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I decided on my skimmer. It’s an old discontinued product but I found new one, Reeflo Orca 200. It is oversized for my system as it can handle 400 gal systems but it works great. I’ll never run out of skimmer on this system. It is the biggest, highest recommended recirc skimmer I could find. I added a Avast swabbie and overflow container to minimize on maintenance.
Next was the sump. I had a limited amount of room left in the stand, so my first try was a Marineland 25gal glass cube. It was the perfect size fit and shape. I cut all the holes and had it plumbed w/o and issue. I was a trial tester for a new reeflo pump and it caused me some problems. During the trial I needed to change pumps and during the entire ordeal the sump cracked at the hole for the return pump. So, I was fortunate enough to build another sump, just a little sarcasm. I found a company and had him build a little larger 27gal, 3/8” rimless acrylic sump. I used the same 3 chamber design from my first design, I cut and glued the internal panels in. After cutting the holes I plumbed everything up.
Yes, I have ball valves on everything. I used pvc for most of the runs but isolated every pump with spa flex. (The finished system can be heard only due to the dart skimmer motor, the needle wheel chops a lot of air and causes the noise.) The overflow, snapper return and eheim feed pumps are all dead silent. When the skimmer is off you can hear the ecotech pumps making their noise quite plainly.
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