pico :wink: Essentially, I will be building a tank within a tank. This will allow me to do a couple things...

1. Instant sump! Using the 20 gallon allows me to use the original principal of having a sump system and overflow... And depending on how much water I decide to keep in the sump, I might be able to fit a skimmer in there! The sump will contain the heater, pumps, and all plumbing.

2. The LED lighting system that I'm building will now be fully modular. I'll be basically building mini spotlights, though I haven't decided if I'll be using optics or not... I think at first not. Either way the rack will be mounted at the top of the surge unit... about 8" off the water's surface. The lights themselves I'll probably hang at first, until I figure out how to gimbal them.

3. The surge unit... I've worked out the size... the whole unit will stand 24" tall, including the height of the 20 gallon. Not too shabby, and since the 20 gallon tank itself will form the case for the pico, all plumbing and pipes will be hidden. Eventually... It'll look pretty frankensteiny until the tank is painted or whatever I decide to do... likely skinning. So the 'clean' look I'm going for will come with time.

So this is officially a 'mod' project. I'm cool with that :mrgreen: It's still a pico (the original 20 x 8 x 9 still applies). I still get a sump. A better one, in fact, and no worries if something leaks! Everything stays modular and able to move to a different tank if (when?) the time comes and that happens. I might be able to attempt my passive skimmer now! Probably not worth it on a 5.5 gallon display though :lol:

I want to make a point that although the lighting and everything else points to this build not being in the same vein as my other planted project, I expect that this tank will be 1/2 to 1/3 planted. There will not be any seagrasses in this one though, just macros. The tentative stocking list above doesn't reflect this, but I do intend for there to be some surviving hitchhikers and will alter my plans accordingly.

I do want to keep some SPS corals, specifically that which hitches in (if any) and Porites, the symbiotic coral for christmas tree worms. SPS aren't the true focus of this tank... diversity is :wink:

I think I have read this before a couple of times. the couple of kinks can become a huge pain in the orifice.