southpaw23 Posted July 11, 2003 Share Posted July 11, 2003 Hi.... I have been toying with the idea of building a refugium from scratch seeing that the idea of turning my HOB to a mini refugium has been a lil more difficult than it's worth and probably gonna cost quite a bit of money and still not able to give me the full benefit of a refugium...i learnt from my LFS that they take custom orders on glass tanks and if i could give him the specs, i could easily get one made for far less the cost than what it would cost me for say an aquaclear (though this is still be an assumption seeing that i haven't passed them the specs of this glass tank yet...will see how that goes i guess) so this is what i've come up with. It's a hybrid of an Aquafuge and a regular HOB filter....this will sit at the back of the tank at a slightly elevated height from the main tank. the reason why i considered the output to the tank to be similar to a HOB filter is mainly cause i wanted to stir up the water surface as a regular HOB would. I figured, it would also allow the pods a better chance of flowing into the main tank as the population in the fuge grows (i could be wrong here but that was my take on this matter....) Lastly...saves me on two possible problems on the output to the tank....one being that i won't have to have another hole drilled in the tank and two, i won't have the incident of a siphon break when using a u tube in the event of a power shortage...and this way won't have to deal with overflow problems either. So here's the pic...please warn me if there's any possible fatal flaws in my design and inputs on improvements are most welcomed........ Link to comment
southpaw23 Posted July 11, 2003 Author Share Posted July 11, 2003 Forgot to mention that my tank is a 15gallon and the refugium would approximately hold about 5 gallons...bringing the total volume to 20 gallons... Link to comment
skeletor Posted July 11, 2003 Share Posted July 11, 2003 I don't think you'll get good water movement in that thing. Water is always going to take the path of least resistance so you might end up with a big dead spot on the right hand side. how about moving the outlet down to the opposite end of the inlet ? -skeletor- Link to comment
wetworx101 Posted July 12, 2003 Share Posted July 12, 2003 Agreed, if you move the overflow over to the far side more then you will be okay. Then it is just like every cpr fuge, acryliccity fuge, of the ones I built for my tanks... Link to comment
southpaw23 Posted July 12, 2003 Author Share Posted July 12, 2003 Thanx for the input guys....the reason why i had the overflow to the tank in the middle was mainly due to the fact that my fan is sitting on the right edge of the tank and if i were to put the overflow over to one end then i'll need to figure out a way to place my fan over my tank coz as it is...i don't have an attachment for the fan so it just sits supported by the two edges...difficult to explain...hope you understand.... so the main issue that i'll be dealing with is dead spots am i right?....and having the overflow on the opposite end of the tank would solve my problem?....i'll probably need to place another partition on the far right as well.....following acryliccity and aquafuge's design i guess well, back to the drawing board....i'm just trying to design the fuge so that i'll be able to fit my other equipments nicely in place....but thanx again for your input guys..... Link to comment
wetworx101 Posted July 13, 2003 Share Posted July 13, 2003 Ok, I have an idea... Instead of having to construct an overflow, do this: Link to comment
Graywolf57 Posted July 13, 2003 Share Posted July 13, 2003 Wetworx - Simple and elegant solution....you must not be a professional engineer...if you are you're a rare one Link to comment
wetworx101 Posted July 14, 2003 Share Posted July 14, 2003 I am according to my profile... Thanks, BTW, your avatar looks just like my lil 'sharky'. Bull Terriers Kick A$$!! Link to comment
southpaw23 Posted July 14, 2003 Author Share Posted July 14, 2003 That looks like a pretty good idea.....will that solve the flow issues for sure? Would i still be required to add another partition to the far right similar to the aquafuge design? Thanx again wetworx...as Graywolf has put it...simple yet elegant... Link to comment
wetworx101 Posted July 14, 2003 Share Posted July 14, 2003 Sure, the flow would run the whole fuge in one straight shot...and no, I dont think you need another baffle at all. The main reason for this second partition in many designs is to keep crap and macro from getting stuck in & clogging the overflow pipe. Now, having said that, you could just add a strainer (red) to the intake of the overflow, not that it is needed...many fuges dont have this problem, but you never know when a piece of macro might break off and be sent adrift... But, like I said, a strainer would solve the problem as well. The only small thing I might suggest to the design is to angle the intake of the overflow towards the bottom (represented in orange) more to allow more critters to get sucked up and into the main tank more, otherwise they have to float up more to make it into the main tank, which isnt as frequent. Not a critical design issue however. At the other end...I hope you plan on having the pump in the tank and pumping into the fuge, not in the fuge and sucking in. It doesnt work. It's because of this: on the input of the fuge, inside the fuge, just under the intended water-line, drill a small hole which will serve as an air-break for when the pump goes off. This will prevent the syphon from otherwise flooding the main tank when the pump goes off. Another way to avoid this is by having a minimum of piping inside the fuge on the input, so that a syphon would only involve the top inch of water...either way, due to the syphon break, the pump should be in the main tank (unless your tank wont mind having the extra water from the fuge syphon into it as well, or isnt much lower than the fuge; sometimes possible although rarer with nanos...in which case: disregard what i am saying here)...which brings me to the next thing: without the input tube reaching down to the substrate like a downspout(represented in green), there is no need for the baffle at all (purple). Previously, it was used for water directing, but eliminating the downspout (green) would make this useless. The downspout serves no function. If anything, keep the downspout, but drill it with holes (like a spraybar) and cap it's end IF you are experiencing too much turbulence. This will also allow you more substrate space bacause you will not have a baffle...so the dsb can run the full length of the fuge. Link to comment
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.