[Binare]

Great designs. Just for discussions sake, I'm curious as to why so many people allow water to bypass their skimmers in designs like this. The water being passed through a "skimmer section" where input and output are both within allows water to bypass, and some water already processed to be processed again. I personally like direct fed or recircs for this reason. I can plumb my drain directly into a recirc and have 100% of the water processed, then flow through a refugium split into two horizontal layers. Bottom being a benthic low light zone shaded by an upper zone of macro. Macro layer limited to 2" or 3" deep so no need to turn or swirl. Then onto return/chemical filtration section. The only bypass happening is the chemical portion, which is unavoidable. I'm curious too as to how many people match their flow to the sump and NOT the display. Matching flow to the sump, taking into account what the skimmer processes and the needs of the refugium makes more efficient use of the sump IMO.