Sump/ overflow questions

ac2020x, could you let me know what overflow and pump you finally decided to buy? my tank is a 60g and i have a 15g spare tank which i want to use for a sump sometime down the road...could you also let me know what website you have refered to read about sump and overflow installation?

also, do you or anyone know if it is safe to leave sump and overflow for as long as a month just incase of a long vacation?
 
Ummm.. no, you need someone to watch your tank if your gone on a 30day vacation, but the most they will have to do is top off the evaporated water with freshwater and feed lightly every few days while your away. If you don't top off your sump will go dry eventually, exposing your pumps and heater, in turn probably causing a house fire.

AC2020x - Overflow is MAX drain. Think of the overflow box as the drain in your kitchen sink and the faucet as your return pump. If you have high pressure you can put more water in your sink than your drain can handle, but if you don't turn the faucet on all the way the water just keeps draining slowly. You don't have to max out the overflow box rating, actually, you want to avoid doing that because things like algae will eventually grow in there as well and slow down the rate a little over time. 700GPH is the max I would push through a 800GPH overflow box.
 
Ok, sounds good and makes sense- Mr. Cicilid- I think i'm planning on going with teh CPR Bak-Pak CS100 as my overflow it seems definitely like a good overflow and theres also a youtube video of it. - it's a 800GPH overflow
http://cgi.ebay.com/CPR-CS100DX-Ove...0?hash=item5ad0b36eb8&_trksid=p3286.m20.l1116

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zVGwdRVHU4

As my return pump I plan on using the sen 900 with a 900 GPH return rate- It seems good as well-
http://kensfish.com/senwaterpumps.html

In all it may be relatively expensive but should definitely get the job done well I think- thats my current plan at least- However this is the first time I've ever done this so in no way am I an expert but it seems like it should work well.
 
I would plan on buying a second one of those return pumps shortly after setup as a backup. Cheap pump. It will work, but will probably break around the year mark, maybe sooner, so good idea to have an extra on hand. Or go with a quality pump like I mentioned and just have an extra impeller on hand to replace if it ever breaks. Cheap pumps are also known to leak big amounts of electricity into the water.

I just got an email from MarineDepot, Mag7 pumps are on sale for $79.99 and 9.5's are $99.99 and a good pump for your needs as well, and much more reliable than the one you posted.
 
Sounds too good to be true, I would buy the New Mag7 over the used 9.5. Plus yout not really looking to max out your sump/overflow setup, the water will be cleaner if you put a smaller pump on the return. The overflow/return is really meant for cleaning and shouldn't be thought of as flow for the tank, that is a tiny side effect of the return.
 
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