Seems like you have it planned out pretty well already!
What biological filtration are you thinking about for your biological sump?
Hi,
So far I have the BIO Sump planned in cardboard, which I still can changed and have changed a few times. Like for instance changed my idea from filter socks to those plastic filter media cups, which I can put a homemade filter sock into if needed and just throw them away instead of washing socks. I found that the natural felt stuff you can get at places like Joanne fabrics work great.
Both sumps are a race track design as you can see from the pictures.
24"wide x 28" length divided down the middle at the 12" mark, giving me 4 linear feet of sump area in each. I feel it is far better then a 8 foot long sump tanking up all my cabinet space.
The current idea is a 1 1/2 over flow pipe from above tank, into each sump and the refugium.
The BIO SUMP DESIGN so far is;
The 1 1/2 inch from above tank in to the BIO sump will be "T" off into two 1 1/2 pipes at the sump to create more flow, control noise and even out the water flow into the first chamber, controlled by gate values.
The first chamber (aeration chamber) the water will flow into and up to the 10" mark and then flow laterally into chamber two which will have 2 filter media cups which are 4" wide by 7" deep and the heaters temp probe .Total water depth for chamber two is 8.5" Then it will flow over the 8.5" divider and into the skimmer area at water height of 8.5" for reef octopus classic 200 and a True Temp heater.
From there it will flow into a second filter block and felt liner basket and drain into chamber 3 (water depth of 6") which will have wet bio balls at base and a 24" tall x 6" diameter clear pipe for trickle over bio balls feed by small pump, which will feed back into the wet bio ball area.
From there it will all past to the next filter pad area, chamber 4.
The rest of the sump will have movable dividers, so I can change chambers and whats inside them in the future.
I plan to create a chamber 5 for a brightwell cubes and some crushed coral rubble, and then move onto a brightwell bio block chamber 6 , then a final polishing filter pad chamber 7, and then in to a dosing chamber 8 area before going to the external ECOTECH Vecta L2 pump.
I am also considering removing the wet bio balls and using a Aquamax BIO Pellet reactor with pump in that chamber and a carbon reactor with pump in the same chamber....
I want to be able that when I have to clean a chamber I do not totally upset the good bacteria foundation that could cause issues in either sumps.
That is why I designed it to have 2 sumps, 2 return pumps and a separate refugium that will over flow into each sump. The 1 1/2 overflow to the refugium will have a "T" off to go to a UV Sterilizer with a flow control return pump to the main tank so that the water is flowing though at the right flow for the UV. KInda like a closed loop idea for the UV.
I don't like having the refugium in the sumps cause I think think the water flow should be slower in the refugium then in the sumps.
I hope my description helped you understand and you were able to follow.
I look forward to any suggestions or ideas you have.
I will try and take a pic of the inside of the cardboard mark up I have...and post it to my 300 gallon oasis in AZ thread.
Hope you have a great holiday....
