Refugium Baffles

I am planning on doing a DIY refugium, Most likely a 30 Gallon Long for my 125.

I want to have three seperate secions in this order:

INTAKE-----> REFUGIUM------->RETURN


I have an Iwaki 55 that I will be using for the pump. The aquarium has (2) 1" inch drain holes that will lead down to the refugium and have (2) 3/4" return holes. I plan on purchasing an Octopus 150 for the PS

MY QUETSION IS: WHAT SIZE SHOULD THE BAFFLES BE?
A. From the intake and into the refugium?
B. 1st Wall of Bubble trap before return?
C. second wall is just height of aquarium to 1" form bottom?
D. second wall of bubble trap/return section?


I would greatly appreciat any help. Thanks!!

 

There's no real set height. I have the same type of sump you want to build. I have an intake, a refugium and a return section. My intake baffle goes from the bottom to about 1" from the top of the tank. My next section is much lower. The first baffle for the bubble trap is only about 7", the next baffles goes from the very top to about 1" from the bottom, then the last baffles is about 6" tall. Now, I use a 20 gal. long tank for my sump, so your heights may be a little different, but you can use the same proportions. Good luck.

 

I would make the refugium go like this....fuge...return...intake(skimmer). You can control the flow better and since you are running dual overflows anyway. You can tee off one of the overflows for the fuge. As far as baffle height. The ones where water goes under make 1 inch from the bottom. The ones going over is something you will have to measure. My 40g sump I made those baffles 9 inches tall. The tank is 18 inches tall. This assured me that my sump will not overflow in a power outage. The only baffle i made different was the fuge side. I made it about 16" so it has some good volume

 

Agree with guitarman. Just make sure you have enough room so it doesn't overflow if the power goes out. I wasn't clear on whether you were doing two or three baffles between the first and second section. If you do three with the middle one raised drill a couple of drainage holes on the side of the first section so you don't trap water.
The last section is where the water level will vary so make that big enough for your planned setup. If you are planning for an ato then it could be smaller. I like big return sections personally cause then during water changes I can remove Moe water without shutting down pumps.

 

i found a sketch of mine..Even with my ridiculous number of baffles, I still got microbubbles. So I went with using a filter sock and it works great. I could probably do away with all but one baffle

 

This guy makes the best sumps and then tells you how to make it yourself. His are all acrylic, but you can use glass also.
Melevsreef.com | Acrylic Sumps & Refugiums

 

"I would make the refugium go like this....fuge...return...intake(skimmer). You can control the flow better and since you are running dual overflows anyway. You can tee off one of the overflows for the fuge."

I like this idea, however, I have an external iwaki 55 pump. So I need to have it at the end.

I appreciate all the input, it has been extremely helpful.

 

I hear ya. I had about 5 inches to play with when my sump was pushed back in the stand. So I put a 90 degree then about a foot of pvc and another 90 to my pump. So my pump sits at the end of my sump like yours will, it just draws water from the middle section

 

Can you post a pic of it so I can see how you have it set up? I would greatly appreciate it!

Thanks!!!

 

yeah will do tonight when I get home