Separate Refugium Splitting Pump 4 Ways Question

[WhiteShark1]

So after about 4 years of having my 75 gallon tank (and sump) I’ve recently started having some trouble with keeping my alkaline, PH, and Nitrate levels stable (it’s nothing extreme, Nitrate is at around 10-15 ppm, Alkaline drops to around 7-8 dkh, and PH keeps dropping to around 8). These problems started in the last month and while I have a few theories as to what may have caused it (addition of a kole tang about a month ago, along with the natural build up of a bio load over a 4 year span), I prefer not to have to continually dose my tank with chemicals in order to keep my levels stable (to answer everyone’s question, yes I do water changes regularly and did a few large changes to see if I could drop the nitrates to 0, but was unsuccessful).

I already have a sump/refugium below my tank and I had an idea that in order to stabilize everything I would add a separate refugium outside of my tank. Now the problem is I live in an apartment so space is limited so my idea was to just get a 12 gallon (or around that) Rubbermaid tub and place it next to my tank and add water, live sand, and chaeto. But without being able to gravity feed an overflow back into my display tank (or sump) I would be forced to buy 2 different pumps and have one working against the other (one pump bringing water in, while the other one pumped it out) an idea I really didn’t like since 1 pump could always fail therefore causing disaster.

After thinking on it for awhile I came up with the idea to get a powerhead (I was thinking a marineland maxijet 600) and split both lines coming into and out of it (so that one inlet would be taking water in from both the separate refugium and the display while the outlet would be putting water back into the refugium and the display as well). I’m hardly a plumbing expert and I was curious if anyone had any thoughts on this design (would having a longer tube running to/from the display to the separate refugium cause some sort of backflow or something like that).

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

[Porscheboi]

have you thought about drilling and joining the two sumps together with a bridge pipe then still utilizing one pump still? Just a thought?

[WhiteShark1]

I have, but unfortunately the way my tank is set up I'd have to drill through my stand and completely rearrange my sump since the only outlet is on the side where I have the refugium so it's already covered in sand (bought the tank off craig's list so it was already set up this way).

[Porscheboi]

Give me a pic I'm pretty handy about this I bought a sump set up and repurposed it if you need to post pics go to image post.org and they will give you a forum link choose forum link 1 sorry I didn't get with you quicker white shark

[Porscheboi]

Btw IMHO your fuge should be as large or larger than you tank if we are going Eco here? If not your going to need a larger skimmer, ca reactor, carbon, uv sterilizer, & etc. Go natural with a new stand equal size . Remember more volume equals more stability. I'm sure after this post we will both push your thread to the top, with hateraid. Grasshopper more volume =equal more stability??? If that exists??with simulated saltwater???

[WhiteShark1]

A picture of my tank and sump, or of the separate refugium I am trying to build?

[neptunestender]

IMO I would do as porsheboi recomended and use a bridge or siphon. Balencing two pumps will fail someday and one will overpower the other FLOOD! There has to be a way you just may not see it now.

What is your stock list for the tank? Other perams? Ni, Na, P04, Mag, Cal, Alk. Do you dose kalk in your topoff water?

BTW, if you tried to ppst a pic I dont see it.

As to your last post, the more pics the better we can understand and help.

Ed

[WhiteShark1]

Well yes that’s why I’m using just 1 pump and want to split it 4 ways, that way if the pump does die it basically just stops the water flow into the separate sump (and nothing else happens).

Parameters are as follows
75 gallon tank with about 125 lb live rock (plus sand)
15-20 gallon sump (never actually measured it.
Ammonia – 0
Nitrite – 0
Nitrate – 10-15
PH 8.0
Alk 9dkh
Calcium 380

Stock:
1 clown fish
2 chromis damsels
1 royal gamma
1 Foxface
1 Kole Tang

Plus various clean up crews crabs/snails, and coral/clams (some of which are doing fine, others are waisting away, mainly my Xenia and Frogspawn). I also just tossed what was left of my leather toadstool last night. It was mostly dead and I was becoming concerned that it could potentially be poisoning the tank.

