Design of a semi-open or open system reef tank

[ritchie1]

Anybody have any ideas in designing a semi-open or open system reef tank? I live about 50 meters from the shoreline/5 meters from sea level and plan of pumping water from the ocean to a plastic water tank in an airconditioned room where the aquarium is, to equalize the temperature. Once the temps are equal, pump it into the aquarium (overflow). The shoreline is sandy and frequently contains a lot of debris like dead leaves, branches, etc. The clearer water is usually (depending on weather and season) about 200 to 300 meters from the shoreline.

Alternative:
Leave the aquarium outside and pump the water directly into the aquarium. This saves electricity with respect to cooling, but the problem is the debris near the shoreline and high sea surface temps. Currently sea surface temps are near 31 C. How deep would I have to go to get lower sea temperatures of around 27 C?

Is it as simple as running PVC pipes connected to the pump inside the house? Can i just put a plastic screen in the pump intake to prevent sucking debris? Will the pump get damaged when it sucks water that contains some sand?

Anyone know of an industrial pump or commercial pumps not normally used in aquariums that can be used? I found a brass one here normally used to pump water out of fishing boats, but that will probably not work as brass contains copper....Finding aquarium pumps (not to mention supplies) is very difficult here.

 

[pcardone]

So I understand. You want to use the ocean as your sump?. Seems like more hassel than it is worth. Set up a normal reef tank. and use the ocean for livestock and water changes. That way you will have more control over your enviornment.

 

[Anonymous]

The Monterey Bay aquarium does this, albeit on a somewhat larger scale.

Maybe you could run a pipe a mile out to sea, and have a continuous flow-through?

 

[bleedingthought]

Whatever you end up doing, post pictures!

 

[ritchie1]

This is my 75 gal tank now. The lights are 3X40 W ordinary daylight tubes and 3X40W actinic. Before moving, had the corals outside with natural sunlight and they were growing really fast. Now the light is barely enough.

I'll be building a 200 gal open reef system within the next few months, and will post the progress here in reefs.org(this thread is also at the DIY forum). Will keep the tank outside and use natural sunlight.

 

[Anonymous]

You can have a large tank of fresh oceanwater outside and use it for a surge system for your main tank. As far as pumping it, the pump alone would spin the dial of your meter.
There is a tank in Hawii that uses a surge system, you can also see a drawing of what they have. TM

 

[Anonymous]

I would be leary to use water that I could not control the quality of. You would need to test it often, probably for more than the standard stuff.

 

[ritchie1]

Thanks for the posts.

Good idea on the surge device, i'll use it to feed ocean water into my aquariums. When the ocean feed is not running i'd also want one running continuously. Found it here:
http://www.masla.com/reef/csm.html
If a surge device is used, will powerheads still be necessary?

Yes, i'm thinking twice about running the ocean feed continuously mainly due to the inability to control the system and the clogging of the pipes. Maintaining the pipes might be too troublesome due to the animals that attach there such as barnacles. Guess the only way to know is to find out and see. If the open system is too troublesome, then can always run it as a semi-open one with a turnover with the ocean of say, 150 gallons every two days or it can be shut off temporarily when the conditions in the ocean are not ideal. All the while trying to keep the aquarium as stable as possible.