Sump project

[olsibejta]

Hi to every one,
Im new in this forum but have about 2 years following the rules publucate in here for dicsus care.
I may tell that im new in discus, but i have 2 years keeping discus in a 240 litre tank with canister filter fluval 306 and have had no problem till i have installed a RO system.
Im planing to DIY a 450 litre tank in dimension 200 cm x 40 cm x60 cm high, but as i do not have experience in Sump filtration, i'm asking this forum in sump dimensions for this tank, materilas to use, return pump, installation from aquarium to sump because the aquarium will be as a divider for kitchen and staying room with a stand of 87 cm high ..
So my questions are :
1.dimension of a sump
2.sump design
3.materials to use in the sump
4.inflow and outflow positions and pipes
5.return pump.

Im open at any ideas for now for aquarium dimension or any other thing because i have not initiate to build any thing till now, i thing that a 450 litre tank will acomodate perfectly 10 discus and other tank mates of them. Till now i have had no experience with sump's, i have used only canister filters. Atached is an idea what I want to build. Thanks.

[Filip]

Hi Olsi and welcome to Simply discus . Its great that you have decide to join and post to forum after 2 years long learning experience .
Im curious about your bad experience with your discus after you have installed your RO unit . What happend to them and why you think your RO unit caused the troubles?

As for your questions regarding sump build, im not experienced with sump since i also use caniter filter, so i hope others here will help you more than i can .
All i can say is that i encourage you to do a sump as it is much more efficient filtration than canister is . It holds much more water for the system, more space for materials and much easier maintenance .

As for your questions:

1. General rule is - The bigger the better :) .
Just keep some space in your cabinet for other technicalities and for a 20 G Quarantine tank , if you dont have any other space available for it in your appartment .

2.I will let others help you with this

3. Same concept as any other filter . Water hits the mecanical compartment first (sponges , filter floss etc. ) , than your Bio (Matrix , Fluval , Sera Siporax etc. ) and equipment and possible chemical filtration at the end (Heater , Purigen , Carbon etc. )

i leave 4 and 5 for sump users too.

10 discus would be perfect number for the long run in this Tank volume.

How do you plan your tank planted , biotop look or a Barebottom tank ?

Good luck with your project Olsi .

[Neptune]

Sumps are the way to go but you have to plan a couple things.
1. how are you going to get the water out of the tank.
There are lots of options here, you can use something like an Eshopps overflow, drill the tank, bean animal/herbie design etc.
My opinion: if possible drill the tank and go bean animal..very quite, built in safety no maintenance.
once you get that figured out
2. A sump is nothing more than another tank with water flowing through media.
the easiest way is to use the Swiss poret foam and just cut it to fit and layer them vertically in the tank to produce "walls"
You can cut glass to create baffles/chambers to fill media and silicon them in.(that's what I did, pretty easy).
3. Plump it all up.
4. Stick in a return pump of your choice and you have a sump filtration system.

This of course is very simplified and no detail, but don't overthink them. They are just a tank with media in it and return pump.

Go to youtube and look up DIY sumps, pick an easy design and ask questions about it.

[DiscusRob]

in reference your problems when you started using the RO Water, did you check you pH to make sure it was the same or very close? That'd be the first thing I'd look at.

[olsibejta]

After installed the RO system i have had no more problems, because my tap water was very hard for discus, but from RO the water parameters are acceptable with level 7 the PH.
Im thinkig on a hardscape for the main tank, like some wood, 4-5 anubia, and some black sand.
My only concern in sump is the fact of overflowing water from aquarium to sump, and since we have sometime problems with electricity blackout in here.
Inflow and out flow from maintank will be from the side of 40 cm, so im thinking to use canister filter idea ( from up tank will be the inflow fom sump to aquarium, and in the same side but down at the and of aquarium will be the outflow pipe water going down from aquarium to sump ).

[Filip]

Consider using white PFS sand for bottom instead of black sand Olsi .It would make discus colours much more vibrant and appealing. A fellow member of this forum Ryan has taken comparison discus pics of before and after switching the sand colour in his tank and the results are amazing .
And don't go with more than one inch depth because it affects water quality and discus wellbeing acordinglly.


