Looking to build a small scale Wet/Dry Filter

[weimerheimer]

In my "Old School" mentality/logic I'm thinking about building a small scale Wet/Dry Trickle Filter for my son's 10 gallon Nano Reef Tank. Thinking about using either a 5 1/2 gallon or 10 gallon glasss aqaurium as the basis of the sump itself. I like the added volume the wet/dry system adds, espcially to an already small system.

Can anyone out there share their design, pictures, links, of what you've done?


Thanks!
Lonnie

 

[jsgarrido]

i have a 55 gal with this skimmer , fuge and bioballs combo i rigged it up a little put it works great im getting great results

 

[sicksnoopy71]

I love hang-on. Looks good. I bet it shows real nice results to for the 55 gallon.

 

[DaveK]

More to the point, what do you plan to keep in the tank? Different livestock may change how you want to construct your filtration system. For example, if you are going to have the standard amount of live rock, at about 1 lb per gal, you most likely don't want to build a trickle filter at all.

 

[weimerheimer]

More to the point, what do you plan to keep in the tank? Different livestock may change how you want to construct your filtration system. For example, if you are going to have the standard amount of live rock, at about 1 lb per gal, you most likely don't want to build a trickle filter at all.

Good Point!

Ideally would like to keep Live Rock, a few soft Corals, a few Inverts and 2-3 fish.

Are you saying a trickle filter is way over kill for this size reef tank OR is it no longer any good to use this type of filter system?

 

[DaveK]

If you want several fish, you'd better start with a much larger tank, and use the 10 gal you have for the sump. By the time you put live rock and substrata into a 10 gal tank you will have displaces a lot of water. That 10 gal tank will be holding only about 6 gal of water. A 10 gal tank used as a sump will usually hold about 4 dal of water, because of the way you construct a sump.

The typical rule of thumb for SW fish is 1 inch of fish for 5 gal of water. So that 10 gal of water will support two 1 inch fish or one 2 inch fish. A small SW fish is usually about 2 inches. I'd recommend a much larger fish or restrict the stocking to a couple of small gobies.

Trickle filters are usually not the best type of filtration for a SW reef system. Because the trickle part id so good at turning ammonia into nitrate. This creates what we term a "nitrate factory".

My personal preference for SW filtration is a large powerful skimmer and a berlin type sump, and optionally a refugium. There are several additional items you could add, such as reactors to for carbon or GFO.