Wet/ Dry to Refugium

[NYC OZ]

What is the best way to convert my Wet/Dry to a refugium? Is there any info available on the web? Any help would be appreciated.

55 Gal corner overflow, 150lbs LR, PC Lighting.

TIA,

OZ

 

[House of Laughter]

More importantly, whatbkind of wet dry?

The problem with converting a wetdry (in current format) to a refuge is that the flow rate through the newly constructed refuge is too high to maximize benefit.

I would add on a refuge or slow your circulation to make it work best. I have converted a 30g acrylic tank with 2" bulheades for returns and 3x1.5" bulkheads for feed from the oveflow. Works great,

But no fuge :-(

House

 

[NYC OZ]

How about taking out the bio balls and replacing them with Live rock? Or any other suggestions. I recently had a tragedy in my tank and lost my Mandarin( Froggy) and Rock Beauty(Sinatra)and my Nitrates have gone through the roof.I have been doing water changes every other day, and figured now would be the time to make some changes.

 

[marrone]

OZ

What would help is to post a picture of your wet/dry filter. If your going to remove the bio-balls do it slowly as they're acting as a biology filter and may cause an amonina spike in your tank if removed all at once. Once all the bio-balls are removed then you should look to either make it a refug or add live rock to it, if your wet/dry filter is the type that can handle a refug you can start to make it a refug. That will help keep the nitrates down.

Also if you have just recently had a spike in your nitrates you need to check other reason why this could of happened. This could be from over feeding or not enough live rock in your tank or just plain over load of live stock in the tank.

Michael

 

[eghatchny]

How old is your tank? I also have a wet/dry filtration on my 75 gal. It has been running of about 1 1/2 yrs. and no problems with nitrates at all. I have about 90-100 lbs of liverock which help a lot to clear it up.

 

[NYC OZ]

It's a regular 2 chamber wet/dry. I have 150 lbs of LR and I can't fit another piece into the tank. I would actually like to take some out and place it in the Wet/Dry. What are my options? Can I make this a Fuge?

Thanks All

 

[marrone]

OZ

If you wet/dry looks like any of the one on marine depot web site you should be able to convert over the wet/dry to a refug. By the what are you nitrate reading. Also what do you have in the tank, corals, fish and inverts.

http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium_miscellaneous_cpr_aquafuge_refugiums.asp?ast=overture&key=

 

[NYC OZ]

Mine looks like this. Yes fish, inverts and a gonipora.

http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium_filters_precision_marine_wet_dry_trickle.asp?CartId=

 

[marrone]

Does the first compartment hold water or does it just drip down and flow into the other compartments. The 1st compartment is the one where you would want to setup your refug. Also the bio balls are causing your nitrates so they do need to go.

 

[NYC OZ]

It just drips down and flows into the other compartment. I am starting to understand how they work now. This will not work with my filter. I will use it as a sump once all the Bio Balls have been remove. Last question.. Should I use live rock to replace the bio balls or will it just die off in there?

 

[marrone]

Yes looking at your filter it probably wouldn't work. I would just run the filter empty as a sump. The rock wouldn't be submerged completly under water so some of the things grow on it and from it will die off but the bacteria will live on and that what you want.

By removing all the bio-balls it should help to reduce the nitrates also a good skimmer will help too. You need all to look at how many fish you have in the tank. Since the tank is only a 55gal tank and have alot of LR too many fish will cause the nitrates to go out.

 

[GQ22]

have to tried to do a hangon refugium on your sump? that is what i am going to try to do. A small 13" one. I got a 26" sump, but have aqua c Urchin skimmer, and two return pumps in there, so there isnt enough room to turn mine into a refugium. They sell hangon all over the net. just type refugium on google.

 

[House of Laughter]

one way to convert it to hold a larger volume of water is to silicone a piece of acrylic where the sponge would be raising the height of where the water will have to travel - this will increase the water level in the left hand chamber allowing you submerge the rock into the sump and have it live well. You would have to take the bioball rack out.

Hope that helps - getting the bio balls out will definately help your nitrates. And as far as the madarin goes, they need tons of pods to live healthily.

Good luck

House