Help me design my sump?

[eyebedam]

The title says it all. I ordered me a new 180 from glasscages last weekkend That is reef ready & have been debating on what type of sump to get. My prevous tank was no drilled so this will be my first reef ready style tank. Im only used to canister & hob type filters. I was thinking of having glasscages build me a sump but Im not familier enough with them & was looking for some input from some of you that have already gone through the trial & error period. I had an extra door put in the side of the stand so I could more easily fit a larger sump in there if needed.
Thanks
Jason

 

[Pickupman66]

congrads you lucky bastard! I had GC build my sump for me. took one of their stock ones and modified it a bit to add in some things such as an area for placing media bags like chemipure and purigen. I like having a seperate skimmer area to help with microbubbles (make sure water level in this chamber is constant) and having a larger return chamber to give more flexibility for water additions and evap. if you dont go with an auto top off the larger return area helps bacause you gan go longer without having to fill it. Stock GC sumps have a very small return area. make sure you leave a nice ammt of room for heaters etc... I have some pics of mine in my gallery...there was also melevsreef, check out these sumps
http://www.melevsreef.com/allmysumps.html
hope this helps

 

[Angela Short]

I went with there standard 65 sump but it is too tall IMO and the last chamber where your pump goes is way to small and I have to top off 2x's a day or it starts sucking air. I have a ATO but not got around to installing it.

 

[Angela Short]

And I installed my own extra set of dividers to make a fuge side and it is just straight across acrylic. It really needed to have those grooves cut in like a overflow because the cheato tends to want to flow over the top into the baffels. I guess eggcreat will stop it but Oh well another time consumming project! Go back and look at fishdocs 120 thread, his sump/fuge looks nicce and has the groves the way I mentioned.