Agressive 230

[chevmaro]

I have been reef keeping for some time now and have really enjoyed it but I am now converting my main tank to fish only. AC went out in the house a couple months ago and I cooked my corals while I was on vacation . I will eventually go reef again but for now I want to try something new and keep some of the fish I have always wanted but could never have.

My setup:
230 gallon Tank 6x2x3. 3x175 watt metal halides. 50 gallon refugium, Reef octopus recirc 250 skimmer. 300lbs live rock, 2 inch sand bed. 3500 GPH total flow with about 1500GPH turn over.

My sump is just not big enough, after setting up the tank I really hate it. My refugium is 36x18x18 and there is alot of room under the stand. I have currently just the refugium, no filter socks, no bio balls.

I am going to plumb a tank in next to it so I can run my skimmer in sump style. I have about 30x20 footprint to work with. I am wondering if I should put a wet/dry in?


I just want the best filtration for my tank. I know Skimmer is priority and mine is a little underrated. I am going to buy a bigger skimmer soon. I have to get the sump setup first.

What is best? Wet/Dry only, Refugium Only, Refugium + Wet/Dry?

[leebca]

Even though you've got some experience, I'd recommend reading through this post: Setting Up a FOWLR Aquarium

Regarding sizing a skimmer, you'll find info on that in this post:
What is Water Quality

Also take note in the above post that even though you are setting up for a FOWLR system, you need to still control the balance of Alkalinity, Magnesium, and Calcium.

With enough live rock and a minimal substrate, you'll find most of your biological needs will be met. The addition of a refugium would top it off; as would a bio-ball system. Both together would be an overkill in my opinion -- as far as biological filtration is concerned.

The value of live rock is diminished by using bio-balls and non-in-tank filtration. More on that is found here: What is Live Rock, Anyway? So, if you do go bio-balls, you can cut back on the live rock.

Which is better? Neither. Depends on what you're targeting. If you do want any non-mobile invertebrates in the tank at all, skip the bio-balls and increase the live rock surface area. If you don't want them, go bio-balls.