refugium

[Jeroen]

Hi,

I am building a new aquarium and sump. The flow out of my aquarium gets split between a refugium and the main sump where the skimmer is located. The flow from the refugium goes to the second part of the sump where the return pump is.

What percentage of the flow should go to the refugium? Would 5 to 10% be enough or would it need more.

Thanks,

Jeroen

[wasp]

Jeroen it's more normal for the full flow to go to the sump, then refugium, then back to the main.

By refugium do you mean an algae refugium for the purpose of cleaning the water? If so, a good rule of thumb is to have the entire volume of the tank passing through it 5x per hour, same as the sump. But if it's just for growing pods, etc, a much lower flow through would do.

A common way to plumb this is the sump is set a little higher than the fuge, so the water can flow from the sump to the fuge by gravity, and the return pump is in the fuge.

[chimera]

you could consider doing what i did and have the main overflow pipe go from tank to fuge; halfway down the pipe 'T' it off so water goes to the skimmer then to sump. whatever the skimmer doesnt need will flow the fuge. fuge also flows to sump. skimmer has ball valve prior to it meaning i can close it and perform maintenance on the skimmer whilst the fuge handles all the flow. that actually reminds me i want to put a ball valve onto the end of the refugium pipe to see if I shut if off whether the skimmer will handle all the flow. its restricted from 40mm down to 25mm prior to the skimmer but I dont see why it couldnt handle that volume (about 4,000lph)

i still think an upstream fuge gravity feeding the display is the best way to go - but typically not possible for most setups.

i guestimate flow to be about 60/40 to the skimmer/fuge. will measure this tomorrow as i want to find out exactly what it is!

anyway see the last pages of my thread if you want some ideas.

[Jeroen]

Thanks Wasp and Chimera for your advice.

My idea of the refugium is to minimize nitrates and grow food for the fish. I don't want the outlet of the refugium to pass through the skimmer which might take some of the goodies out again.

My skimmer is a Deltec1250 and is a skimmer that sits in the sump. So my sump is split up to main inlet with skimmer. Secondary inlet for refugium and combined outlet with return pump. The outlet of the main tank is 25 mm and is 25 mm all the way to the sumps main inlet. I have a T-piece in tere that splits the flow to the refugium and that line I made 20 mm. But the way it is set-up I notice that I only get about 5 to 10% flow to the refugium and wonder if that is enough. I have now a bigger pump and the whole flow to the sump/refugium is now about 5x the tank volume.

Jeroen.

[Feelers]

will measure this tomorrow as i want to find out exactly what it is

I always wondered this - how do you measure flow, - I have seen calculators, but is there another way to do it?

[lduncan]

I always wondered this - how do you measure flow, - I have seen calculators, but is there another way to do it?

A bucket and a watch. ... unless you want to get technical.

Layton

[chimera]

I don't want the outlet of the refugium to pass through the skimmer which might take some of the goodies out again

mine doesn't. skimmer outlet goes to sump. refugium outlet goes to sump.

A bucket and a watch. ... unless you want to get technical

EXACTLY!

[Jeroen]

Thanks Chimera. Mist that part indeed. :oops:

Spent a lot of the day trying out different ways of plumbing and ended up with using 25 mm to the refugium and 20 mm with ball valve to the sump inlet with skimmer. With this set-up I can manage the split between the 2. Still hard to get it all nicely fitted in the stand.

Jeroen