Upside Down Sandbed Sump?

[DLChaney]

anyone heard of this, i recently read and article in Marine Fish and Reef 2005, its basically a sump here the sand+ substate is placed on eggshells with a few inches of space in between the bottom on the tank, i just wanted to know if anyone has more information on this, the article claims it increases the benefits of your sump because it cause water to flow through the substrate, effectively increasing the surface area the water comes in contact with. I may consider doing this, i would just like to read more about it to see if its too complicated. Any info would be super

[clown2be]

I read the same thing, and had never heard of it either. I have been surfing RC for awhile now and never seen anyone mention an upside down sandbed. Here we go " DSB-SSB-BB now UDSb."

[myakkareef]

Basically I think this is a Plenum....It was used early on in the hobby in the main display tanks...Try searching "Plenum"...I think that is what it was called anyways...

[sarduci]

Egg shells or eggcrate? One is from a chicken, the other from the lighting section of Home Depot.

Eggcrate or Light Diffuser has been used in plenum systems like they have over at GARF for a long time.

[MarkM3]

If water is flowing through it; it is the same as having bioballs, sponges, etc. You will break down more ammonia, but at the cost of producing nitrate. This is not good for a reef, perhaps only for a fish-only system with heavy bioload.

[H20ENG]

Egg shells or eggcrate? One is from a chicken, the other from the lighting section of Home Depot.
:lol: :lol: :lol: :rollface:

[DLChaney]

yeah, my bad, egg crate, and it has 5 inches of crushed corals, then the sand on top of that, all of which is on top of eggcrate, which is on pvc pipes

[mux11]

I came across a page that talked about making a stand for the LR to sit on. They stated that this greatly increase the filtration effects of the rock and bettered the tank for it.
hmmmm interesting.........

[rsman]

this is built the same as a RUGF, but with sand. it can have a temporary nitrate lowering effect, what you get is the anoxic zones on top, and slightly forced, these and many devices like them have been chatted about before. what will eventually happen, when used in a reef who knows when it might be 20000 years from now, channels are created in the sand and the denitrification lowers. to some end the inverts and such at the top of the sand will stirr up that sand and reduce some of these channels this is not a plenum, and it is not a nitrate factory. but at some point it reduces the nitrate only as fast or a little faster than it creates them.

[Daemonfly]

Interested me as well, but I think he mentioned it was rather new so it didn't seem to be aged well enough yet to get conclusive results.

[Aquayne_wv]

I have a copy of Dr. Jaubert's patent on plenums. It shows water flowing around on both sides.

[wahshk]

It is a plenum.

[rsman]

no its NOT a plenum, READ the descriptions, a plenum uses an open space, where water moves ON ITS OWN and slowly, and the open space is anoxic this is not the same thing, the space under the bed is NOT anoxic, there are a zillion other differences but thats the biggest.

[DLChaney]

yea, the upside down sump was not a plenum, it was basically a sump in which the substrate (crushed coral) was elevated so that water could flow under it and, in consequence would be forced up through the sandbed/substrate, where it would have much more surface area contact, basically, every minute ounce of water would have to filter through the sand bed before it was returned to the tank, with a normal sump, most of the water just passes over the substrate, and not through it

[ddenham]

so if the openspace is not anoxic, due to the flow, where would the anoxic zone be? Also why wouldn't this fill up with detritus and phospahtes like DSBs do?

[rsman]

the way it works is you pump water into that open space, so things in the water column dont get as stuck in the sand bed because water is pushing it up, well in a perfect world that is. the anoxic zone is at the top of the sand bed, within the top 1 or 2"

[sharkdude]

couldn't you periodically backflush to prevent accumulation of detritus?

would the normal sand bed fauna still colonize and consume detritus?

[rsman]

couldn't you periodically backflush to prevent accumulation of detritus?

ok lets try it differently, it is "backflushed" all the time your pumping in clean enough water into the bottom of the unit, reversing the flow would just disrupt the anoxic areas and suck in the detritus this wont catch, the channels are created by bacteria this ALWAYS happens when you have a low flow sand filter.

would the normal sand bed fauna still colonize and consume detritus?

yes but the detritus isnt there well in theory they will extend the amount of time it works, but they will do that for a normal DSB also.

[eddybabyhd]

a