Refugium dsb yay or nay? *PICS*
 

75 gallon display tank, newly setup 30g sump with over rated skimmer. Fuge chamber is fairly small at 7"wide,12"deep,14"high. I am unsure if I should have a deep sand bed with these dimensions... My main point of sump is for pod population since my skimmer seems to be doing okay with nitrates for now. Suggestions on what you would do with the refuge? I am planning on having a fairly heavy bio-load.
Thanks

http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e1...r/CIMG7505.jpg

http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e1...r/CIMG7491.jpg

i dont think a DSB that size is going to provide any real benefit and if you ever need to drain and clean your sump its going to stink and be a real pain.

i would plump a 5 gallon bucket to your sump along with a small pump. Have the bucket overflow back into your sump via a bulkhead and some piping.

i believe its referred to as a remote sandbed and you can swap it out or remove it by just turning a couple ball valves when needed. Plus you can probably fit way more sand in there and still have tons of room in your sump for other stuff.

+1

I would ditch the sand, put in some macro algae with some lighting and some live rock. Pods will be happy there.

if you want to run a heavy bio load your best bet is good husbandry.

1. Water changes weekly
2. keeping the skimmer neck and body clean so its performing well (you can get a swabbie to this for you if you are lazy - www.avastmarineworks.com)
3. bio pellets seems to be very helpful (kien has documentation on how this produc has performed on his tank)
4. use a little carbon but switch it out every two weeks. There is a calculator on the BRS Site - use it to determine how much carbon you need and replace it regularly (dont put a bunch in for 6 months)
5. gfo - same as carbon - check the brs site for refresh info and quantity to use.
6. get fighting conch to keep you display sandbed clean and make sure you have tons of flow to keep the dietrus and food constantly suspended in you water column so it makes it way into you overflow and gets filtered.
7. stuff some loose filterfloss between your baffles after where the tank water enters. CHANGE IT WEEKLY at the bare minimum.

That's a very small DSB area and it won't be effective. It's all about water and sand contact surface. And it doesn't seem to be deep enough. Ideally you should dedicate a whole tank of a decent size (or a container or whatever you like), aka remote DSB, and stock the container with sand up to 6"+. People also recommend to replace all sand in DSB every 2 years or so. Sand is cheap anyway. You don't have to use LFS sand. Do a search and you will see people are using hardware store sand successfully.
So to sum it up:
1. A remote DSB
2. a large surface area in DSB ( as large as you can).
3. A really deep sand bed, 6"+.
4. Be prepared to replace sand every 2 years.

Thanks for all the good info. I think I am going to take all the sand out but a half inch or so, add some rock rubble and a ton of chaeto. Going to be a btch getting it all out... lol