What's the order: sump, fuge, skim...skim, fuge sump

[spiderpig]

I've been researching away and have read all kinds of things about sumps, fuges, skimmers. Many people have combined them but I haven't been able to get my head around the sequence. What's the order?

Sump->Skimmer->Fuge->Chem->Return

Sump->Fuge->Skimmer->Chem->Return

/--Skimmer--\
Sump< >Chem->Return
\--Fuge-----/

Also, should the flow through a fuge be slow or fast? Skimmers seem to want pretty good flow, but I've seen several discussions about fuges being slow to allow more contact time for export.

Final question...why are all the threads with ecobalance locked and not allowing me to join the madness
?

 

[Krish]

Where setups are concerned, it all depends on what you are trying to achieve. Take for instance chaeto in a refugium...It requires a lot of flow to keep the ball of chaeto tumbling, from what I understand, for best results via nutrient export. On the other hand, other types of setups erquire less flow. Typlically when you see sumps with skimmers and fuges, you will see the skimmer where incoming water is to catch all the "junk" coming in followed by the refugium and so forth. However, there is no one way to go about things as people have been successful with many different approaches. Best piece of advice would be to go with what you think works best for your application

Final question...why are all the threads with ecobalance locked and not allowing me to join the madness
?

When things get too far out of hand after repeated warnings, threads are usually closed here because this is supposed to be a friendly forum for discussion and not a place to bash and throw insults. If some threads are left open, the "madness" as you called it would just continue and RF doesn't really support it...

 

[Snowboarda42]

Personally, I would go Sump, Skimmer, Chem, Fuge, Return.

 

[chadmace]

Personally, I would go Sump, Skimmer, Chem, Fuge, Return.

I am working on changing out my current 30g sump for a 25&29g sump/fuge. I am going this same exact order. Provides cleaner water to the fuge and allows pods to make it to the tank without going through a skimmer or whatever media reactor you may have.

 

[Herefishyfishy]

If you are looking for more pods in the fuge, dirtier water is better. Turbulance can't be beat. As Krish says, if the fuge is the main interest, have it first. If just an afterthought, have it later. Mine is first, turbulant and PACKED with stars, pods, snails, shrimp, etc etc.

 

[salmonslayer]

My two cents. Above is correct. Myself I have skim,sponge in baffels,cheato. The only down side of cheato last, is it gets stuck in the sponge on my outlet.
I also have a above sump full of three kinds of plant life packed full of pods etc. This feeds my tank. Gravity fed so pods etc don't get damaged from the pump. I find fish etc like to hang out by that inlet. Best of luck to ya

 

[chadmace]

From what I understand through all the reading I have done on here and whatever links people provide (usually Melev's Reef when dealing with DIY sump/fuge) while the more nutrient rich water will help things in the fuge grow your other filtration will consume pods, etc. I would assume sending living organisms you'd like to make it into your tank through a skimmer at about 1000 gph wouldn't be a great idea. I guess ideally you would have the water from the tank go to the fuge, then to the tank, and run your sump/skimmer separate. Unfortunately with the space, and power constraints I have everything for me will have to be inline. Which putting the fuge last would make it a direct shot to the tank. The fuge should still get plenty of nutrients as the water dumps into the compartment right before the fuge so not all water is skimmed. My idea for cleaner water is more to the fact of not having a bunch of detritus, etc in the fuge like my sump currently collects.

I hope my logic here is not wrong since I am spending quite a bit of money getting all this stuff ready so I can improve my filtration.

I guess that brings you back to the defacto answer for everything "It depends on what you are trying to do."

 

[spiderpig]

How about this?

Thanks everyone for replies. I'm quickly learning that all reef answers should start with...it depends what you're trying to keep

My goal would be to filter the water but also send some critters back to the display as a food source. Any opinions on this scenario:

Tee off the incoming overflow before the sump. The tee feeds the fuge, with a valve controlling the flow of the fuge. Meanwhile, the main overflow line feeds the sump->skimmer->char->return chamber. The fuge, with cheato or the like, trickles into the return chamber. The combined gumbo goes back to the display.

The idea being that the bulk of the overflow goes through mech/chem filtering, a portion goes through bio, and what returns to the display is filtered water but with some goodies. Or is this overly complicated and would putting the fuge after skim/char accomplish the same with less complexity?

Or would all this be moot once the critters hit the pump impellers?

Thanks in advance

 

[chadmace]

They would have to share a common tank or you will have problems. If they share a common tank then the overflow is driven by the return pump. Meaning water entering your tank overflows at the same rate it enters so you have a balance. If you use separate tanks for your sump and fuge it would be impossible to hit that balance or have a pump that is steady enough to maintain that perfect balance. A good resource if you haven't been given it already is http://www.melevsreef.com/allmysumps.html

Good luck on your set-up.