Plumbing 101- have a few questions

[Mig Snake]

First off, I'm new here, and I'd like to say hello.

Now to the fun stuff, I'm trying to add a refugium and chiller to my 60 gallon Uniquarium. I had ADHI build me a custom refugium to fit my application, though I'm not getting much in terms of support on the plumbing aspect. I have included a sketch of what I intend to do, though I'm not sure if this is correct.
My question are;
1) at what height, in the main tank, should I drill the bulkheads for the gravity feed to the refugium? And the return bulkhead for the main tank? Also, what size should these be?
2) do I need to add any one-way valves to ensure that I don't have a flood in the event of a power failure?
3) when the water falls into the refugium, can I add a piece of pipe to reach under the water level so it does not make too much noise, or will this ubstruct the flow?
4) I'd like to hard plumb everything, though I read that the return to the main tank should be soft line. Does this really matter?

Any help on sizes of plumbing, bulkheads, valves...... would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Simon

[Fly Guy]

welcome to trt

1) at what height, in the main tank, should I drill the bulkheads for the gravity feed to the refugium? And the return bulkhead for the main tank? Also, what size should these be?

Dont drill the tank specifically for the fuge. Split your drain line to feed both the4 sump and the fuge

2) do I need to add any one-way valves to ensure that I don't have a flood in the event of a power failure?

One wya vavles arent to be trusted anyway......you should already have a system in place for the sump returns whether it be anti siphon holes or the water simply falling away from the ports to prevent this. If you dont...we will figure this out


3) when the water falls into the refugium, can I add a piece of pipe to reach under the water level so it does not make too much noise, or will this ubstruct the flow?

simply adding a pipe wont fix it as it will create another problem with trapped air gurgling......but adding the pipe along with a vent stack can fix this

4) I'd like to hard plumb everything, though I read that the return to the main tank should be soft line. Does this really matter

IJ prefer flex pipe for everything that doesnt require a perfectly straight run as it is simply easier to work with and is quieter especially when it ends up resting against anything else. Besides that does it matter?? No...whatever works for you

hth

[Mig Snake]

The tank was a Uniquarium, one of those where all the equipment is built into the back, so I never had a sump. I'm starting from scratch with all the plumbing, so I need all the help I can get. I don't have a hole drilled at all, nor do I have a system for preventing flooding, these are a couple of items I was trying to get exact details on. Thanks a lot for all the help,
Simon

[Geoff]

Welcome to TRT!!



do you have a link to the aquarium manufacturer?

why do you want to add a fuge? they do not do anything useful for the tank. it would be better to use it as a sump where you can put a nice sized skimmer in it. that would be a lot more beneficial to the tank than a fuge.

i do not like to drill the tank for returns. i feel returns should alway be run up and over the back of the tank. keeps the back siphoning do a minimum. not sure a 15g tank is big enough to handle the backflow from a 60 if the power were to go out.

G~

[Mig Snake]

Here's a link to the tank manufacturer; http://www.advanceaquatanks.com/uniqrectangle.html

I realize that the 15 gallon refugium won't hold much in terms of back flow, though due to the design of the tank, the area from which I'll be draining only allows a limited amount of water to enter in the event of unwanted drainage. If you look at the upper right hand corner of the picture in the link, you'll see that the slots are only about 1/2" - 3/4" from the top of the tank, once the water level gets below that, it wont allow further drainage.
Further, I thought that a refugium would allow for better filtering than the current system I have. Is this not the case? And, if I do use the refugium, do I get rid of the bio balls in the back of the tank?
Some of the main ideas behind using the refugium, was to have a better filtering system, allow my girlfriend to get the seahorses she wanted, and to be able to store all my equipment in a different area. I didn't have a way to run a cooler, and I wanted a better protein skimmer. I hope I didn't waste my money with this idea!

Once again, thanks for all the help,
Simon

[Fly Guy]

Keep in mind that while seahorse tanks are cool........the entire tank needs set up for them in tempoerature and flow, and if you really want a reef tank, you need to get a seperate tank altogether for her seahorses.....or just have a seahorse tank.

you can get rid of the bioballs whether or not you do a refugium. Gopod flow throughout your live rock and a skimmer is all the filtration you need. I am a refugium hater like Geoff and think you should just get the biggest skimmer possible that will remove excess nutrients permantently, instead of to a place that will continually release them as it supposedly does its job of removing them.

Yes thats a biased opinion. A well set up tank cant support a refugium in the first place, so why try to grow one?

[Mig Snake]

I'm very new to this stuff, so all the help is greatly appreciated. If I wanted to use the setup that I have just as a sump, would the plumbing setup that I've outlined work, or are there changes that need to be made?

I found this setup online, though I'm still unclear as to what my flow pattern should be. Also, what size pumps, fittings, lines.... this is really what I'm trying to figure out before I go an buy a bunch of wrong sized plumbing.

Thanks again,
Simon