sc8kv123
Active Member
I built a refugium similar to this on for my 3 gallon nano. I enjoy seeing my refugium grow instead of stuffing the algae into a tight hidden chamber in the back of my AIO. I've now added one to my 15 gallon tank and thought I would share this with you all. Its a very simple build requiring little DIY skill.
What I used:
-Oxo containers (It has to be air tight!)
-rigid tubing (small enough to have a tight fit into your airline)
-standard airline
-a piece of 3/4" pvc at least the height of your container
-a stepper drill bit (for drilling the plastic top)
-a heat source to bend the rigid tubing
-aqualifter (or similar type pump)
Putting it all together is pretty self explanatory. You should get an idea of how it went together from the pictures.
Mmm 50% off! You can find these at most department stores or even order them from BRS. They extremely useful in fish keeping.
Here you can where I drilled the 2 holes for the drain and return using the stepper bit. I drilled them out to about the same size of the outer diameter of the airline tubing that I planned to use. The idea here was to use a short piece of airline tubing as a uniseal. Once the airline was in the hole I drilled I then put the rigid tubing through the airline in hopes of an air tight seal.
The longer line on the right is my drain, it will feed down into my pvc weir. The left line is my return I made from heating rigid tubing.
I made the weir from 3/4" pvc cut to the water height I wanted to maintain. You can silicone it to the bottom of the container or you could just cap off the bottom of the pvc and find another way of securing it. I cut some teeth into the top but this is not entirely necessary. You can see where the drain line will go down to near the bottom of the pvc weir. The other end of the drain line will feed to where ever you would like it to drain to, mine is fed to the isolation section of my sump. The return line is connected to an aqualifter. It should be setup to push water into the return rather than pull water from the drain.
When you are ready to fill up just crack the lid and flip on the aqualifter pump. This will release the pressure from inside the container and keep the water from draining. Once your happy with the water height just replace and lock down the lid, being sure you have a truly clean seal on the jar. Pressure will build up and start the drain.
What I used:
-Oxo containers (It has to be air tight!)
-rigid tubing (small enough to have a tight fit into your airline)
-standard airline
-a piece of 3/4" pvc at least the height of your container
-a stepper drill bit (for drilling the plastic top)
-a heat source to bend the rigid tubing
-aqualifter (or similar type pump)
Putting it all together is pretty self explanatory. You should get an idea of how it went together from the pictures.
Mmm 50% off! You can find these at most department stores or even order them from BRS. They extremely useful in fish keeping.
Here you can where I drilled the 2 holes for the drain and return using the stepper bit. I drilled them out to about the same size of the outer diameter of the airline tubing that I planned to use. The idea here was to use a short piece of airline tubing as a uniseal. Once the airline was in the hole I drilled I then put the rigid tubing through the airline in hopes of an air tight seal.
The longer line on the right is my drain, it will feed down into my pvc weir. The left line is my return I made from heating rigid tubing.
I made the weir from 3/4" pvc cut to the water height I wanted to maintain. You can silicone it to the bottom of the container or you could just cap off the bottom of the pvc and find another way of securing it. I cut some teeth into the top but this is not entirely necessary. You can see where the drain line will go down to near the bottom of the pvc weir. The other end of the drain line will feed to where ever you would like it to drain to, mine is fed to the isolation section of my sump. The return line is connected to an aqualifter. It should be setup to push water into the return rather than pull water from the drain.
When you are ready to fill up just crack the lid and flip on the aqualifter pump. This will release the pressure from inside the container and keep the water from draining. Once your happy with the water height just replace and lock down the lid, being sure you have a truly clean seal on the jar. Pressure will build up and start the drain.
really wanna build one
