100 gal Rubbermaid sumps?

[dwall174]

I know my "Future System" will not be nearly the size of some of the tanks I’ve seen here on Large Reef Tanks, But my total water volume will be somewhere around 325 gallons! My set-up will be a 135 gal main tank, 65 gal FO tank, 50 gal Rubbermaid frag tank, & a 100 gal Rubbermaid sump.
My plans are to have each of the three tanks drain into separate filter socks on one end of the sump then run through several baffles before being pumped back to the tanks.

Anyway what I’m looking for is any pictures or drawings of how everybody placed their baffles & skimmers in their 100 gal Rubbermaid sumps!

[dwall174]

What nobody has pictures or drawings of their 100 gal Rubbermaid sumps

[NewMariner]

The only baffle system I have heard of someone putting in the Rubbermaid stock tanks are the ones where they take a 5 gal bucket drill a bunch of holes in it...and then find a smaller bucket to put inside of the 5 gal bucket to actually have the water input into..

But who knows someone might have some kind of baffle system setup...

[dwall174]

Yea I have seen a couple like that! In fact on my current system all I use is a one gallon glass jar that overflows about ¾� above my sumps water level.
It works ok with only having around 800 GPH running through it! But I’m looking at probably 2000 GPH or more going through the Rubbermaid sump.

[Alphabet]

Pics soon...upsizing.

[lesniewv]

I found that baffles were too difficult with the rubbermaid sumps. A bucket or similar works well. I have a 32 gallon trash container with holes drilled in the lid...skimmer, overflows, heater, calcium reactor all dump in there and it eliminates salt spray and excessive evap from all that turbulence. You can see that I used 3x 1.5" exit tubes that start at the bottom of the can and end up at the water surface to ensure no bubbles get to the return pump. Also let me put the skimmer intake in the can so it takes the raw water from the overflows as well.

[dwall174]

Originally posted by lesniewv
I found that baffles were too difficult with the rubbermaid sumps. A bucket or similar works well.

Was that because of the shape of the tub? Or did you have problems getting them sealed?
I have a table style jigsaw & router table so making the baffles shouldn’t be too hard, I’m just not sure what to use to bond them to the tub! Being that they are made from structural foam, regular plastic adhesives like Weld-On may soften or melt it too much?

[lesniewv]

The shape mainly, too high, too irregular and the trash can works really well. I only have a 70 gallon rubbermaid, and when you add up the cost for the plexi (need some rather large pieces at least 1/4" thick to span the distances) and time involved, it just wasn't worth it. I would think that plain old cheap All Glass silicone would work....it's worked when I put plexiglass baffles in a glass 40 gallon breeder tank and an acrylic maxireef wet dry, but don't quote me. The forces on your sump baffles will be much greater then what I have experience with, and I know silicone is not the best for bonding to plastics. I'll defer to someone who has real world experience.

Good luck...I can't wait to see what you come up with.

[DrBDC]

On my stock tank sump I used a taller bucket like IO and Oceanic for the input. Then a shorter bucket (Coralife) for the return pump area. Water overflows the top bucket and in between I have chaeto growing with a couple of shop lights hanging over it and 6 ge ultra daylight 6500K bulbs in it. The only thing is to keep the water level as high above the return pump bucket as you can but still have overflow cascade from the input bucket. If the water level gets too low it will float the return bucket out from no water. There is about a 4 or 5 inch buffer there to work with. In a stock tank this is probably 15 gallons so it's not that hard. A couple times I did have problems when my DIY skimmer freaked out and skimmed 20-30 gallons. Of course when I was out for the evening. My skimmer is tuned well now but I'm going to build one fo those shut off scrum buckets for it that will cut the skimmer off after 5 gallons so I don't ever have that happen again.