Which would you personally prefer?

I have 2 sump designs and i was wondering what you think. Either A 2.5" (length) by 8" (width) by 13" (height), my point is a small refugium pictured in picture 1 or would you want no refugium but a "media tower" if you will with filter floss and pads ext. shown in picture 2. Which one?

In picture 1 the left is refugium, middle is return and right is skimmer

In picture 2 the left is return, the middle is skimmer and the right is media raised by egg crate (layers of it)

I guess my question is, i know i will want a refugium later on but is it worth it right now if its only 2.5" thick? i mean it is really tall and wide but will it suffice?

 

IMO the idea of a bigger fuge being better is false. The key to a fuge doing it's job is growth not volume of macro. As long as you trim your macro often enough that it always has room for growth I think you will have a lot of potential for nutrient export. I'm also strongly against setting up a media chamber. Any filtration area that is impassable to water is only a detritus trap/nitrate factory IMO. Carbon sitting somewhere in your sump where the water can flow freely around it works much better.

 

I don't think it will be worth having a 2.5" refugium, I have to disagree with Mike (for once ) and say everything I've ever read is that bigger is always better if the refugium is setup properly. I've seen numbers on the quantity of nitrates and phosphates exported per dried gram of some macros but I don't have links handy. It takes a lot to have a significant reduction in nutrients. However for only a 22g maybe it would help a little bit, I personally wouldn't do it though, there are easier ways to control nutrients IMO.
I don't think the couple handfulls of macro that will fit in that area will be worth it ultimately. It could become a hassle to maintain such a slim area in the sump I think and I would also be concerned with the macro in that section not being able to move around well which may lead to it getting stuck in that section, and thus only exposing one side of the algae which could mean the bottom side of the algae may die and release the nutrients back into the water.

I don't like mechanical filtration because it's unnecessary to use all the time and just more things to maintain.

Have you considered maybe just making your return area a little bigger? Are you sure your return area is big enough to handle your evaporation for a few days without the pump running dry?
Do you have enough room to handle another feed pump for a phosphate reactor or something like that in case you want to add one in the future?

Be careful of trying to squeeze everything, even the kitchen sink, into a small area. I would rather be able to do a few things well then to do a lot of things poorly I guess sums up my opinion.

My 2c FWIW!

 

o gees. Not exactly what i wanted to her screwtape but the truth is the best for me right now. Can anyone argue that (hopefully!!!)? Maybe John from reefcleaners is on tonight browsing the forums and can buzz in? anyone?

 

I am assuming you are driven to this design because you are limited in footprint size. Is that correct? If so, how much room do you have vertically?

The reason that I ask is that when I was researching sump refugium designs ran across an interesting one that had the refugium above the pump section and overflowing into the skimmer section.
input#1 input#2
here to fuge

| overflow baffle here
| fuge |
|__________________| |
| |
| overflow to pump here |
| pump here | |
| | |
| | skimmer here |
|__________________|___________________|
|

 

Alright that didn't work in my attempted text drawing.

THe guy had the refuge effective as a tray above the pump area and gravity overflowing into the skimmer. Partial overflow into the tray, the partial into the skimmer directly.

He solved your issue by using the vertical height to gain more volume. I didn't use it, but it was clever.

Just a thought. It would give a larger pump volume for evaporation and effect a larger fuge with the impact on some complexity for the tray fuge.

Maybe it helps, maybe not. Just trying to help.

M

 

Oh... the tray was removable so that he could get to the pump and the tray did not cover the full depth so the pump plumbing and electrical had vertical routes.

M