The
refugium box
|
The refugium box is made
out of a salvaged Bio-Logic trickle filter box. Acrylic hooks were cemented
on with Weldon, so that the box can be hung over the edge of the reef tank.
The box has two chambers due to the original
design of the filter. The water is pumped to the left chamber through a
pipe that is clipped to the top of the dividing wall. The water flows to
the bottom of the left chamber, and up the floor of the right chamber.
The right chamber will hold some live sand. A short length of PVC pipe
is inserted through the opening of the right chamber's floor to keep sand
from falling through the bottom. PVC pipe pedestals were used under the
box to minimize the amount of weight hanging from the tank wall. |
The
overflow
|
The overflow was made by
cutting a notch on the upper edge of the box, facing the reef tank. A rectangular
piece of acrylic was bent using a butane torch, and the U-shaped channel
was cemented to the box to direct the water overflowing through the notch
into the tank. The hooks were placed much too high, so I used some
plastic tubing in them to act as cushions between the hooks and the tank's
edge. |
Side
view from the top
|
The pump that feeds the
refugium is a MicroJet that is in the reef tank itself. The hose that leads
from the pump to the refugium box is clipped to the top of the refugium's
dividing wall, to prevent any mishaps. The dividing wall also has a hole
in it to prevent the left chamber from overflowing in case the pipe that
leads to the sand chamber gets blocked. The water from the left chamber
thus has two outlets to the right chamber. |
Drip
guide
|
To channel all drips directly
into the tank, a lip was glued to the spout. Without the lip, water tends
to splash as it falls into the tank, and sometimes drops will travel along
the bottom of the spout to reach the edge of the tank. The lip is a strip
of acrylic that was attached to the spout using cyanoacrylate gel. |
Tee
connector to propagation tray
|
A barbed Tee connector was
added to the refugium's inlet hose, and part of the water was redirected
to a propagation tray that sits beside the tank.
The propagation tray will act as secondary refugium as well as hold coral
cuttings. |
Live
sand added
|
Live sand was added to the
right hand chamber. In this case, the sand is about 2 inches deep, as compared
to less than an inch in most of the main tank's bottom. |
