Schnitzel's Sticks
Someone asked me about current filtration, here it is...
I have a basic 3 compartment sump. Sump is fed from a bean animal overflow.
First chamber is an Aquamaxx skimmer. I had a Vertex, a bubble king, and an ATB. IMO high end skimmers are the biggest waste of money in this hobby. I get the same colors and same growth with this $400 Aquamaxx as I did with the my $1200 bubble king. Much rather spend money on a quality light fixture, calcium reactor, return pump, apex, and an ATO.
Haven't ran socks in 3+ years. They just create more maintenance.
Second chamber is a tiny fuge. I have a Tao Tronics grow led light I got off of amazon. I found a bunch of reefers using it, so I tried it out. I only keep chaeto in the fuge.
I also run 2 Tunze pumps in my sump to help keep detritus from building up. One in the fuge, and 1 in the skimmer section.
Third chamber is a Fluval SP6. The Fluval is an AC, non adjustable pump that uses an Askoll motor. Having a quality return pump is extremely important. Everyone now a days is running controllable DC return pumps. IMO adding a controller just adds another point of failure. No thanks! I have a manifold off the Fluval that feeds my calcium reactor. I also have a line that bleeds off extra flow back to the sump. The Fluval is a monster, almost too much flow.
I don't run GFO, I don't run bio pellets, and I rarely run carbon. I do have some extra live rocks in my sump, but it's not much, and honestly i doubt it really does much. I did run Siporax at one point, but it just became a detritus trap, so I ditched them.
I run a Geo CR818 calcium reactor with a Geo second chamber. Everything is controlled by a classic apex.
I'm running an avast marine ATO that is also controlled by the apex. They have an option to plug in their ato to a break out box instead of a stand alone ato controller.
Water changes are done 40-50g at a time, and only when I have spare time. Currently it's been almost 6 months since my last water change. I do think water changes help, but clearly they aren't a necessity.
Flow in the tank is 2 mp60s, 2 Tunze 6095s, and 2 Tunze 6105s attached to sea sweeps.
I started the tank with all dry rock and dry sand. I used the cheapest dry rock from marine depot, I forgot what they called it. I did acid wash the rock, which I think helped from keeping the rock from leeching nasty stuff back into the tank. When I acid washed the rocks, all kinds of gunk came off them.
Not the biggest fan of starting with live rock. I went through a lot of headache making sure there wasn't any bad hitchhikers going into this tank.
