Leaking sump???

M

matt19849

Reefing newb
Hi Everyone,

I'm not sure what's going on with my tank at the moment so hoping someone can shed some light on things, I have a sump in the cupboard under my main tank but there seems to be water under and around the tank. The inside walls of the cupboard are covered in salt and the bottom of the cupboard is wet. I can't see any obvious leaks or anything - would this be a leak somewhere or is there just a lot of condensation?
If its condensation how can stop it from happening as much?

Cheers, Matt
 
it could be condensation, or could it be splashing? i had to battle a splashing issue with my sump when i first built it, all the air that was trapped in the water comming down from the overflow was causing the sump to be a rolling boil... so, i re-arranged some of my plumbing, to let the trapped air out, and it solved my problem...

whats your tank temp and whats the room temp? also, if the salt is on the walls of the cabinet, then its not condensation, cause when the water evaps from the sump, it leaves the salt in the sump, so all you would have is clean water to condense, salt dosent evap....

i think its a splash issue, but its just a guess.....
 
we had that issue with our sump and #1 and i shortened the pad at the top of the sump and didnt have the water in the stand or a wet floor anymore sometimes the way the sumps are built it flows off the pad and down the back side of the sump and its a pain to find out what it is but thats what happened to us
 
That makes a lot of sense didn't think about splashing, the tank temp is between 25-27 and the room temp keeps varying with the cold nights can be anywhere between 15-20ish
I might see if i can get a kind of lid for the sump see if that will stop the splashing or is that not a good idea?

ltljokersbetterhalf - what pad did you shorten at the top of the sump?
 
at the top of my sump there is the top level that runs over the bio balls back down into the sump it has a filter pad there and that did have a lid on it but i removed it and shortened that filter pad
 
arrrr I don't have that, my sump goes from an overflow in the main tank down to the fisr part of the sump which is a big filter bag then into the compartment with the skimmer then into one with seaweed then back into the tank - not sure if thats how it should be or not?
 
check all the seams of the tank and sump just to be shure it is not leaking from a seam i have a open sump and nothing gets wet also have two fans the blow on the water and my stand is dry their is no moisture under my stand at all.
 
I dont like the idea of a lid on the sump, just cause it will limit gas exchange... but what you could do, is take a length of black cloth, and stretch it across the top of the sump for a few hours, and see how wet and or salty it gets, that will tell you something....
 
Does your sump have plastic edging around the bottom and top? Look along those edges for areas of salt build up. If you see a chunk of salt on the outside of the tank, that's an indication of where a leak is.

Splashing could also be the culprit. Having any of your tank stand's wood be wet is bad. It will compromise the integrity of the stand, and the last thing you want is a broken stand.
 
I'll try and find a black cloth from somewhere to give that a go, if it its splashing and the cloth gets soaked could I put a lid on the sump but drill a few holes in it? It will help with the splashing and still let air etc to it?
 
I've unplugged everything and taken it out as much as possible without emptying the sump completely and couldn't see any chunks of salt along the black edging on the bottom of the sump.
A rotting stand isn't the way I'm wanting to go lol
 
yea, see if the salt on the walls of the stand is higher than the rim of the sump then its almost gotta be splash.... you could cover the sump with cloth, that would allow for air exchange, but would catch the splash, and you could wash it, or whatever when it gets stiff with salt...
 
I've just been looking around the stand etc and there's damp on the walls behind the tank but not on the back of the cupboard so I'm assuming I have a bit of condensation and splashing inside the tank which is going to be fun, just a thought about covering the sump up and allowing for air exchange, how would the main tank get air exchange if it had a lid on it constantly?

Both my sump and main tank are lidless so my guess is splashing from the sump and condensation from the main tank - any ideas :D
 
I've turned down the return pump to the lowest setting so it should slow everything down a bit, the pipe which leads to the sump from the tank is above a bag filter, i've pushed the pipe further down into the bag to try and stop splashing from that hopefully it will help
 
i still think you should stretch a black cloth across the top of the sump to gather some proof... a towl, the leg of a dark pair of pants, something... just to get proof of concept at this point... it dosent even have to cover the entire sump if thats not convienient...
 
i've put something over the top now so i'll have a look in an hour or so and see what its like, gotta try dry the walls behind everything now though lol
 
It def looks like splashing, I put a black cloth over it and there were dotted splash marks over it, if i shine a light on the sump well enough I can see what looks like little bubbles that pop and make a splash - like when you pore a glass of coke or something you get the jumping bubbles its like that :(
 

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