Plumbing a long run under my house?

[jhampton_wsu]

I currently have a 90 gallon in the middle of my house. It is a rambler. Now the sump is in the stand. I want to add a chiller but I would rather have it in the garage. I was thinking of moving the sump to the garage for this. My tank is drilled in the bottom and I currently have the bulk heads hooked up to flex tube with the barbed fittings. The tubing is 3/4" ID for the return and 1 1/4" for the drain line. It would need to be plumbed this back into my wall down under my house with a straight run about 20ft then back up the through the wall and out into my sump. My question is, would all the 90 degree angles on my drain line mess things up? Plus since I would be dropping down under the house and then coming back up about 3 feet I'm worried that my drain water would not flow right...any thoughts?

 

[MC Lighting]

for such a long run you would need to use large piping that will overcome the loss of flow from the angles and distance. The problem is if the sump is not lower than the tank it will not work correctly. In my old place I had my 2 sumps under my tanks on opposite sides of the room interconnected with a 1.5" and 1.25" PCV lines each had several bends. The sumps were the same height and although it worked fine it was a little bit of a scare when a pump was stopped since there was little in the way of gravity to move the water quickly from side of the room to the other. If you could keep your sump say 1-2' below the tank level I think you would be just fine but if it were me I would use 2" pipe. The cheaper and easier thing to do would be to just run a loop that is pumped from the tank out to the chiller and back to the sump this way you can use say 1" pipe and since everything is under preasure no worries about having to go above the sump.

 

[jhampton_wsu]

Thanks MC Lighting. I could have my sump below the level of the tank. My stand now is 32" tall. To use 2" I would need to re-drill (not an option since the tank is set up) I was also thinking the easiest way would be to run a loop but I was kind of using this as an excuse to build a new sump.

 

[trido]

You may lose a little bit of your gravity drain but it will work as long as the sump is still lower than the display tank. I'd use a larger pipe under the house to help reduce pipe friction.
Also, for saftey sake, use PVC pipe instead of poly. Id hate to spring a leak due to a sharp rock or mouse chew under there.

 

[jhampton_wsu]

Would it be bad to start my drain at 1 1/4" and then go up to 2" or would that be pointless. Do you think I could keep my return at 3/4" and just use a large pump?

 

[Myteemouse]

If you have a garage slab in your garage and your house is a rambler!
You should have two or three step out of your house into the garage!
Your floor joists are prolly 8-12" tall and then the bottom plate and the decking so your talking 12-16 inche just in lumber not counting the 2-4 inches of slope on your slab then add the 32" of stand hieght!
Your good but what I would do is run the pipe and drill a hole in the "RIM JOIST" into the garage where your sump is going to be! Put the sump on a 2" piece of foam on the slab and level it up!
You'll have plenty of fall. To keep the flow to the sump But the other guys are right GO bigger on the drain line for cheep insurance!

 

[jhampton_wsu]

My house is the same level as the garage slab, no steps. The bottom plates sit on 2x8 tounge in groove car decking so I'd have to come up through the 3" of wood in the wall between the garage and house and then 90 out into the garage. I don't have much experince with the bulk heads in my tank. I just put in the ones that came with it. Should I just buy new bulk heads and pvc straight to them or should I start with flex and sitch to pvc. Thanks to all for your advice.

 

[MC Lighting]

I don't think the starting with 1.25" is going to be a problem so long as you make it very short and only 1 or 2 ell's... I would think about changing the BH's to threaded one or you could use a PVC threaded union and use a hose nipple on one side with a piece of hose in between the PVC and the hose barb on your BH.

 

[BobinCovington]

I have a sump out in my garage about 20 feet away from my tank. I did use larger diameter drains and it was a little tricky, but it works and having all the waterworks and noise in the garage is really nice.

 

[jhampton_wsu]

BOB, when you say tricky what do you mean? Also how big is your drain?

 

[BobinCovington]

I went with a 2" drain using spa type flexible PVC. I went down through the living room floor, 20 feet run under the floor then up through the floor near the wall and out to the garage sump, which is about a foot below the level of the floor. I replaced an earlier 1.5 drain with the 2 inch and it made a lot of difference. If you go too small diameter, you might get some surging. Also if you go under the house to do PVC, bring a knee pad, a headlamp and maybe a fan for ventilation...trust me

On my second plumbing effort, I also added some valves capped off to allow for flushing out the lines with a hose if needed.

 

[boosted306]

Good luck with the venture and keep us all updated on how you are going it.

 

[Bosco83]

So what kind of return pump will you be using for this? Sounds like an interesting idea. I have a rambler and I think my garage is about a foot below the living room.

 

[jhampton_wsu]

I haven't gotten as far as selecting a pump yet. I'm still conceptualizing the plan. I think i'd have to cut my poly 1.25" drain line and get a barbed coupler to go from poly to pvc then up to 2" pvc into the wall, 90 down through the wall, 90 under the house run 20ft, 90 up and, 90 out into the garage and then 90 down again. 5 90 degree angles. The return from the garage to the display would be similar but I now have 3/4" id poly hose so I'm worried that a coupler from it to pvc may reduce the flow too much. I currently have a mag 12 and it circulates about 750gph. I don't think I need that much turn over though. I currently have 2 tunze nano strams in my tank and I'm thinking about getting a third powerhead soon.

 

[trido]

I have a mag 18 as a return with near 20 feet of 1" spa flex on the return line. Im lucky if I get 1000GPH max at 6' of head pressure along with pipe friction.

Maybe you should swing over the hill to my place before you plumb this in. I can gurantee you will leave with some plumbing ideas. My drains (3) run under the sink. behind the washer, through the exterior wall of the house through the concrete wall and back up hill into the sump. You'd be suprised what gravity and water pressure can do when working together.

 

[jhampton_wsu]

Trido I think I may take you up on the offer. Why don't you like spa-flex? I was thinking about using it to get into my wall then switching to rigid for the rest of the run.

 

[trido]

Trido I think I may take you up on the offer. Why don't you like spa-flex? I was thinking about using it to get into my wall then switching to rigid for the rest of the run.

I do like spa flex. McClendon in Woodinville gives a good discount if you buy the whole roll. Actually, less than anywhere on the web, believe it or not.
When I refered to poly I meant the clear stuff from Lowes or HD. I tend to relate that stuff to the hose barb fittings you were refering to.
Let me know If you want to come by this weekend.

 

[jhampton_wsu]

Trido,
sorry, I think I got your previous posts mixed up with a comment I read on another thread by MC Lighting. What's your schedule like tomorrow afternoon?

Trido I think I may take you up on the offer. Why don't you like spa-flex? I was thinking about using it to get into my wall then switching to rigid for the rest of the run.

 

[trido]

Trido,
What's your schedule like tomorrow afternoon?

Open
Do you still have my # ?

 

[jhampton_wsu]

I think so does it start with 29