Octopus vs. Coralife

i vote for coralife but that is all that I have had it had done me justice. I use the box to filter out bubbles but with a few mods. I add some sponges at the top and let the bottom clog and it removes bubbles fine. The 125 I have in a sump I just let it run through the box with no bottom to eliminate the noise. Bigest problem I have had is air hole kept getting cloged but if you make sure sound reducer is above water line this will cut back need to clean.

 

also if you choose coralife make sure you get the needle wheel version not the venturi system.

 

absolutely--good point K+

 

It depends on how many fish you put in the tank.

I would go sump. Adds to water volume, you can hide all your other equipment in the sump, and your options expand. You could do a 20 long or even use a rubbermaid container and build yourself a cheap sump.

 

I am definetly getting the octo, i just fell in love with it, i think. I am most likely saving up a little longer to get the bh 300 dual skimmer for only 50 bucks more.

 

i know its small but i have a 10g. what is the simplest and cheapest way to make it into a sump?

 

I have a question for you. Do you have a sump or do you need hang on the back? If you have a sump, I would suggest getting the octopus NW-150, it is about 175 or so and is large enough to handle a 125 or so.

Now if you need hang on, I think the coralife is the better of the 2 but I would suggest moving up to the 125 skimmer.

Kim

 

Get an overflow box, or build yourself a PVC overflow (there's some plans I've seen floating around on the internet) - stick the 10g underneath the 55, have the overflow drain into the 10, put all equipment into the 10, and then have a return pump send the water back up to the display.

You can get a 20 long for 20 bucks at Petsmart, will add room for more equipment later - like a Carbon / Phosphate reactor. But the 10 gallon will do for now.

You will definitely want to run carbon. Keeps the odors down and removes chemicals / etc. from the water.

Edit - if you do the sump route, you can get rid of HOB filters which can turn into nitrate factories and run a filter sock for mechanical filtration. You can clean the filter sock by tossing in the wash machine, which will save money on filter pads down the road.

 

hey could i mod the octopus bh 300 so i have airline tubes running from the collection cup into a bottle or something like that?

 

$175 is out of my budget, and as of now, no sump