Please help me design a self sustaining reef system

[BruceW]

I have seen responses along the lines of buy a TV and a copy of a reef DVD as an answer to similar questions on other forums.

I recognize that this is quite a challenge. My goal is to have a system that can maintain itself for a month on its own and have it operating on its own within 9 months. I have been reading about other attempts to do this but am new to the hobby so I fail to understand a lot of the nomenclature and lack the basic principles on a lot of topics.

Our current 65 gallon tank setup is described in this thread https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/seven-week-old-reef-tank-lots-of-growth-calcium-at-260-ppm.214097/

The goal is to have a lot of coral and minimal fish.

Our display setup needs to fit into a 52" wide by 9' tall area of our kitchen. A basement storage area is located below the display tank. I have a channel to run plumbing and wiring between the two. I also have access to the floor trusses to support them. One end of the tank will be on a 2x8 load bearing wall. I can support the other end if needed. I have access to water and drainage in the basement. I could easily store hundreds of gallons of water in the basement. The basement is not heated and drops as low as 60F during the winter so I would need to heat any sump in this location.

The largest 48" tank that I have found is 150 gallons. That tank is 48" wide by 24" thick by 30" high. I am uncertain if the height may be an issue for water quality.

I would like to keep the setup as simple as possible. Perhaps using one or more refugiums and a mangrove to filter the water. If the sump were two to three times the size of the display tank I assume that would reduce the amount of dosing and frequency of water changes needed. If I need more surface area for air exchange I can build shelves with trays for the water to run through.

If I do need to dose some number of chemicals to reduce maintenance I am happy to automate that.

How can I eliminate the need for a protein skimmer? The need to empty the protein skimmer makes it difficult to be away.

I would like to have a strong population of copepods and ampipods to help with feeding the coral and fish. Perhaps some edible macroalgae was well.

I very much appreciate your advice.

 

[Lab_Adam]

No matter what you do for your set up you will always have to be there to help it along at some point. You could set up a system that could do automatic water changes and top offs. As far as eliminating a protein skimmer if you keep a very lightly stocked system you could get away with that. Also there will be a need to clean the glass as well.

 

[Mike in CT]

If you keep your fish stocking reasonable, and only have fish that will feed from a feeder, you could easily keep a tank going for a month without touching it.
As long as nothing breaks or goes wrong, and you don't have a lot of corals that require dosing. When I had surgery, I knew I couldn't do water changes or bring up water for topping off, so I made sure I had enough top off water to last 3 weeks. Could have easily made enough for a month. I did feed, but that can be done by auto feeder. If you really wanted a skimmer you could have it drain into a bigger container, maybe with a float switch in case it filled up.

 

[Paul B]

For the skimmer just attach a tube to the cup and run it to a five gallon bucket. I have mine set up like that and only need to empty it every couple of months. I put a little Clorox in the cup every few weeks to keep algae from growing in it.

 

[carlosR]

I tried it, even with a 9 year old stable tank. Everything eventually crashed. I eliminated the skimmer and phosban reactor and carbon reactor. It took a few months but I wound up with 4 fish alive and a leather coral and some xenias that were on their way out.
I came to the conclusion, no great revelation here, that we are creating an environment with our water. The fish and corals are almost an afterthought. I want sps then I have to make sps water and so on and so on.
Good luck and maybe you'll do better. I just got fed up with all the gadgetry, now I'm back to skimmers, reactors and my own water concoctions. My tanks are looking better every day.

 

[BruceW]

This guy designed a reef tank that only required annual maintenance in the early 90s. He ran it for 8 years. http://www.theokaa.org/articles/zero.pdf

 

[Latino277]

I have heard of people using ARID (Algae, Remediation, Illuminated, Device) reactors with calcium reactor that ran without skimmers and need very little maintenance. I would assume that these systems would also have a low bio-load. Water changes would only be done to replace exhausted nutrients. there are a number of devices that can help with automating water changes and auto top offs.

good luck with this.

 

[250mixreef]

This can be done for an extended period of time.it will take money and an experienced reefer friend to set you up . A quality aquarium controller with an internet connection is a must. Dosing /feeding / water change/auto top off /heating and cooling even an ip camera can be installed to visually monitor your set up. Apex is the way to go for this. A large enough ato is a must. Many things will have to be taken into account and your set up will have to be up running and stable for quite some time b4 you can leave it. And of course you will need someone to check it out from time to time .

 

[Paul B]

My tank requires very little maintenance, few water changes, no controllers, reactors or dosers. Just a skimmer and it is 44 years old. I go by old school simple philosophies, I only feed clams and live blackworms and all my paired fish are spawning including the 24 year olds. I also don't have to quarantine and have had no sicknesses or parasites in 35 years. I dose drive way ice melter and baking soda and run a reverse UG filter.
Certainly not the best tank on here, but probably one of the simplest and oldest. It is mostly LPS with a little SPS and about 26 fish.

 

[250mixreef]

Tank looks great Paul. Do you leave it alone for an extended period ?

