ATO to refugium mod without drilling & equipments

[reeferdugong]

Hi guys,

i have a red sea Reefer 170 and i've seen alot of ATO to refugium mods. I'm thinking of modding the ATO to refugium, mainly for housing pods, not so much for nutrient export.

I'm thinking of doing the simplest mod without any tools, plumbing and drilling. I'm thinking of siphoning the water from the main tank to the ATO to fill it using a small tube (e.g. dosing tube), and the water then drains via the small hole to the return chamber. This hole is already available on the ATO in the first place and it's big enough for pods to go through.

I won't be needing any pump, don't need to buy the diamond bits to drill the glass, no bulkheads, just gravity. Do you guys think this could work? Or is there something that i didn't consider?



Would love to hear your thoughts!

 

[Evo R]

Personally I would not go the siphoning route. You would need to drill a siphon break hole. Have to restart it manually after every water change and or power outage. If you drill too low you might flood your ATO/refugium tank and or your sump before the siphon breaks. If you drill it too high, the surface agitation from your flow pumps/wave makers might break the siphon.

Those Red Sea ATO tanks are notorious for getting clogged in the bottom drain hole. Once again leading to possible flooding.

Plus you would need to black out the refugium tank otherwise you will have algae issues in your sump because of light spill in your sump.

Why not rather build a small egg crate cage in your sump to house the macro algae to cultivate pods? Simple easy and cheap.

Or easiest route still......buy some form of pods in a bottle and just manually dose your tank with pods as needed for feeding ect.

 

[reeferdugong]

thanks for your input! i actually didnt consider that. That might be disastrous if the drain hole clogs..

I’ve considered the eggcrate route, it’s just that the space is very limited in my sump but i think i could place it somewhere. It’s just harder to block light spill this way though

 

[New&no clue]

I had a 350, and I looked into turning the ATO into a refugium. I planned to buy two small pumps and some 3/8 tubing. I was going to paint the ATO black use the Tunze refugium light. Put one pump into the return chamber to pump the water up and one in the ATO to pump the water down.

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[Evo R]

thanks for your input! i actually didnt consider that. That might be disastrous if the drain hole clogs..

I’ve considered the eggcrate route, it’s just that the space is very limited in my sump but i think i could place it somewhere. It’s just harder to block light spill this way though

You are most welcome!

Another option, Use the the ATO tank, have it drilled close to the top to act as an overflow, seal the bottom drain hole, add a small return pump in your sump, pump water from your sump into your new refugium/ATO tank and presto. It fills with water from your sump and then overflows with gravity back into your sump. No more worries about flooding ect. If the small return pump stops or fails then its maybe 1 liter of water that will flow back into your sump max.

You can even use black vinyl to black out the small tank and placing the small refugium light close to the water surface of the small tank prevents light spill into your sump.

 

[WheatToast]

I'm thinking of modding the ATO to refugium, mainly for housing pods, not so much for nutrient export.

Huh. In my experience, Sea lettuce (Ulva sp.) has been the favorite surface for my copepods to cling to and it is said to match (maybe even exceed) Chaetomorpha in terms of nutrient uptake capability. I did not succeed with growing it though (I gave it necessary trace elements but it probably required more flow, nitrates, and phosphates).
https://www.algaebarn.com/shop/macroalgae/clean-sea-lettuce/