Needs Advice On Everything, But Especially On Sump Tanks Etc.

[Bristolbulldog]

Ok, just so you know, i have brain cells. if this was the BMW forum (www.335itc.co.uk) i'd be answering your questions. I am hoping i can put myself in your capable hands (so to speak).

I'm branching off into a new project. Tropical fish, and i'm guessing they are fresh water tropical fish. I love the mad variations you can get, especially after nearing the completion of my car project and seeing my brothers sisters small tank with all those crazy animals in.

I have done alot of research over about 2 days so now i know what a tank is, i am getting there on what a sump tank is, and have no idea how to hook it all up so it doesnt empty my tank if a return pump fails, or some crazy fish changes his job title to "plug".

I have a setup in mind. its here: -
tank option 8
option 8.

I want to put a sump or referium (can't fully remember what is called) tank in the front as well. the diy side of things is easy. Keeping the little buggers alive sounds very difficult.

I don't want tangels of pipes and wires in the main tank, and do want it to be visually impressive, thats why i think i need a sump tank?

From here i have no idea. Do i need to order my tank with a overflow (i.e. the pipe that comes from the bottom of the tank, or do i take a pipe over the top of the tank and into the water.

I have so many questions, but its mainly about how to safely and cost efficiently hook up this tank, and get it doing what its supposed to. I don't want to have to worry about a pump failing, or a power glitch etc. Hydraulics on car's isn't such an issue (although on a tuesday afternoon spelling it is), so understanding this shouldn't be.

Also, how do you change out 25% of the water a week! thats a massive amount isn't it?

Sorry for such a broad post, but when i start to get up to spped better, and continue reading so many posts on forums etc, i will get up to speed.

Many thanks in advance, and i hope to pay back anything to the forum once i have learnt (hopefully not the hard way).

 

[ox5477]

Nice tank your looking into buying there first of all

Secondly.....for that size, which the bigger of the two would be 55USG (or around 220L I think) is not in need of a sump or a 'refugium'. A refugium is used in marine applications to increase the water volume of your tank to help decrease the saturation of harmful chemicals and polutants in your tank as well as gives a safe 'refuge' for some tank inhabitants that are very beneficial to your tank's health but are also very delicious treats for other inhabitants of your tank. So you put them down in the refugium and they can thrive and add/substract things to/from your tank and make it much healthier and happier and create a more natural environment.

You can put a sump on a 55USG but it is a bit impractical as you can get many HOB (hang-on-the-back) filters that do just as good, if not better of a job then the sump would; and it removes the need for all the piping. You can do a canister filter from fluval, eheim, which will allow you to remove the ugly intake of a normal HOB and allows you to be more free with your filter contents.

You don't need overflow holes drilled on a tank that size if it is going to be freshwater. You could do it if you want to do marine though; just be easier to use a weir overflow box to remove the tank water down to the sump though as it removes the chance of the glass cracking or being leaks in the fittings.

25% is not a huge amount. Make sure you go out and buy a gravel vacuum. Its a fat hard piece of pipe on the end of a long hose,(usually 25 or 50 feet). If you get one that hooks up to your faucet, you can easily do water changes on this size tank in less than 10 min (i've gotten it down to around 6 or 7 minutes).

Wow, so anyways, gave you lots of info to try and digest so please post more questions if your unsure of something and I'm sure, even if it's the most obscure question, somebody will have an answer for you.


O....P.S. I would recomend sticking to the freshwater tropical fish. As tempting as marine may look, you need to poor a lot money and hard work into a marine set-up and for a person new to fish-keeping, it is very daunting and risky. Not saying you shouldn't try, just suggesting that most people start with freshwater and then move to marine after quite a while when they feel more confident in their knowledge and ability.