As for your water hardness , try to age your tap water for 24 hours prior Waterchanging and see if its good to go that way .
Many members here successfully raise and keep discus in water hardness above 300 TDS without using RO.

[olsibejta]

Hello guys,
I have finished the aquarium stand and aquarium with glass material,,,,, now is time to create the sump ?!, i have created an idea depending on the space and I have sketched one, but the only problem is that i can not put the heater in the sump because the heater is a 300 w, ehiem and is about 60 cm long, please take an eye and give me some ideas if the sump will do its work,
im planing to put in the sump filters in the first chamber , bio media with volcanic stones, UV sterilizer, air bubble under volcanik stones and bio media in the middle chamber, with a 3000 liter/hour return pump at the last chamber.104342

[olsibejta]

I forgot to mention that i intend to put a a cover in the sump because i don want the water to evaporate .... what do you think

[Second Hand Pat]

Hi Olsi and welcome to the forum. Looking at your picture in the first post it appears the tank have an overflow?
Pat

[Neptune]

1. Make your fist chamber so you can run your plumbing in and the ends of the pipe are below the water line.
No splashing, quite and the bubbles will start to come out in the first chamber.
2. You can run an inline heater on the return pump line. That's what I do.
3. Get your return pump chamber as big and deep as possible so water fluctuations don't affect the pump as quickly.
4. ALWAYS design for power outages...Don't allow any baffle to get so high that it can't hold all the water from a power outage.

[olsibejta]

Thank you, Pat & Neptune, insted im thinkig to use my space to build an down aquarium to age the water for 2 days using heater, air pump and the return pump to get water to main tank, about 100 litre to age, and do the 100 litre change in 2 days, it seems less expensive and not so complicate, so i must run the main tank with the cansiter insted of a sump, what do you guys think is better to use this space for a sump or for ageing the water and normaly if i dont have a sump i will change the water more frequently, this decision is because im limited in space so which is the best way to go with sump or ageing water....

[Neptune]

What is your tap water like?
For me no brainer. If your tap water is half-way decent I'd run a sump and change water from the tap.

You sump does not have to be complicated. You could literally set up vertical layers of poreite foam and have a very effective sump.

I personally would do everything possible to make the sump work, but that's just me.

[Jack L]

my tips on sump

1. poret foam
2. skip all the extra stuff
3. herbie overflow to keep in quiet
4. pvc flex pipe for ease of setup

[Neptune]

my tips on sump

1. poret foam
2. skip all the extra stuff
3. herbie overflow to keep in quiet
4. pvc flex pipe for ease of setup

Perfect! should be a sticky right there!!

[Jack L]

1. Make your fist chamber so you can run your plumbing in and the ends of the pipe are below the water line.
No splashing, quite and the bubbles will start to come out in the first chamber.
2. You can run an inline heater on the return pump line. That's what I do.
3. Get your return pump chamber as big and deep as possible so water fluctuations don't affect the pump as quickly.
4. ALWAYS design for power outages...Don't allow any baffle to get so high that it can't hold all the water from a power outage.

my only concern on 3 is that if that if the overflows plug, the more that is in that 3rd chamber then the more that will pump to main tank and overflow.

[Jack L]

I forgot to mention that i intend to put a a cover in the sump because i don want the water to evaporate .... what do you think

i think that i often think of doing that but never do. i get concerned about condensation water running down outside of sump and being a problem.

[Neptune]

my only concern on 3 is that if that if the overflows plug, the more that is in that 3rd chamber then the more that will pump to main tank and overflow.

See #4 LOL..

[Jack L]

Agreed on 3, but I'm getting at the overflow plugging and power staying on, in that case it will empty the return chamber up into the display tank.. follow me?

[Neptune]

Agreed on 3, but I'm getting at the overflow plugging and power staying on, in that case it will empty the return chamber up into the display tank.. follow me?

Ahh got it...I do a Bean Animal so lots of redundancy.

[Ryan925]

Agreed on 3, but I'm getting at the overflow plugging and power staying on, in that case it will empty the return chamber up into the display tank.. follow me?

Since my tank isn't drilled I'm going to be using a dual outlet external CPR overflow box. Going to use second outlet as emergency drain