Advice on hiding a refugium

[flat6guy]

Just purchased a Fluval M60. This tank comes with a pre drilled and assembled bulk head for a drain to make water changes easier. I would like a refugium but prefer it not to be a hang on the back as that would take away from the clean lines of this aquarium. My thought would be to utilize the bulkhead to feed a refugium under the cabinet and pump water up to the display via small pvc tube. I could also put a tee into the drain pipe so I can still perform easy water changes. Any thoughts?

 

[Crabs McJones]

Just purchased a Fluval M60. This tank comes with a pre drilled and assembled bulk head for a drain to make water changes easier. I would like a refugium but prefer it not to be a hang on the back as that would take away from the clean lines of this aquarium. My thought would be to utilize the bulkhead to feed a refugium under the cabinet and pump water up to the display via small pvc tube. I could also put a tee into the drain pipe so I can still perform easy water changes. Any thoughts?

Sounds like it should work, as long as there is room under the stand to put another tank large enough to be an effective refugium :) How would you do the return though? cuz there is only one bulkhead for the drain right? You could do rubber braided hose to a hang on back nozzle

 

[flat6guy]

I like that fitting. Cleaner than what I had pictured in my head. What would you think to be a big enough refugium on a 24 gallon tank?

 

[Crabs McJones]

I like that fitting. Cleaner than what I had pictured in my head. What would you think to be a big enough refugium on a 24 gallon tank?

if you have the space a 10 gallon tank would be awesome. The only thing you'd have to do is figure out a way to divide the return pump from your micro algae so the pump isn't constantly clogging up. Maybe a piece of acrylic in between them or something. And you wouldn't need a large return pump either. Maybe only 250 gallons per hour.

 

[flat6guy]

I was picturing a 5 gallon tank with a small acrylic baffle to keep the algae out. Would the pump kill pods or would most survive the quick trip to the display tank?

 

[Crabs McJones]

I was picturing a 5 gallon tank with a small acrylic baffle to keep the algae out. Would the pump kill pods or would most survive the quick trip to the display tank?

The pump will kill some, but most will stay in your algae and live rock in the display.

 

[flat6guy]

Looking to keep a thriving population of pods for fish as well as a reduction in nitrates and phosphates. Hoping this go around with this new tank will be a better success.

 

[flat6guy]

Found a tank that I think will work for my Refugium along with a return pump. Need to do some work to plumb it altogether. Will need to make a light and acrylic top for the füge too.

 

[Mandelstam]

Are you planning to do a standpipe? How will you regulate water level in the back compartment?

 

[Skydvr]

I wouldn't use stainless braided hose. Salt creep and corrosion will make a mess of that in a hurry. You likely wouldn't be getting a high grade stainless unless you went to an industrial supply house and it would be difficult to get them to sell you a short length. You also don't need the braided to prevent the hose from swelling.

You don't need, or want, high flow through a refugium, so a smaller diameter hose or tubing would be fine.

What diameter is the hole for the drain?

I personally shy away from single drain systems as there is no backup or emergency drain. (Just because the glass is drilled does not mean the glass is not tempered). Plenty of people run them though. If you go to a hydroponics shop, you can get a large strainer that will fit over the standpipe and reduce the risk of the drain getting blocked off.

 

[flat6guy]

I’m using pvc. I believe it’s 1/2”. The drain pipe will is in the final chamber of the sump. The sump is behind the display tank. Similar to bio cube or Red Sea. My plan is to use a stand pipe in the attached sump that is 1” ish below my desired water level. From there I will use flexible aquarium or pond tubing to connect the attached sump to the lower refugium sump. I picked up a quiet one pump that will deliver aprox 100 gals per hour back to the display. I will install a plastic ball or gate valve to restrict the outlet of the pump if needed.

 

[Larry L]

My plan is to use a stand pipe in the attached sump that is 1” ish below my desired water level.

