Sam11909

Cool, the mangroves will be a nice decoration touch (apart from their usefulness). Seems like it will be key that you keep the sump clean, so the whole thing looks great.

That's one of the reasons why I decided to add mangroves to the sump. I should be able to keep up with the maintenance if I can remember to clean the sides of the sump when I clean the DTs. All three sections will be bare bottom and the last section will be emptied once a week for water changes, so I'm not to worried about detritus building up.

I don't like the skimmer where it is, but frankly no matter where you put it in that set up it will export pods. If you put it in the first section (labeled Cheato fuge), it would get first shot at the most nutrients, it would have less chance of sending microbubbles into the return zone, and not affect the pod population.

You can put your carbon in the final (return) zone, but the ATS may cause microbubbles as well. That's something you'll have to tweak.

Lastly, with the refugium, frag section and ATS all being lit up, your skimmer is going to grow algae within. Cleaning it often is going to be needed, probably 4x a year.

I wish I could put the skimmer before the fuge, but there just isn't enough room after I raise the skimmer to the optimal water level of 9 inches. To what degree do you think the skimmer will affect the pod popualtion entering the DT? I didn't think about the ATS putting off microbubbles, but that's a really good point. I'll probably add a small baffle at the end of the sump after the return to aide in reducing bubbles. I realize that I'll have to clean the skimmer often; my current setup also has the fuge and skimmer next to each other. It's a little extra time, but I would probably need to clean it out just as often for regular pump cleaning maintenance, the algae will just remind me.

Forgot to add there will be LR right after the skimmer and before the return for extra filtration which would add some extra pods heading into the DT.

How far down could you pull the skimmer? Could you run it like this:

Filter sock -> frag area -> skimmer -(bubble trap)> split return <- chaeto/mangroves

Ball valve some of the return over to the chaeto/mangroves section with a higher baffle that will overflow from that refugium back into the return section as well. That way your skimmer is getting water without pods and your refugium can be whatever flow you would like. You still would need to block frag section lighting from getting to your skimmer, so I would use some black acrylic for that baffle.

By the way... if there's anything wrong with that idea let me know. I want to get this big tank plumbing thing really figured out! :-) Also... I'll always be a big fan of dual return pumps. If one ever goes down you're at least still running at half flow.

that's a perfect solution, I didn't think about having a split sump. This is exactly why I post plans on RA. Doing a sketchup now.

overflow>filter sock>frag tank>/skimmer>//>return pump and fuge pump/<fuge and mangroves/<ATS