djreef
Guest
Mikester -
remote sandbeds can work exceptionally well. The key is flow. You have to turn the system over several times an hour. I was running, roughly, 250 gallons per hour through my 45 gallon refug with the intake drawing water from a settling point in my main system. I rigged all the powerheads to push the water to the same point in the main tank. The key is to move the water enough to allow the flocculent to be drawn into the refug, thus using the refug as a settling pond, as such. Allow the macros to grow thick enough, and they will filter the crap out before it hits the return to the main system. Keep the bug populations up and they'll also help. Run through the main system twice a month with a powerhead, or turkey baster, to get the crud out of the rocks, and everyone is happy. In the 3 years that I ran the hi-flo system I never had measureable nitrates or phosphates. All of this while feeding roughly 4 oz. of food (wet & dry weight) per day through the whole network. I ran the most diverse system that I've ever seen using this method. The one caveat is that it was a bitch to maintain, given that everything grew so fast in it that I had a hard time keeping up with the dosing schedules (esp. after I began travelling for work), and the constant turf wars that errupted between the animals overgrowing each other was also a pain. I took the system to the extreme, though, prob more than I should have.
DJ
= 8-->{I>
remote sandbeds can work exceptionally well. The key is flow. You have to turn the system over several times an hour. I was running, roughly, 250 gallons per hour through my 45 gallon refug with the intake drawing water from a settling point in my main system. I rigged all the powerheads to push the water to the same point in the main tank. The key is to move the water enough to allow the flocculent to be drawn into the refug, thus using the refug as a settling pond, as such. Allow the macros to grow thick enough, and they will filter the crap out before it hits the return to the main system. Keep the bug populations up and they'll also help. Run through the main system twice a month with a powerhead, or turkey baster, to get the crud out of the rocks, and everyone is happy. In the 3 years that I ran the hi-flo system I never had measureable nitrates or phosphates. All of this while feeding roughly 4 oz. of food (wet & dry weight) per day through the whole network. I ran the most diverse system that I've ever seen using this method. The one caveat is that it was a bitch to maintain, given that everything grew so fast in it that I had a hard time keeping up with the dosing schedules (esp. after I began travelling for work), and the constant turf wars that errupted between the animals overgrowing each other was also a pain. I took the system to the extreme, though, prob more than I should have.
DJ
= 8-->{I>
. The lighting was 440watts of URI 50/50 VHO, 250 watts of 6500K Iwasaki MH, and 110 watts of 10K PC (on the ends) mounted in a ventilated wooden canopy. Fuge was lit by a 150watt 50/50 URI VHO, burned 18hours/day - pretty much was off whenever the MH was running on the main tank. Needless to say heat was a big problem. I had to run fans for that, and keep my apartment at 67 degrees during the day. Reliant energy LOVED sending me my electric bill each month. If you were to ask me if I miss it, I'd have to say yes, and no. It was a major pain to run because of the time & complexity, but it was also damn nice to look at. Maybe when I retire one day I'll do it again. For now, I think I'll stick with my FOWLR setup. It's much easier/cheaper.