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Filtration



Someone shut the cupboards!
The water is cloudy from an initial bacterial bloom.
New Tank Syndrome Blues.


The sump is a 40 gallon Sterilite® tub that both filters feed into. (Each filter has it's own 1.5" drain coming off the back of the tank at either end, pulling down surface water.) The sump contains two 200 watt Tronic heaters set at 74 degrees, which is keeping the tank warm just fine, 6 Bio-Chem Zorb packets, and a pH Pinpoint probe.

Each filter is a 21 gallon Sterilite tub, fed into the rear top via a bulkhead that connects to the 1.5" drains coming down off the back of the tank. Each filter has a few inches of filter wool on top, followed by a 2" thick foam pad, then biomateral. The water is delivered atop the filter wool, then runs down through the foam, biomaterial, and out the drain to the sump.

Did you really expect a pump to say something? :)


The pump is Dolphin's AmpMaster 3000, plumbed down to 1" PVC (inlet 1.5"), operating at ~8FT head pressure. This delivers a flow of ~21 GPM, but I had to dial it back a bit to create less turbulence (trying to keep that pH down!). The turnover is probably about 1000GPH. This pump is very powerful, capable of delivering high flow rates very efficiently, using only .8 - 1.0 amps and 115 watts. It is also virtually silent if you put it on a rubber pad, does not transfer heat, and is maintenance-free. In top of all that it comes with an extended manufacture's warranty of 10 years. I got this pump mail order from Marine Depot who has better prices than anyone on Dolphin pumps (anyone I ever found anyway), and they are very efficient and reliable. (I also got my pH Pinpoint Monitor from Marine Depot, and again they were cheaper than anyone else I found.)

I added a denitrating component to this system in order to manage nitrates better.

Swim Back

Wanna email me, bud? Sure you do.


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