Hypothetical reef tank

Delphinus · #1 08-21-2007, 04:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mr_alberta

Gyre tanks...well, while the concept is interesting, they look kind of....gross to me

Not my cup of tea.

Probably better suited to a backroom frag growout, true. I *did* say my suggestion was a bit "out there."

Having said though I think the less aesthetic aspects are merely a design challenge that should set the creativity neurons firing. I'm hoping to do a show level gyre tank for gorgonians at some point, but, ah well, since I'm basically a one-armed man for the foreseeable future it ain't happenin' anytime soon.

Catherine, the Calfo manifold is probably the way to go. Unfortunately, they're kind of ugly too, unless you have a canopy to hide the piping. The idea is that you have a pipe with various output points that you can hang locline (or whatever) from and thus tweak your flow patterns without bulky pumps in the viewable areas of the tank. I imagine a google search should yield some good examples of setups but I can't think of any offhand.

michika · #2 08-21-2007, 04:41 PM

Since my tank isn't really supposed to be in my apartment it will have both a canopy and stand, as well as a set of doors to cover the tank itself. In short everything can be hidden away to look like a cabinet or something.

I was thinking I woud make the water level even with the 1ft mark, and then maybe keep the glass taller, 15" or so. The canopy level could then come down, cover the extra 3" of space and then the manifold as well.

I still worry about how to keep the whole structure up and how to prevent it from bowing or dipping in the front. I'm also now trying to figure out how to make it asethetically pleasing while ensuring I have a crazy amount of flow.

mr_alberta · #3 08-21-2007, 05:13 PM

Rigid PVC should be more than enough to prevent dipping...here's my old calfo system:

Pic of what you see in the tank:

michika · #4 08-21-2007, 05:17 PM

I remember that system! What was the longest length you had to cover? Any problems with disturbing the sandbed (or was this tank BB?)?

mr_alberta · #5 08-21-2007, 05:32 PM

My tank was BB so no worries about the sandbed. The longest length was 45" with a 14" segment at the end (it was L-shaped). It wasn't a true calfo manifold as it wasn't all one continuous "loop". I split the manifold in half with a SCWD so that only half of the "loop" would fire at a time. Worked quite well, but too bad the SCWD adds so much headloss to a pump. In retrospect, an Ocean Motion 2 way would have been better as you can use much larger pumps with it.

christyf5 · #6 08-21-2007, 05:51 PM

Uh, pardon my ignorance, but do you have to provide an "excess" of flow so that water makes it through to the final outlet at the end of the line (so that you don't have the most pressure coming out the first outlet, then less at the second, even less at the third etc?).

michika · #7 08-21-2007, 05:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by christyf5

Uh, pardon my ignorance, but do you have to provide an "excess" of flow so that water makes it through to the final outlet at the end of the line (so that you don't have the most pressure coming out the first outlet, then less at the second, even less at the third etc?).

Good question...I'm pretty ignorant too about this....anyone?

mr_alberta · #8 08-21-2007, 09:11 PM

There's got to be a Mech. Engineer somewhere here that can explain why you don't need ball valves on a closed system like a Calfo Manifold...

Quote:

Originally Posted by christyf5

Uh, pardon my ignorance, but do you have to provide an "excess" of flow so that water makes it through to the final outlet at the end of the line (so that you don't have the most pressure coming out the first outlet, then less at the second, even less at the third etc?).

michika · #9 08-21-2007, 05:54 PM

I'm about 90% sure that this is the way I'm going to go. I'm going to try and do an external overflow box so I can maximize the space in the tank. I don't want to go BB, so I'm sure that will be a problem I will have to deal with later.

I want a very random flow, so I guess I'll look into an Ocean Motion. I don't think I want to use a SCWD again, because, like you meantioned, of the headloss.

I guess that makes my next step figuring out what pumps to use, and how I may want to drill my new tank. Should I be looking at doing a few returns through the back of the glass?