10g tank/wet/dry filter spray bar

I

imafloormatt

AC Members
Jan 4, 2010
70
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Washington
So I have been working on setting up a 10g tank for a planted aquarium that has a built in wet/dry filter in it. I go the idea from here ( http://www.danoreef.com/DIY_5.5.htm ) but I changed the idea a bit to work as a wet dry filter ( http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=219197 ) . My problem is I have been having trouble thinking of a way to get the water to tickle over the bio-balls. I would make a drip tray out of acrylic but I don't have the equipment to cut the acrylic accurately enough to make it fit perfectly in the bio section of the filter. Then I bought a bulk head thinking I could fit my spare spray bar to it and use that as a way to distribute the water but I could not find a fitting that would connect the bulkhead with the spray bar. So then I though of this:

overflowidea-1.jpg


Sense aquarium hosing is a little more lenient about what exact size piping it will fit over, I though this would be a little easier. I thought that when the water level in the tank area reached as high as the spray bar in the filter section, it would fill the hose connected to the spray bar enough to start dripping water over the bio-balls. Will this work? My only worry is if my maxi-jet pumps water faster than the spray bar can drip water out but I though I could just drill more holes into the spray bar if that happened. I will also drill some holes in the top of the piece of acrylic that divides the filter area and the tank area just in case the the spray bar gets clogged or if the pump ends up pumping too fast. Then rather than overflowing onto my carpet, it overflows back into the filter section (this will also keep the maxi-jet from running dry if that ever happens.

Will that idea even work or will it just dump water into my floor? I would love some help with this as soon as possible, I have the tank painted and want to start putting everything together as soon as I can.
 
I dont see why it shouldnt work, of course test it outside first to work out any kinks, i dont think the tank will ever overflow b/c there is no extra water, your actually losing capacity, if the pump ever failed the water would just even itself out between the two chambers, make sense?
One question though how is the water getting back into the tank? I see the pump but no hose, just a thought, goodluck though!!
 
Not sure if you can see it but I used an upside down butter dish cover. If you look close you can see the distortion from the design in the clear plastic. The pump sits in one end.

How it works is the water fills the whole bottom of the container but the pump can only access what is able to run over the top and into the butter tray cover.

I set the water level in the W/D area by shutting the overflow off and adding water till the W/D was full to top of butter tray cover but not flowing into it keeping the pump unable to pump any more water to the tank and the tank was just about to overflow then I turned off the pump and opened the overflow allowing the water to equalize between the tank and the W/D. After the water stabilized with no flow either way I marked the W/D area with a full mark. Adding water to this point with pump running or not will make sure if the overflow stops while pump is running the pump will run out of water before the tank overflows. This will also make it safe till you get the overflow water dispersion adjusted to your pump flow. Whenever the overflow gets behind the pump would run out of water before the tank overfilled and the overflow caught up.

All in all it looks like it should work. Good luck with how ever you decide to do it.


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I think it would be easier to have an overflow into a drip tray like in the second link you posted.
If you put a little lip on the tray it wouldn't have to fit perfectly.
I can see the spray-bar getting blocked without a pre-filter.
Also I thought that wet/dries weren't good in planted tanks because they gas off co2? I could be wrong, I'm just wondering..
 
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