How do I build my own sump!

[Will Milberger]

I am doing it this way myself.

 

[DarthSimon]

This is how I incorporated a refugium, built a platform and recessed it in...

See on in back with Kessel??

 

[Oberst Oswald]

Use one of your 5 freshwater tanks to make the sump. Not hard to do... go to Home Depot or Lowes and you can get 2 pieces of glass cut to fit. Be sure to use aquarium safe silicone. Learn to use Goggle... "How to make a marine sump".

 

[cracker]

Doggo, can You fit a 20 long under the stand? Lot more room. sorry if already mentioned.

 

[DoggoThePuffer]

If your seriously planning a sump for a 125 then a 10 gallon won't be suffecient.

Oh no, it’s for the 55 gallon. I will use a 20 G long for the 120g if it’s suitable.

 

[DoggoThePuffer]

Use one of your 5 freshwater tanks to make the sump. Not hard to do... go to Home Depot or Lowes and you can get 2 pieces of glass cut to fit. Be sure to use aquarium safe silicone. Learn to use Goggle... "How to make a marine sump".

I do but it’s so pricey and some is useful but some is not. I wanted to mainly know what to put inside and what to use as a return pump. But I can’t use any of them as all are occupied and the water is good.

 

[DoggoThePuffer]

Doggo, can You fit a 20 long under the stand? Lot more room. sorry if already mentioned.

Sadly I measured the area and only a 10 gallon fits since it’s a corner tank. And you are the first one to mention it. Never allogize if somebody already mentioned something too, they could have forgotten and you could have re-sparked the idea!

 

[pluikens]

Sadly I measured the area and only a 10 gallon fits since it’s a corner tank. And you are the first one to mention it. Never allogize if somebody already mentioned something too, they could have forgotten and you could have re-sparked the idea!

Your 55 gallon is a corner tank?! Also, you have said this new tank is a 125 gallon and also called it a 120. Do you know what it is and also what dimensions it might be? This matters because for many fish the footprint can be just as much or more important than volume. Fish need room to swim and not many will use the whole water column.

 

[pluikens]

@DoggoThePuffer Since you kids are all on the youtube these days. Have you watched yet? You may not be looking for something specifically ULM but you can steal some ideas from their sumps for the softie and/or LPS tanks. I guess a 60 cube is pretty similar in shape/size to a corner 55.

 

[pluikens]

So from another thread, I found out that this will be a freshwater tank. I find that sumps between freshwater and saltwater vary a fair bit. For saltwater, I wanted a refugium chamber, a chamber of constant water level for my protein skimmer, and then a chamber for my return pump with fluctuating water level which I can maintain constant with an ATO (auto top off) system. For freshwater, I look for additional water volume and basically the most surface area for nitrifying bacteria as possible. If this tank/sump is for freshwater and your ~55-gallon corner display is about 27 1/2 inch by 27 1/2 inch by 23 inches high, I'd suggest using a standard 20 gallon (not long) tank as the sump. You can get a custom piece of glass cut at a glass store or even get an acrylic baffle set off eBay. Acrylic will require you to use a good amount of silicone. I've only used glass but I have read that silicone doesn't adhere to acrylic as well as it does to glass. Gmacreef.com has really good info on sumps, overflows, and more. Here's a link: http://gmacreef.com/reef-aquarium-sump-tank-design/ Again for freshwater, I think you would be just fine with one baffle to keep filter media in one chamber and a smaller chamber (but still amply sized chamber as your return chamber level will rise when you turn off the return pump). You can start with a lot of filter sponges, go DIY and get a bunch of dollar store body scrubbers, or move up to something like K1 kaldness media and add a powerhead to the pump. If you want to add other media, imagine you're basically replicating an Aquaclear HOB filter (my favorite HOB for freshwater tanks, btw) but putting it below the tank. If you check my build threads, I'm newer to saltwater like you but keep a 100+ gallon koi tank in my house and a roughly 5,000-gallon koi pond in my backyard. Those are some dirty fish to care for. I'd suggest watching some sump videos from the King of DIY on youtube too.

All that being said... It's great that you're on board with the sump idea but before jumping into sump design/building, you may want to first establish how you're going to be plumbing from your display to the sump and back. Are you going to drill your corner tank or go with a HOB overflow? Have you considered the advantages and disadvantages of each? What return pump are you going to use? I'd suggest determining the flow that you want through your sump, find an appropriately sized return pump to achieve that flow rate, then youse the GPH rating to narrow down which overflows will work for your situation.

 

[ArowanaLover1902]

Any response here will not been monitored by user: DoggoThePuffer. The user can no longer post after this thread: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/help-puffer-has-pink-ball-coming-out-of-its-butt.397662/ . Not trying to call anyone out, just trying to make sure noone wastes their time here.

P.S. Don't read the attached thread, its blatant animal abuse