 

[BruceW]

@Paul B, your tank looks amazing. How can I learn more about it?

 

[BruceW]

@Latino277, thanks for the tip on the ARID. That looks like a great product.

 

[carlosR]

I like your tank and philosophy, glad it's working.

 

[Paul B]

25o Omixreef, I do leave it for extended periods. My wife and I travel a lot, usually for a week or 10 days and I did build some automation into the tank. I also have a tank sitter to feed because I don't use dry food.
Bruce, there is more information about my tank on here than you will want to read. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/i-just-realized-my-reef-is-44-years-old-this-month.194963/

I also just wrote a book, out next week but no pictures of Supermodels in it unfortunately

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

How can I eliminate the need for a protein skimmer? The need to empty the protein skimmer makes it difficult to be away.
.

FWIW, my skimmer empties into a large salt bucket, and in that bucket is a sump type of pump that senses the liquid level and pumps to a drain when needed. So I never worry about the skimmer except from cleaning it once in a while.

 

[Reef_Hobbyist]

FWIW, my skimmer empties into a large salt bucket, and in that bucket is a sump type of pump that senses the liquid level and pumps to a drain when needed. So I never worry about the skimmer except from cleaning it once in a while.

So you go to a bucket first and then to the drain. Is there a reason why you went that route rather than straight from the skimmer to the drain? Any odor concerns using a bucket?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

So you go to a bucket first and then to the drain. Is there a reason why you went that route rather than straight from the skimmer to the drain? Any odor concerns using a bucket?

The drain is in another room of the basement, across a hall. So the sump pump can pump it up and over where gravity draining cannot.

I have a bathroom exhaust fan in my basement fish room, and connected to it are 6 elephant truncks made from large diameter cheap tubing (dishwasher disharge extension tubing, I think). One of these passes through the lid of the salt bucket with the sump pump. So it is well ventilated. My concern is humidity and mold, not smell as my skimmate doesn't small bad.

 

[Mike in CT]

Randy, what if your skimmer goes crazy and starts foaming to the point where you are losing lots of tank water, are you not afraid of pumping to much of your top off water into the tank?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Randy, what if your skimmer goes crazy and starts foaming to the point where you are losing lots of tank water, are you not afraid of pumping to much of your top off water into the tank?

Well, that hasn't happened in the many years I've used the setup. I'm also not sure how the setup I use makes that any more likely than if I just let it drip into a collection container.

My top off is also not super fast anyway for that and related reasons.

I use limewater as my top off and have overdosed it a handful of times, but never due to skimmer issues.

 

[BruceW]

@Paul B, I am enjoying reading about your tank. 44 years is quite and accomplishment!

Here is a start to putting my ideas to paper.

I envision using a 48" long tank, perhaps 52" if I order a custom tank.

The water from the overflow on the display tank would descend approximately 8.5 feet to a one foot tall roughly tank length and width tray where it will get good air exposure and effectively double the surface area of the display tank. Before arriving in the tray it will transition 180 degrees inside piping to slow the flow.

From there the water will transition another 3 feet down into a 275 gallon food grade storage container. The storage container will have an ATO system that keeps it around the 200 gallon level. The ATO will be connected to a RO/DI filter that will be plumbed into the house water supply to be able to supply water whenever it is needed.

The refugium could be homemade or a fancy off the shelf product. It would be filled with yet to be determined sand, mud, algae, copepods, etc. A separate water pump would pump water from the storage tank at a healthy rate for the refugium.

A doser connected to the to the storage tank would inject necessary chemicals that are determined to be healthy for the tank.

I am hopeful that FishBit will be successful. If so I will use one to monitor salinity, temperature and PH. If not I will likely build my own system using a Raspberry Pi and commercially available sensors. I see using a Pi as a failsafe regardless. For example it could monitor the FishBit's salinity value and stop the ATO if salinity levels are low or add additional water if salinity is high.

Temperature should probably be controlled in the storage tank. I may need to insulate that tank as it is stored in a basement that drops into the 60s in the winter.

Water changes could be accomplished by turning off the ATO system, pumping water out of the storage container and then adding new salt water to the storage container.

If power were lost then some of the water from the display tank would drain from the display tank into the storage container via the return line. I have a standby generator so this would only occur for a short time but regardless I would leave sufficient excess capacity in the storage tank to contain that water.

As for feeding I am considering an in display tank refugium where plants that the fish can eat would be planted and I am hoping to have a sufficient copepods and amphipod population amongst the live rock and spilling out of the refugium to reduce the feeding needs. I would like to recreate as much of the marine ecosystem up the level of small non fish eating fish as possible.

I recognize that I may need to add a protein skimmer and various "reactors". I appreciate your advice as to what these might be. I really like the idea of the ARID reactor but am uncertain if they remain available. I would prefer to develop a solid plan to be tweaked after implementation rather than simply experimenting with a wide variety of accessories. I like the KISS policy and would like to stick to it as much as possible.