refugium and pluming question

[petere1989]

I have a 20 gallon tank currently. I have also a now empty 10 gallon. If you see my other threads I've been having bad algae problems and am in the process of getting it all sorted out. But I was wondering if anybody could help me on something. I am considering making my 10 gallon into a refugium and putting macro algae in the tank but i am totally clueless to the pluming and everything i need. that way I can put the skimmer and everything in that tank instead of the display tank. i am short on space so it has to be a very simple system.

[DUPioneers]

Originally Posted by petere1989

I have a 20 gallon tank currently. I have also a now empty 10 gallon. If you see my other threads I've been having bad algae problems and am in the process of getting it all sorted out. But I was wondering if anybody could help me on something. I am considering making my 10 gallon into a refugium and putting macro algae in the tank but i am totally clueless to the pluming and everything i need. that way I can put the skimmer and everything in that tank instead of the display tank. i am short on space so it has to be a very simple system.

The basic idea here is that you want water to flow from your display tank into your sump/fuge, where it can be filtered by your macro algae and skimmer. Then, the clean(er) water needs to flow BACK to your display tank, ultimately creating a loop of sorts.

Put very simply, what you're going to need is plumbing that will (1) get water TO your new sump/fuge; and (2) get water FROM your sump/fuge back to your display tank.

Depending on what kind of tank you have as a display tank, you can accomplish (1) several ways, be it a pump, an overflow box, a siphon system, drilling the tank, or whathaveyou.

(2) will (almost) definitely require a pump of some sort.

Since I'm not sure exactly what kind of tank you're dealing with, your specific geographic issues, your budget, or other mitigating factors, it's hard to really advise you which way to go here.

[fishgate]

The simplest way to do what you want to do is to put the tanks next to each other at the exact same water level, get a u-tube siphon (or 2 for safety/backup) between them, and then get a small pump from the 10gal pumping water back into the 20gal. 200gph should be fine. Make sure the pump is high enough up in the 10gal so that if the siphon breaks that you won't overflow the 20gal. The down to this system is if both siphons break, you risk burning out the pump when it runs out of water to pump. You could do this setup for probably $30.