[WhiteShark1]

Well yes that’s why I’m using just 1 pump and want to split it 4 ways, that way if the pump does die it basically just stops the water flow into the separate sump (and nothing else happens).

Parameters are as follows
75 gallon tank with about 125 lb live rock (plus sand)
15-20 gallon sump (never actually measured it) with skimmer, UV sterilizer, and refugium.
Ammonia – 0
Nitrite – 0
Nitrate – 10-15
PH 8.0
Alk 9dkh
Calcium 380

Stock:
1 clown fish
2 chromis damsels
1 royal gamma
1 Foxface
1 Kole Tang

Plus various clean up crews crabs/snails, and coral/clams (some of which are doing fine, others are waisting away, mainly my Xenia and Frogspawn). I also just tossed what was left of my leather toadstool last night. It was mostly dead and I was becoming concerned that it could potentially be poisoning the tank.

[bikeboss11]

Not sure I understand you design, but from what I gather, I don't think that a maxi jet will be able to pull water from both refugium and the display.... If it does, it will most likely pull from the spot with least resistance...... The same thing goes for the output, you will have to install regulators on each line so that you can counteract the least resistance rule, which can be just as tricky as having two pumps....... IMO you can either run a small overflow system to the new fuge and get a pump with a ball valve to use as a return or raise your new fuge slightly above the old fuge, use your return pump to deliver water to the new fuge and have it gravity feed back to the sump/ refugium..... Hope this was helpful and good luck

[WhiteShark1]

Yeah, I see your point about the pump forcing the water through the path of least resistance. I have a few power heads in my tank already, I may have to test that out before I do it. The only other idea I had was to buy 2 pumps, but install an auto cut off float should the water rise above a certain point. Of course an auto cut off would blow my budget (trying to do this for under $50.00 since it’s only going to be something like a 12 gallon refugium).

Ever hear of a pump that is designed to go for ways?

I would like to use a gravity fed method, but due to space constraints I don’t think I can. I thought about trying to hang another refugium on the back of my original (just to increase the size), but I’m not sure that’ll work out either.

[WhiteShark1]

Sorry about the double posts...not sure why it's doing that, but it won't let me edit them out.

[WhiteShark1]

IMO I would do as porsheboi recomended and use a bridge or siphon. Balencing two pumps will fail someday and one will overpower the other FLOOD! There has to be a way you just may not see it now.

What is your stock list for the tank? Other perams? Ni, Na, P04, Mag, Cal, Alk. Do you dose kalk in your topoff water?

BTW, if you tried to ppst a pic I dont see it.

As to your last post, the more pics the better we can understand and help.

Ed

I'll try to get some this weekend (currently at work now).

[Porscheboi]

Get some pics up so we can see what this looks like? Without seeing it it's hard to help.

[Porscheboi]

Hey men in grey suits, or white shark just referring to surfer talk for great whites lol..
Why do u need two sumps? I have a 29 gallon with 29 gallon refugium my nitrates are zero and all!!!!!!
Perameters are always perfect! I dont use bio balls. I just use a skimmer and light. I could go 2 months without water changes, if I wanted to! why not do a DSB refugium with a little cheato wich will turn into a lot btw??

[WhiteShark1]

Haven't had a chance to take new pictures, but I'll do one better here is a link to my (short) tank build thread. That way you can see a more detailed look at exactly how the tank is set up (don't hate me for posting it on nano-reef, it was the 1st forum I came across 4 years ago when I built my tank...lol)

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=178325

[neptunestender]

Ok, I just reread your original post and checked out the build thread. So now lets look at the problem your having. You say your alk and ph are not doing too good, and I read you dont want to dose. But in my estimation it would help solve those issues better than expanding your sump. Do you add kalk to your topoff water? If you dosed mag alk and calcium, then added kalk to your topoff water you would not have to dose very often. Once those first three are balanced, kalk would keep them pretty much in check for a while as long as your tank is not overflowing with SPS, LPS. That is what I would do for those perams. Plus your coraline, corals and fish would all be better off with the boosted calcium.

