Adding a refugium

[jcarlilesiu]

Hey everybody. I am considering taking an extra 10 gallon tank I have laying around and making a little refugium under my 150 gal. mixed reef. I plan on running the refugium separate from my sump because my sump is basically full.

What I plan on doing is putting the 10 gallon up on a small stand so that it is able to siphon water out of the refugium and back into the sump with a simple overflow. Then I can just pump water into the refugium from the sump either by the T-joint I have on the return line of the main sump pump, or by adding a small power head into the sump and pumping the water up and into the refugium.

I have never done one of these venturi siphon type overflow boxes.

What is there to know? If the water source stops pumping water into the refugium, then the siphon will break? And then, if the power comes back on it floods. Right? So how do you handle this situation?

Anything else I should know about my plan?

 

[FishBeard]

I'm getting ready to do the same on my reef, I run a CPR CY192, a skimmer sump with no room and too much flow for a fuge. Planning on piping in from my return line with a ball valve to throttle flow down real low and making a simple overflow box piped to flow back to the external pump bulkhead on the sump return chamber since it's currently unused running an internal pump. I originally wanted to run a separate pump to feed the fuge, but the low flow rate I want to use I don't see it being an issue tapping into a pump I already have in use.

I have seen schematics of hang on tank overflows with siphons that stay submerged when flow is cut to the overflow, and resume siphoning once the overflow box starts filling again.

 

[Scuba Smurf]

What about having the fuge just above the sump but still under your display. So that you have your display drain T'd off with a valve so some of the water goes into the fuge then have the fuge drain back into the sump.

 

[jcarlilesiu]

Could do that but my sump is so tall that if I had a tank above it I wouldn't be able to access anything.

I have an existing T on the return so ill plumb into that. Just need to get my 10 gal drilled.

Thanks for the suggestion. To be honest, I'm not sure its all going to fit.

Sent from my HTC Thunderbolt using Tapatalk

 

[jcarlilesiu]

Ok, so I want to get my 10 gallon drilled. About a 1" hole right through the side. Anybody suggest a place on the north/northwest side of the city that can do this?

 

[ColaAddict]

I say just look into carbon dosing and you probably won't even need a refugium. I ditched my refugium because it get's messy and needs to be cleaned up once in awhile.
Solid Carbon Dosing: bio pellets
Liquid Carbon Dosing: Vit.C, Vodka, Vinegar

 

[PufferMan]

I recently added a 10 gallon refugium to my system. I had already had a small space in my sump with a few inches of sand, chaeto, and mangroves. But, the mangroves quickly outgrew the space and I needed to upgrade. I went with a 10gallon due to space. I basically built a shelf coming off my 75gallon stand, which was halfway between the bottom of my main tank, and the top of my sump. I drilled a 10gallon, and plumbed it into the system. Water goes from my overflow, into the refugium, then into the sump, and back up into the tank.

Regarding the questions about drilling tanks, its really easy. I just bought a kit that had a drill bit and a bulkhead off ebay for like $10. I was kinda nervous, but it was way easier than I thought. I can't say I would be comfortable doing it on a big tank, but on the 10gallon I figured worst case I was out like $15 if it broke.