 

[Bristolbulldog]

Nice tank your looking into buying there first of all

Secondly.....for that size, which the bigger of the two would be 55USG (or around 220L I think) is not in need of a sump or a 'refugium'. A refugium is used in marine applications to increase the water volume of your tank to help decrease the saturation of harmful chemicals and polutants in your tank as well as gives a safe 'refuge' for some tank inhabitants that are very beneficial to your tank's health but are also very delicious treats for other inhabitants of your tank. So you put them down in the refugium and they can thrive and add/substract things to/from your tank and make it much healthier and happier and create a more natural environment.

You can put a sump on a 55USG but it is a bit impractical as you can get many HOB (hang-on-the-back) filters that do just as good, if not better of a job then the sump would; and it removes the need for all the piping. You can do a canister filter from fluval, eheim, which will allow you to remove the ugly intake of a normal HOB and allows you to be more free with your filter contents.

You don't need overflow holes drilled on a tank that size if it is going to be freshwater. You could do it if you want to do marine though; just be easier to use a weir overflow box to remove the tank water down to the sump though as it removes the chance of the glass cracking or being leaks in the fittings.

25% is not a huge amount. Make sure you go out and buy a gravel vacuum. Its a fat hard piece of pipe on the end of a long hose,(usually 25 or 50 feet). If you get one that hooks up to your faucet, you can easily do water changes on this size tank in less than 10 min (i've gotten it down to around 6 or 7 minutes).

Wow, so anyways, gave you lots of info to try and digest so please post more questions if your unsure of something and I'm sure, even if it's the most obscure question, somebody will have an answer for you.


O....P.S. I would recomend sticking to the freshwater tropical fish. As tempting as marine may look, you need to poor a lot money and hard work into a marine set-up and for a person new to fish-keeping, it is very daunting and risky. Not saying you shouldn't try, just suggesting that most people start with freshwater and then move to marine after quite a while when they feel more confident in their knowledge and ability.

ox, thank you very much for the response, that has helped massivley! not so worried anymore. I have read up on marine systems etc, but i think the car would have to go to 1 finance one, and 2 maintain it time wise!.

only one thing i'm missing a little now really on the whole equipment side of things. your "faucet" is a kitchen sink or similar? so this sucks water and dirty gravel out? or is it best to leave gravel un disturbed?


thanks,

Craig
many thanks for you excellent response,

 

[ox5477]

only one thing i'm missing a little now really on the whole equipment side of things. your "faucet" is a kitchen sink or similar?

Yes, I've heard some people pull water right out of an outdoor spigot, but I use my kitchen/bathroom sink. The hoses you can buy (I recommend a Python Brand Vac, as they seem to fit on almost any faucet) will screw right into the tap. It give you instructions on how to get a syphon going to suck the water out and how to turn it around to put the water back in.

When you put it back in make sure you use a water conditioner to remove the chlorine as that will hurt the fish. You can use luke warm water from the tap about the same temp as your tank, even though some people say it hurts your fish to use water that goes through a hot water heater. I've never had a prob though.

so this sucks water and dirty gravel out? or is it best to leave gravel un disturbed?

It is imporatn for you to stir the gravel around and suck up the bits that fall down between the small pebbles. The gravel is to heavy to get sucked up by the water pressure, but the poop and what not is not and will get sucked up with the dirty water.


One question...do you know how filtration works?

 

[Bristolbulldog]

only one thing i'm missing a little now really on the whole equipment side of things. your "faucet" is a kitchen sink or similar?

Yes, I've heard some people pull water right out of an outdoor spigot, but I use my kitchen/bathroom sink. The hoses you can buy (I recommend a Python Brand Vac, as they seem to fit on almost any faucet) will screw right into the tap. It give you instructions on how to get a syphon going to suck the water out and how to turn it around to put the water back in.

When you put it back in make sure you use a water conditioner to remove the chlorine as that will hurt the fish. You can use luke warm water from the tap about the same temp as your tank, even though some people say it hurts your fish to use water that goes through a hot water heater. I've never had a prob though.

so this sucks water and dirty gravel out? or is it best to leave gravel un disturbed?

