Help my crazy sump/ fuge!

Ok, this is nuts. This is a description of my sump/ fuge. I know it sounds crazy that I keep moving water from place to place but this is how it needs to be if I'm going to keep everything in my storage room and I WANT everything in my storage room!

1. Water leaves Main Tank and is dumped through a filter sock into a 5 gallon bucket.

Question: I have two tanks, one 55 gallon and one 26 gallon bow, can I dump both tanks into the same sump/fuge? If the answer is yes, I'll be HAPPY!

2. Water leaves the 5 gallon bucket and is pumped into a 20 gallon long tank that has been divided into 3 sections, one smaller section on each end and one larger middle section. The water is dumped into the left side, a smaller section. This left side also has the intake of my skimmer. After leaving the skimmer the water trickles into a container of bio-balls.

3. The water travels through 3 widely spaced baffles into the middle section. The middle section holds water and has 4 canisters hanging on the outside: 1. Carbon 2. Phosban 3. Nitrate sponge 4. Sand. The water leaves the canisters back into the middle section.

4. The water travels through 3 baffles into the smallest and third section. In this section is a pump which sends the water into a tube with a T. Half of the water will travel into the fuge (to pick up pods) and the other half will travel into another 5 gallon bucket.

5. The last 5 gallon bucket will return the water to the main tank.

Here's my questions.

1. Am I missing anything that I could add? Nitrates, Nitrites and floating yuck all being taken care of?

2. Are there any problems?

3. I'm building my ATO right now and it keeps messing up. My problem right now is that I got a float valve for my RODI and it keeps blowing apart and flooding when my container is full. I have a tube that looks like this:

going into the elbow into the floaty valve thing that looks like this:


It's all good until the bucket fills then the hose blows out and all the water spills out of the bucket. I've tried silicone. Maybe I'm doing this wrong? The pressure really builds up in that hose once the floaty thing closes, is that right?

I know this sounds convoluted and my scanner is down or I would send my sketch but I hope this makes sense.

I really appreciate any help you can give!

Catherine

yes yoou can have as many tanks as you want using one sump/fuge

you have a nice little setup it sounds like

WooT!

Ok, another silly question. Can I do water changes through my sump/fuge? I'm trying to think of how I would do that. Maybe add a step where I can dump the water into a 20 gallon container then remove that container and replace it with a fresh 20 gallons? IDK, it would be sweet if I could work that out then water changes would mean moving water 2 feet from my big bucket of aged saltwater to my sump/fuge!

Catherine

The way you have everything set up sounds like a flood waiting to happen. How much space is this all taking up. Could you just have both tanks empty into one larger container to save space.
Agrimaster Poly - Tuf Structural Foam Stock Tank (75 Gallon) at Blain's Farm & Fleet
I think the ro/di unit itself has to have a shut off built in to get it to work.
I have mine that fills up a tank that fills up my sump. When the large tank fills up I just shut the water off. Then once a week I fill the large tank.

You can do water changes from your sump/fuge. The same way you would from your display tank. Remove the old water from your sump, and add the new water to the sump. I do mine this way, and I like it because I don't have to turn off the powerheads in the display tank (because the water level in the display doesn't drop).

Doing water changes from the sump also helps adjust your tank inhabitants to the new water better, because it is added to the display slowly.

yes you can do water changes from the sump many people do that but every now and then you may want tpo siphon the tank a bit

I think I'm missing something. Why the bucket on each end?
I have a 3 section fuge. Skimmer in the first, fuge in the second, return pump in the third.

Yeah why the buckets? Mo parts = mo problems.

Oscarsdad, I agree, my concern is that this is a flood waiting to happen. The more pumps, the more places I move the water to the more the possibility of a problem.


