Recommendations for expanding 425xl with frag tank

[TaylorJames]

I am planning on expanding my system with a frag tank and want to get some feedback or suggestions about my plan of action.

My current setup is moving towards SPS dominant. I just got my system back in a good state after some neglect. Short story.. I moved from an apartment to a house in September/2018, during the move the skimmer and a power head broke, lots of algae and some coral die off, didnt have much time to dedicate to the system until recently. The system is now operating good with steady params.

Equipment

• Red Sea Reefer 425xl (20g sump, 90g display, propbably 100g of actual water volume)
• Bubble Magus Curve D9
• 2 Neptune Energy bars + Brain
• 2 Neptune Wav Pumps
• 2 Neptune DOS
• Ecotech L1 return pump
• SW Mixing Station (2 50g reservoirs + ecotech m1 pump)

Ideally I would like to add a 48" x 24" x 12" frag tank with a sump/refugium housed in a cabinet below it. I would remove the sump from the 425xl and use the new sump for both the frag tank and the 425xl.

Recommendations for sumps and frag tanks?

Am I thinking about this the right way / does it make sense to use one sump for both tanks?
What size sump would be ideal for this setup?
I think my current skimmer could handle the additional volume right?
Is the new addition too much water volume to be adding to the existing system all at once?
Should I be adding a smaller frag tank than what I specified above?

Any suggestions or comments are welcome, thanks!

 

[Ron Reefman]

I've run several different 2 tanks, 1 sump systems, including a 65g shallow reef with a 25g frag tank and a 100g sump/refugium. There shouldn't be any problem doing that.

As always, the bigger the sump the better. But how about a sump under one tank and a refugium under the other? I wouldn't have a DT without a refugium anymore. And I've never bought a sump or a refugium. I either buy a used tank or build the thing myself (the last 2 times. On my first dual tank system I had a 180g DT, a 75g hexagon DT and a 180g (10'x2'x16") acrylic tank that had been a coral display tank at an LFS. I added a couple of dividers and had a HUGE sump/refugium/DSB. This was from the early build process. A friend asked if my local city knew that I was opening up a new Sea World! LOL!