It is imporatn for you to stir the gravel around and suck up the bits that fall down between the small pebbles. The gravel is to heavy to get sucked up by the water pressure, but the poop and what not is not and will get sucked up with the dirty water.


One question...do you know how filtration works?

Now i'm with you!

Filtration. I've got the basics, but these out of tank filters are new to me. previously i used the hollow floor bed type, with the tube that comes to the top of the water, and you pump air into them. when the air goes up the tube it pulls water with it, and pushes it through the filter at the top. I see you can get these for 48" tanks, but i can't imagine you would get the flow rate required?

I do prefer this kind of setup as it would seem that it would pull more dirt and waste through the gravel and any thats manages to make it to the bottom, and when the gravel is disturbed the waste can be pulled out even better when it does fall to the bottom of the tank?

Now i'm not doing sump tanks and the like i am looking at the filter setup, types of fish etc. Is there anything i still need to know?

 

[ox5477]

when the air goes up the tube it pulls water with it, and pushes it through the filter at the top. I see you can get these for 48" tanks, but i can't imagine you would get the flow rate required?

The type of filtration you refering to is a Undergravel Filter (UGF) that uses powerheads to create suction under the gravel and pull out the poop and crud, but I never really liked this filtration. It's a decent mechanical filtration device, but beyond that it doesn't work very good chemically or biologically. Biological filtration is by far the most important, then mechanical, and then in a very distant third, chemical filtration.

You can get the best of all three worlds prob in a canister, but for a 55G set-up and for being basically new, I would go with a HOB type of filter. It allows you to put a variety of of media (stuff in the filter) to help with all three of these types of filtration.

First and formost, make sure there is a dense sponge in any filter you get. This is your mechanical filter as well it can house your precious bacterial colony that will allow you to biologically filter the tank. Then you could have something like bio-cyclinders(the exact name of them escapes me) or an activated carbon insert. The carbon can also house bacteria as the sponge does, but beyond that, it only does one other thing: it will remove any medicine you try to put into your water to cure an illness that may crop up in your tank, which is why i recomend just putting two sponges in your filter. This will allow for extra mechanical filtration and will give much more surface area for your bacteria to grow on.

Now, this talk of bacteria, what is it all about...isn't bacteria bad? Well read this and it will explain a little about bacteria and this importance of making sure you 'cycle' your tank before you even put one fish in....
Fishless Cycling

And just another note of importance, do not always go by the marked amount of gallons/liters that a filter says it can handle. It's more important to look at the gph/lph (gallons per hour/ liters per hour) that a filter can go through. For optimum filtration, you need to atleast 4x the volume of the tank. So for your 55G (~220L) you need atleast 220gph (~900lph). Thats at a minimum and it's up to you, but I prefer filtering to atleast 5x to 7x the tank volume as this makes sure that no harmful ammonia or nitrite exist long in the water.

O and your concern with pulling the crud through the undergravel filter..... you will get all of that when you vac it with your Vacuum hose.


I guess I should mention too, don't just take everything I take as the last word, I'm sure many people out there might have different opinions then me. The best thing you can do, is buy your tank, and then from there, research, research, reasearch. This forum is filled with tons of info and really smart people that probably now more about specific fish keeping things than I do. So you just have to ask questions and read other peoples topics and you will be amazed at how much you can learn in just a month or two.

If you have anymore questions about anything I have stated or anything else, I would be more than glad to answer them

 

[andywg]

If you have the time and energy, I would recommend a sump. A sump with a trickle tower is pretty much the best filtration you can get for FW and will knock spots off of a HOB. I always recommend drilling for a drain as it is that little bit less likely to go wrong than an overflow.

Remember when looking at turnover for filters that with the exception of Eheim they wil only give you the flow rate without media (so you will be lucky to see half that in a cannister).

Best substrate for cleaning is sand. The dirt all sits on top in a nice easy place to pick up, just wave the syphon over the top to pick it up.