I am starting a new 90gal mixed reef which I will be posting my project as soon as it progresses. I am debating to use a remote DSB (Deep Sand Bed) in my refugium. The refugium is a 30 gal tank w/ baffles, so the refugium portion is about 15gal. In the main tank I am doing a SSB. I am wondering if it would be benefit the tank or if I would be better off with live rock rubble and cheato? I welcome any one willing to share their knowldge on this one. I plan on setting up the tank this weekend.
if i can make a suggestion. why not run a deep sand bed in plastic guttering that water is pumped from the sump then gravity feed back near the last baffle. that way u can run both
Fat Walrus: right now I can not afford to do a DSB in the main display otherwise I would I even searched for southdown in my area with no luck. So I am stuck with paying $1.50BL.
Veriann: I had thought about a technique similar to that but using a 5 gal bucket. I am not sure if I want to go threw that much trouble. In all my tanks now and in the past have had a SSB but time to time a struggle with nitrate swings. I may do this in the future but right now it is to extreeme.
Do you think there will be enough area for the sand bed to be effective? What size grain would you recommend #0 (fiji Pink Sand) or #1 fine sand? Both being aragonite of course.
what is a deap sand bed in a sump, around 4-6 inches?
that's right. there are a lot of debate about perfect height, but 3 inches or less is considered too little, and much more than 7 inches are said to be unnecessary or perhaps detrimental. at least from what i know.
Well I am running a DSB and I used 160 lbs of sand in my 65G. Of that I used 40lbs of Carib-Sea Aragamax Select (0.5-1.02 mm grain size) and 90lbs of Aragamax select (0.2 to 1.22) and 40lbs Carib-Sea Special Grade Sand (1-1.7).
The reason I mention this is you were asking about grainular size. Since my cycle anout 4 months ago, I have had steady ammonia, nitrite and nitrate levels.
I was going to set mine up as 4-5inches just because the height of the baffles are 12 inches high.
i would go with that height. but i would prob go glass/acrylic insert cells so u could change/move it later without disturbing the bed! u only need the glass/acrylic lip to be slightly heigher to contain the water level! its not a huge area so its manageable in 3 or 4 cells.id have a field day with a project like this. sounds like fun!
I would recomend not just using all of one grainsize. 1mm or (0phi) is the border between very coarse sand and coarse sand.
as my actual job is analysis of the benthic supstrate and the correlations of organisms to a phi (size) range (kinda what i do),
i would recomend a mixed sizing from medium/ coarse silt to very coarse sand. (5.5 to 0 phi) (0.02- 1mm). with more of the larger ranges than the silt/ muds.
__________________ Adam J
you would think with a degree and professional career i could actually spell words correctly. sory.
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