As for the nitrates algea would help for sure, have you looked into an ATS? One of these would give you more bang for your buck, rather than chaeto. IMO

If that is a big no for you. Im sure we can find a way to plumb another fuge to your sump. But you may have to drill the stand. BTW what is P04 running? If this number is low then other options would be: coil denitrator diy, elemental sulfur reactor, or some other reactor running a nitrate absorbing medium. If this number is high then either two reactors sulfer and GFO, for instance. Or algea although most find algea to do better absorbing nitrate, getting those numbers low, while still leaving P04 slowly building up.

Get your phosphate tested and well go from there.

These are simply my thoughts, there is more than one way to skin a cat.
Ed

[WhiteShark1]

I actually have begun dosing Kh and Ph, so now my Kh is around 7-8 and My Ph seems to hover around 8.1. I’ve never added kalk to my tank, but I do dose calcium from time to time and last time I tested my calcium (about a week and a ½ ago) it was around 380.

I tested my Nitrates again this weekend and they are still around 10-15 and I added some more chaeto (hopefully that’ll help).

I did think about building an algae scrubber (was my first idea actually), but I run into the same problem as having a separate sump (what with water flow and all). But, if I can figure out a way to do it correctly, I’m certainly open to that idea (maybe if I incorporate it back into my return somehow?).

I’m beginning to wonder if it’s not something else entirely though. I had a massive Xenia cluster that took up nearly ½ my tank and it has been almost completely wiped out (and I don’t think a nitrate level of 10 ppm would do that). Their tips are all burnt off and they’ve went from a healthy brownish pink to bleaching out and shriveling up. Also, my frogspawn has retracted into itself, I lost a leather toadstool, and my torch coral while still very much alive does not look happy. Weird thing is my galaxia, clam, and all my invertebrates are doing fine?

Don’t have my Phosphates levels at the moment (wrote them down when I had them tested at the LFS who told me the levels were low). When I get home from work I’ll post them if I can find the form they gave me. But, I have been dosing my PH and Kh so now I wonder if I’ve raised the phosphate level as well (but the problems started before I was dosing either of these).

[neptunestender]

Ok.as far as dieing coral you need help I dont have the experience for. Post your info on the reef discussions forum, there is prob. more going on than trates and phosphate.

I have a good idea for an ATS, that would use a small pump and most likely fit your setup. Will post idea tonight as I am at work and hard to type out long details on tablet.

Ed

[WhiteShark1]

Ok.as far as dieing coral you need help I dont have the experience for. Post your info on the reef discussions forum, there is prob. more going on than trates and phosphate.

I have a good idea for an ATS, that would use a small pump and most likely fit your setup. Will post idea tonight as I am at work and hard to type out long details on tablet.

Ed

Were you able to find those plans for an ATS?

[jscarlata]

have you thought about your sand? Ive been doign a lot of reading about the benefits of keeping the sandbeds as clean as possible, totally contradictory to older methods of keeping reeftanks, buit the logic is quite sound and very compelling. I decided to take the plunge and have done a few things in the last few weeks:
1-removed all the sand form my refuguium - holy cow, this stuff was so packed with detritus and filth the water was brown. nasty.
2-in sections spread out over a few weeks, i totally vacuumed the sandbed int he display tank. i did not lift base rocks, but i was able to get all of the exposed sandbed. again, the water that came out was brown and filthy, horrible nasty stuff.

Im going to do antoher round of testing tonight to see what the nitrate impact was. My trates werent high .75-1 (red sea pro) and my phosohates were at .06 (hanna), but i would get periodic cyano blooms. im confident i was able to remove a significant amount of the nitrate/phosphate contributing refuse from the tank by doing this...