Dennis, My main tanks are in my studio which has solid wood walls. My sump/fuge room is about 20x15 feet and has my furnace, water heater and whole house vacuum. this room is directly behind my tank. The room has a concrete floor and a drain right in the middle of the room! Unfortunately the walls of my studio are solid wood and my husband FREAKS every time I say I want to cut a hole for my pipes to go through. There is an electrical outlet right behind my tank that I'm going to move which will make a hole that I can put my pipes through. The socket hole is low so I have to either put my tank on the ground OR I can dump the water into something and then use a pump to move it to my tank which is up a little bit. The concrete floor does get cold in the winter and I know I could insulate it but I really don't want it on the ground. Also, because the house equipment is spread out in the room if I put all of these different components of the sump/fuge into one container, I'll be blocking access panels to something. This is why it's so crazy. There has to be another way.

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Catheriine

A picture is worth a thousand words.

in this picture is the left side of my sump/fuge room. I'm standing at the door. On the other side of that wall is the bathroom where my RODI is currently set up. I'm going to put 2 great big garbage can's there one for pure water and one for salt water:



Right now there is a large garbage can in that bathroom filled with salt water, a heater and a pump attached to a hose so I can put the water into buckets for water changes.

In this next picture is the back side of my studio. See the orange bucket? That's right behind my main tank. That electrical box is where my pipes will come through once I move the electricity.


the big beige thing is one of my furnaces with an access panel. If I put anything bigger there it could be a problem maintaining my furnace. The pipes would run behind the water heater to:


That corner. The tank is my 20 long and you can see my skimmer. The big bucket is my fuge. The water would then run back behind my water heater to another bucket and then be returned to my tanks.

Hope this helps?

catherine

will that tank sit lower than your dt tank?

Is DT my Main Tank? Yes.

Catherine

ok then you dont need that bucket as long as pipeing does not go higher than the dt. you can take a j shaped peice of pipe and plug one end of it and fill it with water the water will dump out water until the water in both sides of the pipe are equal so if you alwasy have water comming into your pipe from a higher level than it will flow out. i hope you understand what i am trying to say here

kinda of like this just keep the pipe lower than the DT. it cal have all kinds of ups and downs in it but if it is lower than the DT the water will flow.

The water would leave the overflow of my main tank, travel through a flex tube through the hole in the wall. The tube would then raise about a foot or a foot and a half to the top of my sump. The top of the sump would be lower than the overflow but higher than the bottom of the main tank. This is impossible without Photoshop! I've got to get that fixed!

Catherine

i think as long as it is no any higher than than the overflow you will be fine. can you lower the fuge any

You can kind of see it in this picture.


the little brown box just above and to the left of the orange bucket is where the pipe will be coming through. The 20 gallon to the right of the hot water heater is where the water is going. The water is gravity fed through a tube that is about twice as big as the water flow. I really don't think it will make it. Thanks for the suggestion, I can try it because my tube is very long. I hope it will work because that would save a step in the process!

I know I could put everything under my stand but this way I have so much space, a drain in the floor and it would make my studio a lot quieter! The down side of having to break everything up seems worth it to me. Well, as long as it doesn't flood :mrgreen:

c

you could also build a new stand out of 2x4's and have it sit a bit lower.

Ohhhh, I get it....... this crazy set up is not going to work.

So, I got the water out of the main tank through the wall :bounce: into a 10 gallon tank and back into the tank! I've got a long way to go to get the skimmer to work, to hook the fuge into the line-up but today I feel success. This plumbing stuff is SO HARD. Baby steps.

I'm definitely going to scrap the idea of all these separate components. It's going to be impossible to get the timing down and I'm just asking for overflow or underflow.

Back to the drawing board. :)

Catherine

hmmmm, I'll try it over here:

You guys can't possibly know how much I appreciate all your feedback! I'm severely plumbing impaired. There is no way I would have gotten this far without your help!

I got my sketch pen up and running. It's sloppy but I think you can get the idea:





This is the rough plan. I know there is stuff I'm missing. UV filter? What is it and do I need it? Calcium filter? Don't I want calcium? Why would I filter it? ANY and ALL feedback and comments are much appreciated!

Right now, the water leaves the tank, goes to a 10 gallon tank, 2 little fishies thing filled with carbon and back to the tank. The fuge (Biffy) is built but not hooked and I haven't added the mud yet, do I want to? Now is the time to make changes and additions!

Thanks
Catherine