Triple stack idea

[fermentedhiker]

It'll be awhile before I'm ready to try this as it's part of a larger kitchen remodel that I'm doing as I get the cash to do things. My fish room has no room for another large tank so the only place left is the kitchen. I'm planning on a 48" island. The kitchen and dining area are essentially the same room so the island kind of delineates the two areas. So I'm thinking of placing a display tank that is visible on both sides of the island. By using 36" tanks I'll be able to hide the plumbing along the ends of the tanks(because the island is 48").

My idea is to place a 30 gallon breeder on top(able to be seen only from the dining area) header style fuge. It's purpose is to be an attractive "display refugium" and will be aquascaped using various macro algae. Hopefully it'll be a pod factory that is also a stunning display.

Below that will be the primary display tank(able to be seen from both sides), a 40B. I'm planning on this being a reef tank. Still tweaking the stock list and I'm sure it will be constantly changing.

I was planning on using bean-animal style overflows with the two siphon overflows from the header fuge dumping into the DT.

I was planning on using a 40B for a sump underneath the DT(hidden in the cabinet) but got thinking after looking at some basement sumps and rubbermaid trough sumps about doing something similar. If I placed the sump in a rubbermaid trough(which I happen to have one lying around) then I could use the space under the DT as a third tank.

I realize this is starting to get complicated(especially for my first foray into marine tanks) but that's really just the plumbing. More water volume should make it more stable and a little easier to manage.

The question is then what to do with the third tank. My first thought was because of the difficulty keeping anemones with corals (and I had wanted a pair of black percs and an RBTA) that maybe creating a dedicated nem/clownfish tank would make sense. The other idea if I was able to manage keeping the nem in the DT was more of a FOWLR tank with a fu man chu lionfish and maybe something compatible.

Any thoughts or ideas?

Thanks
Adam

[fermentedhiker]

I"m thinking that the plumbing will go something like this; An external pump with drive the whole system. Obviously it will need to be a higher end one that can handle the extra head pressure of getting the water from near the basement floor almost to the ceiling on the first floor.

While still in the basement I'll split off a small line from the return pump to feed an RDSB in a barrel which will then empty back into the sump, possibly via a chaeto fuge or ATS if it seems necessary.

The primary return will then continue up to the kitchen and be split three ways, one output for each tank. The Display refugium will get the lowest flow about 1-1.5x the tank volume. The Primary DT(the middle tank) and the secondary DT(the bottom one) with each get stronger flow probably on the order of 3 or 4x the volume of the tanks.

All three will have bean animal style overflows. The bottom DT will have all three overflows empty into the skimmer/heater chamber of the sump. The middle DT will also have all three overflows dumping onto the skimmer section. The header display fuge will have the two siphons will empty into the DT. I had thought about having one each empty into the respective DT's, but I think that would make balancing the siphon a bit tricky. Regardless the third "emergency" overflow would empty directly into the sump.

The skimmer chamber would be a modified roughneck tote(so the the skimmer and heaters would have a fixed water level) that would be elevated on a couple plastic milk crates. I was thinking of filling the milk crates with reef rubble that would end up being a cryptic/benthic "fuge" area as well.

I'm hoping to do as much stuff DIY so that I can save money to spend on an ATO, Monitor/alarm unit, as well as a nicer RO/DI unit.

Definitely a work in progress.

[fermentedhiker]

OK I've got a plumbing question maybe you guys can help me with. My plan is to have the return line split to feed the primary DT and the DF(at a lower flow). The DF would then drain into the DT with the exception that the emergency overflow would dump directly into the sump. My question is regarding plumbing the return and drain lines to the secondary DT. Would it be better to have the primary DT(which is in the middle of the stack) drain into the secondary DT(which is at the bottom) or split off it's own feed from the return pump and let them both drain separately into the sump? Separately seems marginally safer(but not much considering they are going to have bean animal style overflows with the emergency drains plumbed to the sump) but involves a rats nest of drain pipes. Daisy chaining will make for a much cleaner install I think and will allow the secondary DT to "scavenge" resources from the water prior to them entering the sump.

Any thoughts?