I can't figure out how you're going to balance the water leaving the tank with the water returned by the pump in the sump. If the standpipe flows faster than the return pump, your water level in the back of the tank will stay at the level of the top of the standpipe, not 1" below it. And if the return pump flows faster than the standpipe. you'll run the sump dry.

 

[flat6guy]

In my head it works like a traditional sump. When pump is off, sump fills to max level. When pump turns on, water pumps out water. Within reason, pump determines how much flow comes through the sump.

 

[Mandelstam]

It can be very tricky balancing a full siphon drain to exactly match the pump without the help of a second wet emergency drain. It is probably easier to try and run a durso style.

 

[Skydvr]

The 1/2" will flow more than that pump in full siphon. Typically you would throttle the siphon to ballance flow, but with no backup, you are asking for trouble.

With such a low flow pump, you may be able to get away with only a single 1/2" drain, but not with any method that will allow it to run quietly with any sense of safety. In the long run you will be asking for trouble and an eventual flood.

If you aren't willing to drill another hole, or can't because the glass is tempered, you may want to consider running a HOB overflow (over the rim siphon) and use the installed drain as your backup.

Definately keep the emergency drain as a dry drain and keep the end above the sump level so it is loud to alert you to an issue. Be sure to still check on it periodically.

 

[Kayotic5011]

This is my 40 gal refugium build, its got a protein skimmer and a 1056gph an hr pump that's remote controlled. This is the best refugium build ive ever done and the middle chamber is amazing nice and calm but still cycles lots of water through there. In my opinion when it comes to something like this the bigger the better, I just up graded this from a 20 long refugium I built and it just wasn't big enough for the tank really and it was connected to a 40 gallon breeder (the one shown above is connected to a 120 gallon). As some of the guys mentioned above the regulation of water from running it dry and over flowing if you have a power outage always an issue and i'm personally finding that the larger the sump the easier to control and the more room you have to do what you really want to. If you could some how make a mini version of this one in that little tank you might be good to go, probably wouldnt cost but 60 bucks in lexan or acrylic.

 

[flat6guy]

I’m rethinking my original thoughts on this füge. I’ll take pics of my attached sump tomorrow and see if it could somehow be incorporated. The tank is 24 gallons with a 300 gallon rated pump. Seems like a lot of flow for a füge. Am I wrong in this thought? The last poster mentions his is running a little over 1000 gallons per hour. In my memory fuges were supposed to have lower flow. Now when I had my last tank, it was 7-8 years ago when I set up that füge. Also my sump was massive! 6’ 125 gallon tank in the basement.

 

[Mandelstam]

I’m rethinking my original thoughts on this füge. I’ll take pics of my attached sump tomorrow and see if it could somehow be incorporated. The tank is 24 gallons with a 300 gallon rated pump. Seems like a lot of flow for a füge. Am I wrong in this thought? The last poster mentions his is running a little over 1000 gallons per hour. In my memory fuges were supposed to have lower flow. Now when I had my last tank, it was 7-8 years ago when I set up that füge. Also my sump was massive! 6’ 125 gallon tank in the basement.

I think the turnover rate depends on what you have in the sump to a great extent and what method/system you are running. 4-5 times/h is a common number that people go by but Triton for instance says 10x for their method. So a 300gph pump would put you in that area. But you could always dial it down with a ball/gate valve if you want to. But if you have somewhere between 4-10x turnover rate you are in the right neighborhood.

 

[Kayotic5011]

The last poster mentions his is running a little over 1000 gallons per hour. In my memory fuges were supposed to have lower flow.

My refugium pictured above works because for one my pump is remote controlled and I only have it set to %75-%80 at the moment with an 800gph over flow, so im possibly pushing like 700 something gph with my pump turned down. The second reason my refugium works the way it does is because I used 6 baffles in the making of mine and the way in which I placed them slows the water in refugium section allowing it to be calmer without completely cutting off filtration rate of my refugium..

 

[flat6guy]

I wanted to deal with this sooner but the bathroom remodel took way longer than anticipated. Anyone have any ideas on where I can incorporate a refugium?