my first sump design

[StraightZALE]

hey people,so i just made my first sump design and i plan on starting the build tomorow after i get off work. please let me know if you see any problems or have any ideas that will make it better. thanks in advance. superdupersump.jpg picture by collectinmyloot1 - Photobucket

 

[StraightZALE]

i forgot to put it in the picture but that tank is 18" tall in case you were wondering

 

[riemannp]

Be sure to factor in warping before you begin; perhaps that is already done, but it's hard to tell from your photo. For example, I can assure you your design will gradually bow outward at the top center of the longer of the side panels. This can be mitigated by a clamp .. I know this becuase I have learned from my design (build about 15 years ago) which has failed .. but then repaired back to shape ... twice over it's life. What thickness of acrylic are you using? How will you assure quality fused panels to each other?

 

[StraightZALE]

its on old acrylic fish tank that i bought

 

[seattlereef]

For your intake into your skimmer area make sure you leave enough room to remove the collector for cleaning. Also if your considering a filter sock make sure you can position it so that the skimmer pump won't get clogged with the sock. Finally it looks like you have your baffels going all the way to the top of the tank. I would be carefull of this for when you turn off the pumps for maintance that you don't overflow because a given area is getting more water either from the return pump and back siphon or from the drain getting cleared, I would recomend leaving some space between the top of the baffel and top of the tank so that it can equalize w/o overflowing a given chamber.

 

[trido]

What kind of skimmer are you using? IME most skimmers are designed to work best in 8-10 inches of water. Is there a reason you want yours to sit in 13? YOu can always raise it up a few inches on a platform if your committed to making that section as deep as your planning.

 

[StraightZALE]

good idea seattlereef, i will definitly shorten the baffles. trido im using a eshopps 2-200 and in the design the skimmer sits on a stand. i was planning on starting the stand at 5 inchs and adjusting if i need to.

 

[jrgilles]

Yea, make sure there is enough room to get your skimmer in and out of there incase you need to remove it for some reason, and make sure you can get the collection cup off.

Maybe someone can back this up, but I think having the carbon in like that where the full flow of your sump/return pump is going over it doesn't work too well. Usually carbon or phosban want longer exposure, slower flow. May think about picking up a little media reactor and running the carbon in that, and that will give you some extra space to work with in the sump. I don't think the carbon will be able to do its job effectively in that setup. But, maybe a pro will also chime in on this.

 

[seattlereef]

Nom Nom.

 

[1guydude]

Wat are you using to seal it? I use E6000 when bonding aclyric to glass and weld-on for acrylic on acrylic!

Also if you needed to you could add a valve to the drain....so when u shut off the pump, u can shut the valve too. This will not flood ur sump and than flood ur floor! Just my thoughts... thats wat i did with my 75gal penninsula tank!

 

[Peppie]

You need to figure out how much water will drain back into your sump when the power goes out. If you do not leave enough room in your return pump chamber for the backwash from your tank, you WILL have water on your floor.
I would also add a brace to the top of your sump 1/2 way of the longest chamber ( fuge ). Or does the tank you are using have a eurobrace?

 

[T1tan360]

i would do it this way. the way you had it before was okay but you didnt need the baffles in the front after you skimmer. and you need that last baffle in your return chamber where your pump is to force the bubbles to the top of that chamber. if you left that alon you will have a waterfall effect going into your return pump chamber causing a poop ton of micro bubbles.

also you wont have to build that high of a platform for your skimmer this way and still have the 12" depth for your refugium.

the water will fill the whole tank and not just the return pump section. i have the same setup as the above drawn and my sump is 48"x24"x24" if you are worried about back flow they sell he no metal check valves Flexible PVC Pipe & PVC Pipe/Furniture Fittings. i have used these for about 2 years now with zero issues.

 

[seattlereef]

I would keep in mind if you put in a check valve that you should periodically make sure that its clear otherwise it will get stuck open from debry. Regardless of the return line you still need to account for water in the drain draining off when the power is off.

 

[T1tan360]

That's why there are clear ones.

 

[1guydude]

well..... i put reg. check valves on my systems .... is that okay?

 

[jrgilles]

Could be clogging issues. I'm a bit nervous with check valves, as they seem to eventually break, but seems others have good luck with them. Hopefully you put a number of unions in your plumbing so you can remove sections to fix/unclog if problems arrise

 

[1guydude]

so if my returns arent pumping water out, i can guess its that huh... my unions are farther up the return so id prob have to cut it out!

 

[jrgilles]

hah, yea. Should work for awhile. If you ever have to cut it out, you can always just put it in with some more unions. I made my pluming like a 3D puzzle where I can break it into many parts, figuring I don't really know what I'm doing, so I better make it moddable. lol

 

[T1tan360]

They make the union check valves for easy removal. I honestly never cleaned mine the have been running strong for 2 years and when I just transferred my tank to a larger one this weekend I looked at them to see if they need cleaning and they were good.

If you have the regular check valves depending on the type of metal they use it will eventually fail

 

[JMacIII]

Andrew,
Like was previously said, make sure you can take the skimmer in and out (I couldn't initially on my sump so I had to cut it down). And it is much less stressful if you leave enough room for the back flow of water in a power outage, then you know it will not over flow.

I also have a couple different kinds of Weld-On if you need to borrow some for the baffles.