[WhiteShark1]

have you thought about your sand? Ive been doign a lot of reading about the benefits of keeping the sandbeds as clean as possible, totally contradictory to older methods of keeping reeftanks, buit the logic is quite sound and very compelling. I decided to take the plunge and have done a few things in the last few weeks:
1-removed all the sand form my refuguium - holy cow, this stuff was so packed with detritus and filth the water was brown. nasty.
2-in sections spread out over a few weeks, i totally vacuumed the sandbed int he display tank. i did not lift base rocks, but i was able to get all of the exposed sandbed. again, the water that came out was brown and filthy, horrible nasty stuff.

Im going to do antoher round of testing tonight to see what the nitrate impact was. My trates werent high .75-1 (red sea pro) and my phosohates were at .06 (hanna), but i would get periodic cyano blooms. im confident i was able to remove a significant amount of the nitrate/phosphate contributing refuse from the tank by doing this...


I'm always nervous about disturbing my sand be that much because the last time I did, I had a major die off of fish. It might have been completely coincidental, but now I'm scared to really vacuum it out. Plus I have rockwork everywhere so unless I tear all that apart it may not be feasible anyways. Though, the sump may be doable.

I’m also going a slow cyano bloom so I’m hoping that the extra chaeto I bought will help with the nitrates.

[jscarlata]

I hear you, but if your send bed is that packed with stuff that you have fish die when it gets stirred, that to me would be a sign that it could be the source of all your problems...and if it's that full of stuff, I'd be weary that all your extra build is goin to give you is more things to maintain. I know it's not what you want to hear or even do, but it might be a good way to restart. This last cleaning and rescape I did took about 90min on my 90g. I tested my water last Night and my nitrate was between .75-1ppm and phosphate at .03, so both came down from .06 and 1.5-2ppm
Maybe consider carefully cleaning the exposed sections of sand in small batches like a 6-10" section at each water change...just be slow
And careful with the gravel vac tube to not disturb the surrounding area?

[WhiteShark1]

I hear you, but if your send bed is that packed with stuff that you have fish die when it gets stirred, that to me would be a sign that it could be the source of all your problems...and if it's that full of stuff, I'd be weary that all your extra build is goin to give you is more things to maintain. I know it's not what you want to hear or even do, but it might be a good way to restart. This last cleaning and rescape I did took about 90min on my 90g. I tested my water last Night and my nitrate was between .75-1ppm and phosphate at .03, so both came down from .06 and 1.5-2ppm
Maybe consider carefully cleaning the exposed sections of sand in small batches like a 6-10" section at each water change...just be slow
And careful with the gravel vac tube to not disturb the surrounding area?

I don't think it was the nitrates that caused the fish to die that time around I think there could have been a disease I stirred up that was caught in the sand bed (or it could have been total coincidence). If memory servers I tested all my levels soon after that particular water change (since I had a die off) and my nitrates and everything else were at 0. I like your idea of vacuuming out small sections at time though.

[neptunestender]

Sorry I had not been checking this thread had been keeping up with your thead in reef chem forum. Anyway yes I do have a few ideas for an algea scrubber for your tank, and if you are willing to do leds I think we could fit it above your sump. Repost your feeding schedule and what you feed and i will work out a little plan, if you still think it is something you want to try. Found some good cheap leds from china would be perfect for an ATS build.

Again I am sorry I missed your post,
Ed

[WhiteShark1]

Well I usually only feed once a day around 5pm give or take (I also alternate mysis and flake/pellet food every other day).

I did plan on using LED’s so I wouldn’t have to continually change bulbs (found some nice cheap ones on ebay).

Not sure if it would fit above my sump as I have plumbing and a UV sterilizer situated over it, but I’m willing to hear the idea’s and maybe we can make something work out.

[neptunestender]

What form do you want to go with? If you do a simple gravity fed I think you could cut the drain line and let it free fall into the sump. That is just looking at your old pics. You could probly dich that uv filter I read that they are not all there cracked up to be. Discuss more later back to work for me.

ED