DIY Refugium Advice

[fish addict]

I recently turned an old acrylic 5g into a refugium for my 20g FOWLR. I didn't want to try to drill the tank and don't trust water pumps to prevent overflows.

I have the tanks level at the surface and am simply running water to and from the refugium with 2 hoses acting as reverse syphons. It isn't the prettiest setup, but it seem sto be functioning pretty well so far.

Does anyone have any opinions/advice about this type of water transport setup? Am I asking to come home to a flood one day?

[reefrash]

How about a pic? Drilling acrylic is not that hard, sometimes it's harder to find the proper bulkhead ;) .

[fish addict]

I now realize that I am going to have to drill it in order to make it work properly. I think that it will be easy enough to drill, but I'm still unsure of how to make a bulkhead for it. Could I not just drill a hole to fit a 1/2" tube return and then seal the tube with silicone?

[reefrash]

Silicone will not adhere to acrylic so eventually it will leak. I didn't mean to imply that bulkheads are impossible to find, just that acrylic is easy to drill. Check your LFS for bulkheads, if they don't have them they should be able to point you in the right direction.

[scotsgringo]

Get The Bulk Head First Then You Will Know What Size To Drill The Hole

[Germanman]

i have a 10 gallon fuge that was a via aqua tank i just have two alternating viaaqua pumps connected with fittings and flow controls and it does fine i put the pumps up high enugh and the water level low enugh in th fuge to prevent a flood. but it has always been pretty stable.