Sump vs Canister

[asonitez]

Well I'm about 4 days from getting my New lighting. Tonight I got a sand sifting goby... this little guy goes into the sand eats it up and then spits out good clean sand. He is AWESOME. Honestly him + my lawnmower blenny has eridacited almost every sign of Hair Algae and red slime algae in my tank. So far so good. However,


My tank is a 54 Gallon Corner and its currently in the corner about 2 inches from the wall to accomodate my Hoses for a EHEIM Canister filter rated for a Tank of 124=180 Gallons. I currently have a TUNZE 9005 skimmer thats doing an awesome job. The more I look around the more I see that people use sumps for reef tanks vs the cannister filter. Honestly I don't plan on keeping anyting rare or super important in this tank other than the fish and a few extremely hardy corals. I want to know if I should blemish the thought of having a nice living room piece correctly fitting the wall instead of standing 6-8 inches from the wall to accomodate the overflow box. Is the Canister filter ALL that bad. I religiously clean the filters on BOTH of my tanks every sunday. What do yo guys reccomend? Rip out the Cannister and install a sump and mak the tank stand a few inches from the wall

 

[depitch039]

Sump,live rock and protein skimmer is current filtration system of choice for reef tanks.

Canister filters tend to accumulate nitrates, bad for even the hardiest corals.

If your maintenance is weekly you may be able to get away with current set up. I did it for first year of saltwater tank but the water parameters using sump and skimmer were drastically better.

JMO

 

[asonitez]

Other than drilling the tank any tips to lower the profile of the sump and stuff though?

 

[KillaGoby]

I prefer a refugium with at least a 4" sand bed for my LPS tanks.

To answer your question a sump is much better than a canister filter. I do believe their are ways to change the canister in to a better filter by removing the media and adding live rock. I've never done it, just heard about it. You might want to ask around about that. This way the traditional media in the canister does not become a nitrate factory...

 

[mladencovic]

Sump has alltogether quite different function from canister filter. Sump basically serves the following purpose:

1) Increases the total water volume which has plenty of benefits.

2) Provides the buffer zone when adding any additives. It allows the added chemicals to dilute to harmless levels before they enter the main display tanks. Many of the additives might be in a crystal form or have parts of them crystallised and if such crystals would fall on live corals they could burn them. When correcting pH or Alk or any other parameter, by adding the chemicals in the sump, you avoid swings in concentration around the living organisms that you care about.

3) Creates "hidden" space where you can put all those "ugly" things that would ruin the aesthetics of your display tank, like heaters, probes and sensors, additional plumbing and space for additional filtration methods (skimmers, nitrogen and phosphates reactors, ozone, UV) and plumbings for additives (Ca, Kalk reactors, additives pumps etc).

4) Parts of the sump, can be sectioned into additional filtration compartments by adding LR, DSB or macrolgae in such compartments. Additional filtration in sumps is achieved by adding the filter socks or sponge filters to overflow returns. This is also the place where they used to put compartments with bio-balls and wet-dry filters, but such filtration method is no longer viewed really beneficial.

5) Provides additional water surface for aeration and heat exchange (evaporation)

6) Overflow ensures the constant height of the water level in your display tank and sump makes auto top-off much more easier and efficient.

 

[mladencovic]

Other than drilling the tank any tips to lower the profile of the sump and stuff though?

I am not sure if I understood you correctly, but if you are asking if there is a way to feed the sump without drilling the tank, then yes, there are HOB overflow boxes you can buy:

http://www.marinedepot.com/ps_AquariumPage.aspx?PageAlias=overflow_boxes_cpr

or make :

...I do believe their are ways to change the canister in to a better filter by removing the media and adding live rock. I've never done it, just heard about it. You might want to ask around about that. This way the traditional media in the canister does not become a nitrate factory...

It is questionable how beneficial this would be. The reason is that, in order for LR not to trap the nutrients the media would, it needs to be fairly "chunky" which would reduce its surface and therefore reduce the amount of the beneficial bacterias that can work on the stuff. Also, how much of LR could you stuff there? 1-2 Lb at most which will be just a few % of your total LR, for comparison. If you are really that diligent to clean filters every week (hats down ) then filter media would be much better choice. Specially since you can put various stuff there and not just active carbon and plain sponge.

 

[blange3]

I've run my 55gallon softie tank with an AquaC Remora skimmer and a Fluval Canister filter for over 2 years with an average amount of not very porous rock and a 4-5" sandbed. I also have a small HOB fuge, but not much going on in there.

If the tank is already up and you like the cosmetics, go with what you have. I run only carbon in the Fluval. I'm sure the Tunze is a better skimmer than the Remora so you are ahead of me in that department.

I've also kept LPS and some easy SPS in this tank as well.

Sumps make things very convenient, but unless you are taking the tank down and drilling it, I wouldn't bother. On a corner tank the HOB overflow would be very obvious and they make a bit of noise, at least the one I have on my frag tank does.

 

[KillaGoby]

I've used a HOB overflow made by CPR. It works well but I would use another pump besides the aqualifter on it. I think you can run a line into the sump with a check valve on it to a better pump than the aqualifter.