Luckyduck
Well-Known Member
The 46" by 19" sump does come with a refugium chamber. However, I did not like the orientation of it due to the water flow coming from the sock chamber before it. Having baffles at the bottom of it where the sand would be wasn't very conducive. "This would make a mess" I thought to myself. So I decided to swap the skimmer chamber and the refugium chambers location with each other. This now puts the refugium right before the sponge chamber which is problematic because it's just a ledge that drops into the sponge. In other words there is nothing to hold back the contents of this chamber.
Problem solving. Grabbed my micrometer, took some measurements, hopped onto CAD and did some designing. Save as SVG. Loaded SVG into my laser cutter and out of 1/4" black acrylic, I cut a 4" tall 15" long weir baffle. Got some black RTV 103 *which is aquarium safe* along with I believe 108 ( this should be helpful for future search queries) and adhered two 1/4" wide track to the glass.
The baffle now makes the new refugium chamber hold just shy of 10 gallons. It is 1" lower than the baffle from the chamber before it so water should still flow smoothly.
It came out great and I'm very happy with the results! It looks like it came this way from the factory. I'm very excited to stock it once the tank is running! Plans are a rubble pile in the middle with a couple Mangroves sticking out and I have around 8 species of Red Macro in my current fuge that I'll transfer over. Not sure if I will add any nano fish or not, definitely some inverts! Considering a Pipefish
but haven't settled on anything quite yet. I'll be sure to keep everyone posted!
Problem solving. Grabbed my micrometer, took some measurements, hopped onto CAD and did some designing. Save as SVG. Loaded SVG into my laser cutter and out of 1/4" black acrylic, I cut a 4" tall 15" long weir baffle. Got some black RTV 103 *which is aquarium safe* along with I believe 108 ( this should be helpful for future search queries) and adhered two 1/4" wide track to the glass.
The baffle now makes the new refugium chamber hold just shy of 10 gallons. It is 1" lower than the baffle from the chamber before it so water should still flow smoothly.
It came out great and I'm very happy with the results! It looks like it came this way from the factory. I'm very excited to stock it once the tank is running! Plans are a rubble pile in the middle with a couple Mangroves sticking out and I have around 8 species of Red Macro in my current fuge that I'll transfer over. Not sure if I will add any nano fish or not, definitely some inverts! Considering a Pipefish
but haven't settled on anything quite yet. I'll be sure to keep everyone posted!
