Making the jump to sump

[owen386]

Hey all,

I purchased a 20 gal long tank to make a sump out of have a few question.
I'm a little nervous about electricity and water so I don't want to risk any kind of flood, so my question to y'all is what fail safe methods do you all use to prevent from flooding. For overflow I built my self a PVC overflow pipe, water will be pumped back up via submersed hopefully mag 9.5 pump. The sump plans were to have the first section where the water dumps in and then the refugium then the area for the return pump I'm a little confused on where I should put my skimmer. Thanks all for the help.

-Owen

 

[Zissou]

This is my setup. The return is in the middle, so you can control the flow into the refugium and take some pressure off the pump as well. Oh, and I didn't draw it in, but it should be assumed that the down arrow is where the water from your display is coming from. The overflow line will empty into the skimmer chamber:

You want to drill a hole just under the water line of your return. So when the power goes out and the return starts a back siphon, air will hit this hole (I actually recommend making two holes) and break it. This will prevent your sump from being flooded during a power outage.

Also, you want to make sure you have enough room in your sump to handle the extra water from your display. The water will drain from the display til it can no longer flow over the overflow weir, which may be a few gallons, depending on how big your tank is.

In the event of a power outage this is what will happen:

The display will start to lose water.
The sump will start to gain water.
Air will hit the siphon break, and the return line will quit siphoning. This is usually a cool sucking sound.
The water will continue to drain in the display tank til it can no longer go over the overflow.

Once the power comes back on, the reverse will happen.

Every once in awhile, you'll be shutting off your return pump for maintenance purposes. This is good to do the first few times you run your sump, to make sure it doesn't flood. Once the display has drained as far as it can, and it STOPS, any extra space left over in the sump can be filled with more water to give you more volume. Then when you turn everything back on and everything reaches its equilibrium (display full, sump down to its running level), the water in your *return* chamber will be at a certain level. Mark this with a marker or tape on the sump, this is the MAX your sump can hold, and you'll be basing your top offs and salinity on this line.

 

[coolhandgoose]

That's a great post, sump building 101.

 

[owen386]

This is freaking awesome thanks so much! Did not even think of having the return in the middle and then The refugium being fed by the pump. need to take some flow off my pump as I'm sure my overflow isn't going to be able to handle 900gph - 1foot overhead. great idea! I still have one question and it might have been answered and I'm just confused so I apologize if that's the case. I feel pretty comfortable in not flooding the sump in a event of a power outage my concern is if the overflow as it is a PVC relying on syphon if that syphon breaks and the sump just pumps out into the display until running dry which would the burn my pump. And cause flood of the display. Again thanks so much can't wait to build this thing!

-Owen

 

[owen386]

So don't loose syphon on my over flow?

-Owen

 

[Zissou]

Hmm, might want to invest in a decent HOB if you're concerned about losing siphon on the overflow. I know HOB's can still clog or lose siphon, but I don't know if I'd want to rely on a DIY pvc one either.

 

[owen386]

Not worried about losing syphon on the PVC overflow any more than a HOB overflow ran hours of test with it in the bathroom simulating power outage and so fourth and faired up fine. Just do not want a flood lol.... So trying to think of every scenario I can for flooding of a sump and this one even with all My reading really has not showed up so was just wondering if there's some fail safe I can put in place.

-Owen

 

[owen386]

Alright so I propped the return pump up so that it sits pretty high in the return section of the sump figured if the overflow stops working I'm gonna flood my display tank and then burn out the pump anyways from running dry so I figured I would just make it so it won't flood my display will have to top off everyday for now but whatever better than a flooded house! I decided I'm just gonna go ahead and buy a new tank reef ready one to put my mind at ease don't like the whole over flow possibly losing syphon. Don't know when this will happen though....

-Owen