mr.wilson
.Registered Member
Hi Corey, what kind of medic are we talkin' here?
You can use 7" dia. 100 micron filter bags catch detritus, but a settling area is a good back-up system. The filer bags plug in a few days, but they are easier to change than the amount of work involved in siphoning out a settling container. Set up an overflow box in he sump with two filer bags, one as the primary, and a second to catch overflowing water if/when the first bag plugs up. The cleaner inverts will keep the area pretty clean, but physically removing the detritus is more efficient than relying on assimilation by critters, but both are good and complimentary.
The skimmer will also remove POC (detritus) so it would work well in the settling container as well.
The return zone is a hard thing to size. While it appears to be just a small area where the pump can draw bubble-free water, it needs to be large enough so as not to affect the system water level too much. What I mean by this is, a small return area does not allow for much leeway in water volume changes; for example, if you remove a large rock from the display tank, sump or refugium an undersized return zone will cause a water level drop that will make the return pump cavitate. A larger return zone leaves room for siphoning out detritus and making changes in rock work volume without affecting the water level near the return pump intake much. You may even consider drilling a few holes in the baffle wall to allow water to leak through when it is needed. If you do this, you can probably do a water change without turning the return pump off. The easier it is to do a water change, the more likely you are to do it. Some water will bypass the dam and weir baffle system, but it is unlikely to cause issues with microbubbles if your skimmer is designed and set well, your drain from the display is a combination siphon/Durso, and your refugium is full of bubble diffusing algae.
If you can do so without losing stability, make the benthic zone eggcrate top removable for siphoning, as needed. It looks like more is more when it comes to spacing the eggcrate panels. My earlier attempts left about 4" between the upright pieces, but that space isn't being populated or needed in any way, so you can double down and leave just 2" between.
You can use the media reactors to pump processed water over the last baffle to the return pump zone. Just like the FIFO (first in first out) skimmer system, this assures that the maximum amount of water is processed by the media reactors and done so only once. Your limitation here is the volume of water going through the reactor (reactor pump).
The monitor probes should get the same readings throughout the system, as the pumps mix water quickly and the probes aren't that sensitive. I have recently started using 1/2" compression fittings (championlighting.com) and a network of tees on a manifold to hold the probes in-line. This keeps then from sinking too low in the sump or getting dry if they rise too high. Make sure you have some shutoff valves to isolate the manifold for probe removal and calibration. An in-sump probe holder does give you more freedom in calibration and access, but I like the in-line idea because you can bring a water line to the controller, rather than deal with multiple probe wires leading to the sump and the limitation of controller location (close to the sump).
The water change water could be drawn from the settling container, but you will need a pump to do so, as it sounds like it will be low to the ground (too ow for a fast siphon). You can shut down the return pump and wipe the settling tank down to dislodge detritus first. Alternatively, you can run a bypass to the display drain line so it goes directly to the second sump zone. Now you can take your time cleaning the settling container without affecting the system. I did a tank like tis using two 55 gallon drums (one as a settling tank, one full of live rock as a cryptic zone), and a large duplex tank (top refugium, lower benthic zone).
Your flow rates look right. It will be easy to match a skimmer to 400-600 GPH, and if it is greater, than you can turn up your return pump. Since you are pumping from the basement, I would go with a Panworld/Blueline/Iwaki pressure rated pump. I think the Posiedon/Velocity P3 will fall short of your needs. You can use the RC head loss calculator to make sure you get the right one for the job. The price difference between the sizes is negligible so you should go one size bigger and valve it down as needed.
If you like the yellowhead jawfish, you will love bluespot jawfish. They are the star of Nineballs tank. He has two bluespot and three yellowhead.
I don't know of any baffle tricks for trapping detritus, but low flow is the key. A deep tank with a dead zone on the bottom works. Dams & weirs speed up flow so you are better off without them. In the old days, sumps had a sloped bottom to concentrate detritus at one end. I don't like the sumps with multiple short dams, as they are impossible to siphon and keep clean. If you are working with a crawl space you may have room to upsize your design to incorporate some cost effective ($10-50) 55 gallon plastic shipping/chemical containers. You can join as many as you wish with bulkheads or Uniseals. This will give you ample settling and lots of extra system water volume. You can have an extra drum/vat of the same size to prepare water changes. If you line them up, you can even alternate which one you use, with all of them plumbed together. Your water change occurs at the throw of two valves.
I hope that gets you started.
* My feather duster tube idea is a no-go. Apparently there is no cash of nutrients and heavy metals in the tubes, just mucous and calcium carbonate.
