I need some serious sump tank help

[silentskream]

It's not saltwater, but i figured you guys would have more experience with sump tanks than the freshwater ppl do,and i haven't gotten a lot of answers from them and this is happening right now so its kinda urgent.

we just got a new tank with a sump.. there's a hose that sucks the water from the display and it sprays out overtop of the filter media in the sump and works by syphoning.
the water then is pumped via large powerhead back up to the display tank.
I have lots of questions:

this sump has no baffles, do i have to put some in?

do i have to match the speed of the syphon hose to the speed of the powerhead?

does the syphon stop if the water in the sump covers the spinning spray bar?

how do i do a water change without breaking the syphon?

what happens when my power goes out?

please help thank you.:help2:


oh, if you need pictures of the stuff i have, there are some at the bottom of this page: http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=118109&page=5

[ooja3k]

what kind of siphon is there... like is it a built-in overflow in your main tank?? or is it an HOB overflow?? or is it just a piece of PVC that hangs over the back of the tank and is just barely in the water and siphons it in... it matters which scenario you have...

also.. as for baffles in your sump.. you need some, but the design really depends on what you want to do with it... a small refuiguim within the sump?/ protein skimmer... is this for a saltwater tank??? how big is it? how big is the sump?? is it a wet/dry??


some pictures would really help clarify some of these issues... do you have any pics of your siphon setup/your sump???

[silentskream]

yeah they're in the link but i'll post them over again here.

the syphon is just the pvc kind that hangs over the back and is just barely in the water.

this is for a 250 gallon freshwater tank, so i dont need a refugium or skimmer, just need to circulate the water over the media and get it back into the display.

the sump looks like my 39 gallon tank, so that's my best guess. it just has a powerhead in it returning the water.

i dont know if it's considered a wet/dry, but i'll post all the pictures i have here... these are all before we put water in it.. but i'll try to get one with water in it.

[silentskream]

ok here is what i got with water in it.. sorry they're not that great, but you can't actually tank the sump out from under the display tank.. it does'nt fit through the holes.

[Reefscape]

this sump has no baffles, do i have to put some in?

do i have to match the speed of the syphon hose to the speed of the powerhead?

does the syphon stop if the water in the sump covers the spinning spray bar?

how do i do a water change without breaking the syphon?

what happens when my power goes out?

please help thank you.:help2:

The thing i can see that would cause you o install baffles is if you are having big problems with bubbles going back to the main tank. If your not, i dont see any reason to install any as you dont need to section any area of the sump off, its low flow anyway by the size of the return powerhead and thickness of pipe.

Yes, there does need to be a balance between overflow and return. The retun is usually just slightly less that the overflow.

The syphon wont stop if the water covers the spray bar.

Unfortunatly, when you do a water change the syphon is going to break. People either keep a small bored aitline tubepushing up into the overflow pipe, or use the venturi from a pwerhead to re-create the syphon..

When the power goes on, the water will flow from the display tank down into the sump tank untill the syphon gets broken. Thus, we need to ensure that enough room is kept in the sump to encompass this ammount of water..This means not having the sump tank running all the way to full through normal running. When running a sump tank, this does need to be checked and ensure that the system does work correctly. Power off the system, let it drain and see how the system handles it..If too much water is going back tot he sump, then simply raise the overflow in the display tank so less water is flowing back in times of power failure.

Its trial and error getting it setup right..

Niko

[silentskream]

thank you SO MUCH for that information.

we've gotten it so that the sump level increases by about 1 inch overnight. (so the return is slightly less than the overflow.)

i would like a way to increase the flow through the sump.. how can i do that? i would need to buy a pump right? is there a pump that goes 2500gph?

[Reefscape]

the only way to increase flow through the sump is to increase both overflow and return. The idea behind a sump is to have slow flow though. This is to allow long contact time between water and filter media..

There are many pumps that will pump over that ammount...

Niko

[silentskream]

do you think what i have is sufficient? how will i be able to tell if it's not enough?

[silentskream]

is it just a matter of preference?

[Reefscape]

a lot is down to preference..what is the make and model of the powerhead you have already?

[1Fish2Fish3Fish]

Wow if your power went out that'd be hell cleaning up 250 gallons...nice writing on the sump though, Shane Loves someone!

[Reefscape]

why would he be cleaning up 250 gallons? it will only drain to the bottom of the over flow

[dorkfish]

wow... that is a seriously getto sump... love the UGF plate dividers... lol... but let me get this straight... all you have for an overflow is a siphon going from the tank to the sump? A little to getto; that set up is bound to fail... there is no way you can match the siphon rate to the pump's flow rate... and even if you can, it is still a serious risk to your home... the siphon can get clogged, power source might change slightly for whatever reason and reduce slow rate slightly... it's just WAY too easy for something to fail there, you need to get a proper overflow.

[silentskream]

shane loves tracy 8) that's me!!

but yeah, we invited a saltwater friend over to come help figure it out, and he said basically he had no idea how to keep it from failing.

so, long story short.. we're going to run it for the next day, and then we're going to get a canister filter.
*sigh* like we hadn't spent enough money already.

its a freshwater tank, so i dont need a refugium or anything fancy.. so i'm thinking about getting a filstar xp4. i have an xp3 on my 90gal and i've been pretty happy with it.