Here you can see that the water is not near as turbulant as it was in the last pics.
This picture is just showing the water movement going from chamber #1 to chamber #2.
Here is another angle on the return plumbing. As you can see, it comes up from the pump into a 90, over to a corner 90 that drops down to a valve to regulate the refugium, then goes through a one way check valve, through a union to take it all apart then finally up into the tank.
Again, here is a full stand shot with everything in the sump
Here is a shot of the return pump with the heater.
Here is a shot of the left side. The skimmer for some reason was not skimming like it should be, but as of the time of this post, it's doing what it's supposed to.
Here is another shot of the right side. That little CFL sucked at growing macro lol.
Here is another shot of the inflow to the sump and the filter socks. Just because lol. I still can't believe at just how well this system works.
Here is a shot of the tubing that comes from the tank to the sump. This allows me to see if there is air in it. No air means I'm about to over flow the tank. As you can see by the white, there is plenty of air. It helps that I have the pump choked off a bit lol. I have since replaced this piece of flexable tubing with a larger piece that actually fits lol. And yes, I know air makes noise and that I could put a gate valve on it for a 100% siphon, but I only have the one drain and without an emergency drain, that is a very bad idea.
Here is an upclose look at the heater. As you can see, 300 watts and working it's butt off to heat this tank up after being shut down for a few hours. However, I noticed a problem. Just below the label, you see some condensation. This is BAD! That is why I now have the top fo the heater out of the water. Just in case there is an electricity bleed. I have since replaced this heater. This pic was from when I first installed the sump.
This is the outflow from Chamber #3, the Refugium going back into Chamber #1. As you can see, it's not flowing that fast at all, and I have reduced it even more.
This shot shows some of the sand and rock of the refugium. I have since removed all of the sand and added more rock. You can't really see it now because of the algae that is on it so I just used this picture lol.
Because I had sand in the refugium, I put the output tube into the refugium into a glass so it woudl force the water back up. Since I no longer have sand in the refugium, I have since removed the glass. The wife was not as impressed as I was at the amount of coralline algae that had grown on the glass lol.
Here is a larger shot of the refugium. However, because water bends light, it looks more empty than it is. It's almost up to the lip that the black cased light is sitting on, by design.
I do have a video walking through all of this, but it just shows what is already here. I made the video for my other site and again, I don't know the rules here 100% so better safe than sorry.
I created this post because I'm about to make another sump for this tank because down by where the return pump is I have a large crack where I ended up putting my half filled ATO container in there and it caught the slight lip of the bottom of the sump. I didn't even notice the break until I noticed my salinity was at 25 instead of 26 where I keep it. I started looking around and I found this crack. My only explanation was the ATO was keeping the level, but the water was ever so slowly creeping out of this crack. Surprisingly there was not even any salt creep. Weird.
So how many of you all have actually built your own sump? I'm not talking about taking a 40 breeder and putting glass baffles in it, I"m talking about a 100% "I built this sump" kind of build! If you have, post up and let me know how it went for you. I think I came out pretty good on this setup. The refugium is a little small IMO on this sump and my next one is going to be a pretty basic setup.
The way this one is now the refugium gets very little flow and I want it to be a little higher. I have a DC pump so I can regulate the flow without a ball valve (pictures above show a MagDrive 1200 with a ball valve) to adjust the flow through the center refugium section on the new build. The other reason I'm not building this one again is because to get a light to fit this thing is a royal PITA! If I have a 12x15 inch section for a refugium, I can use any light I want pretty much.
I will definitely post up and let you all know how the new build is coming. I have one sheet of this acrylic left over and it has been in my studio since 2013. I need to test it to see if it is still any good and if it is, I know I can get all the pieces I need out of one sheet. Now I just need to figure out if I still have what it takes to build the thing lol.
Post up if you have done this before!!
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