Redoing sump need help.

[Bosco83]

So I picked up a used 30 gallon glass tank and made a sump out of it using this design. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxnugJGiT3o I didn't have my skimmer yet and when I got one I guess the skimmer section was too deep as my skimmers outlet is only a couple of inches off the bottom and Mark said it shouldn't be under water. So I cut the baffle for the bubble trap down to about 5" instead of my original 10". When I did that the outlet was half way under water and it also made everything really loud. The water flowing over the first baffle instead of sheeting down the side like it did before rushed over the top and with the skimmer outlet above water both made if very loud. I was just putting up with this until the other day the first 14" baffle from the drain side just broke the silicone and leaned over. So now I had to drain it pull the center support out from my stand a take the sump back out to redo it lol. So how tall should I make my baffles? So they are effective but not so loud?

One other issue I noticed while I had everything apart is that the two part epoxy that I used on my return pump that I dropped and broke wasn't hard anymore. I can scrape it up a bit with my fingernail do you guys think this could leach any bad chemicals into my tank?

Sorry for the long post.

Thanks,
Brian

 

[gotasplinter]

This is a good old link, but it helped me out post your pics on there when your done http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10264&highlight=phosban+reactor

and this one http://www.melevsreef.com/what_sump.html

 

[Bosco83]

Should I put the skimmer in the same section as the drain into the sump?

 

[mfinn]

Should I put the skimmer in the same section as the drain into the sump?

That's where I have mine.

 

[Myteemouse]

Thats where mine is going too.

 

[Bosco83]

Gotasplinter thanks for the link and thanks to everyone else for their input. I made my new sump following this design the second picture down. http://www.melevsreef.com/acrylics/sumps/glass/index.html Instead of using a short baffle and egg crate I just used a taller piece I already had cut and drilled a bunch of holes in it 7 inches up so the water should hopefully stay close to that level. I am feeling a lot better about this design and now I will have a refugium where as before I was just putting the skimmer in the middle section.

Thanks,
Brian

 

[kgross]

I'm a little late, but you can always raise your skimmer up on a platform to make it operate better as well.

Kim

 

[Bosco83]

Ok so I put the sump back in but the last baffle between the return pump and the fuge that I drilled the holes in doesn't let enough water flow through for the return pump. Should I just cut it so it's a shorter just to keep the sand out and then use an egg crate divider to keep the chaeto out? Or should I just drill more and a little larger holes?

Thanks,
Brian

 

[kgross]

The simplest would be to drill more larger holes. It will work fine and be a lot of less work than cutting it down and replacing with eggcrate.

Kim

 

[Bosco83]

Thanks for the quick reply Kim! That's what I was hoping to do I'll give it a try. It's not going to be fun to drill holes now that the baffle is in that is some pretty strong stuff.