[Coolibabes]

Hi there everyone

I have recently purchased a 10ft X 1.5ft X 2.5ft tank and I was toying with the idea of dividing the tank with a piece of glass/acrylic with holes(water to pass through) in it and have a reef setup on the one side and have fish only (fish not suited for a reef) on the other eg large angelfish.

The partition would prevent the non compatible reef fish from entering the reef section and yet I would be able to run the same (reef) filtration. This way there would be no need to setup a seperate fish only tank. Have the best of both worlds on one tank.

Any thoughts?

[mtfabel]

I beleive that this is feasible. But you would need a very good filtration system due to the fact that your fish only tank will be producing much more waste if you intend on keeping large Angelfish. Another thing, does this system have drains and returns on both sides of the divider. I dont know how well the water would pass thru a divider even with holes in it. The key part of that sentence is I dont know. Im sure some others will chime in but IMO you should give it a go.

[Lazy Iguana]

Sounds like a plan! You would save a decent amount of money on lights too, depending on how large or small your reef section is. No need for MH lighting over the fish only part!

You could rig a few power heads up to the divider. This will help flow. Like four power heads, two pushing water in each direction (reef to fish and fish to reef). Putting the overflow on one side and the return pump on the other side will also help flow. You could also leave some space in the tank to allow water to flow over the divider - probably a wise thing to do to prevent a flood should something clog up one too many holes in the divider. I would also leave space around the divider so I could keep it clean (so no holed get clogged).

I would also get a pretty large sump for the system.

Sounds like a cool plan though! The tank is certainly long enough for this. Do not forget to take a lot of photos of the setup.

[Coolibabes]

Thanks for the feedback guys....Much appreciated.

The weir (overflowbox)is situated in the middle of the tank with two outlets. I was thinking of directing one outlet to a sump and the other to a refugium and the returns would be on either side of the tank. Is there a benefit to have the refugium return flow into the reef section or FO section?

The divider would have biggish holes(not sure how big though) in them to prevent clogging as much as possible and the divider would be below the water level(as suggested by Lazy Iguana) and wioould not hinder the function of the weir.

I was thinking of dividing the tank say 3ft reef and 7ft FO. I would prefer having the FO tank much bigger to cater for the large angels, not to mention saving heaps of money on lighting(as mentioned by Lazy Iguana).

Any more suggestions/ideas?

[NATIVEVAMAN]

It took me a minute to get my mind around a tank that size,280 gallons.Now I am having a problem with one overflow for a tank that size.I would add a second overflow and just devide the tank in two without the holes in the devider.Fish only tanks generally have different parameters,flow requirements and lighting needs.