Herbieace's "Frankenfrag-Tank"

Herbieace said:
So making sure I understand two if the methods described. Are these basically accurate?

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I wish I knew how to take a poll.
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First pic looks good, remember to put a tee and standpipe up at the bulkhead and a hole in the standpipe cap to vent excess air and prevent gurgling. Also look into a reverse durso for at the bottom if you can make it fit, will cut down on noise even more.

Second pic is ok, but you really only need a single baffle plate by the skimmer to keep the water level consistent (or just a simple over/under setup). If you use an elevated eggcrate rack and only liverock, you could skip the other bubble trap and simply place a single baffle the same height as the skimmer one, but leave like an inch gap at the bottom, to combine the water volume of both your fuge and return. With sand, use an over/under 2 baffle plate design.

But yea, otherwise, both designs are looking good.
 
Thank you sir. I would never have thought of standpipes. After seeing that nano-sea creations used "your" design on rosko's custom sump I'm definitely leaning that direction. I really like the idea of being able to regulate the flow to each area separately. Does anyone else have an opinion on the pros and cons of each method. If it matters, I intend to eventually use this on a 75-90 gallon tank. Thanks again for the help everyone.

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You may need to pull your baffles and rebuild for a 75, or switch to a separate dedicated fuge tank depending how big a skimmer you intend to run. I'd ask Dre for more pics of how he's running his 29g sump on a 75, it seems to work well for him. Or go with a 40b sump in a custom stand it can fit in.
 
Well I gave you the exact dimensions of my sump and I looooove it. Especially the.under over under bubble trap Fishbeard put together for me and the ability to control the flow to the fuge and skimmer seperately. But to me I think the biggest factor for having the fuge on the end is the water level can be as high as you want. If its in the middle it has to be.lower than the skimmer section and higher than the return so there's not much choice that way. Also why don't you drill the back for two 3/4" bulkheads and use locline for the returns? Much cleaner than over the top IMO.

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sparky5785 said:
Well I gave you the exact dimensions of my sump and I looooove it. Especially the.under over under bubble trap Fishbeard put together for me and the ability to control the flow to the fuge and skimmer seperately. But to me I think the biggest factor for having the fuge on the end is the water level can be as high as you want. If its in the middle it has to be.lower than the skimmer section and higher than the return so there's not much choice that way. Also why don't you drill the back for two 3/4" bulkheads and use locline for the returns? Much cleaner than over the top IMO.

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Cant you tell that those exact dimensions are reflected in my precisely executed scale rendering? :D

Great idea on the returns! I'm ordering and drilling anyway, might as well do it right. I already have more locline than I'll ever use so I just need 3 more bulkheads. Didn't even think of that at all and I didn't like the over the top idea. It also solves a big problem I noticed in that the current hole is far too low. Now that can be a return. Awesome sparky.

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Suggestion, since you have so much locline, why not just set up a closed loop system on the display to keep extra powerheads out of the tank?
 
FishBeard said:
Suggestion, since you have so much locline, why not just set up a closed loop system on the display to keep extra powerheads out of the tank?
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I think I slightly understand what that means but this is just a workshop frag/grow out tank. Is that purely for aesthetics? Do you mean an external pump with pipe plumbed in and out from tank? I think that is probably a great idea for my next tank (I also may not understand you) :D

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Aesthetics, space savings, less heat transfer having the pump external, not really any downside to a closed loop setup on any tank. There should be one hole placed lower in the tank with a screen, this feeds an external pump which then would loop flow back into any number of "returns" to the tank. It would be a separate system from your overflow/return system.
 
FishBeard said:
Aesthetics, space savings, less heat transfer having the pump external, not really any downside to a closed loop setup on any tank. There should be one hole placed lower in the tank with a screen, this feeds an external pump which then would loop flow back into any number of "returns" to the tank. It would be a separate system from your overflow/return system.
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Not sure yet but I think this return pump will be plenty. I also have a spare ph if needed. Definitely going this route on my future tank though. I'll want as few inorganic lines as possible on that. This whole build is training and prep for that project (as is my nc28 for that matter). Closed loop sounds like a great solution though.

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Bare bottom makes any tank look cool.
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Half way through phase 1
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The 29 I am using for the sump is my current guppy tank that I am upgrading to 30half cyl. Using the 20l to hold gups and plants while moving over. This works well because I can keep my current 20t junk tank (macros banished cuc and xenia) running while I build the sump thus having a ready to go fuge when complete. You didn't need to know any of that but I was on a roll.


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Said junk tank.

So here's something I do (and why I have this tank): I do a religious 5g wc every week on my nc28. I hated throwing all that sw out every week and I had the 20 empty so I started filling it and then doing a double switch with the water change waste from the other tank. Anything I siphoned out went in the junk tank but I only took water out. I have wild Xenia, gsp and my brain coral that came back from the dead (all frag skeletons go there too :( ). Interestingly both tanks test exactly the same with the nc just barely registering phosphate sometimes and the junk tank perfect across the board. It's sad because if I could just simply link them together it would dramatically improve my results with the nc I am sure. View attachment 3134

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OK, so it won't be entirely used stuff. After thinking through material costs it seemed doubtful I would do better than this $99 industrial shelving unit from Sam's club. 600 lbs per shelf!
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Flipping the sump 180 allows me to take advantage of the 3/4 drain I'm stuck with on the left to feed the fuge. Having a 1 inch bulkhead installed on the right by Matt at Sho Tank right now. He really liked the separate feeds to either end of the sump, but didn't see a need to tie the drains together. This save quite a few fittings.
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Laid out and ready
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