OP
OP
Mr_Stian
Active Member
So this weekend has been very busy. Both with working on the aquarium but also with the family and friends. But there has been made alot of progress on the aquarium. The main thing this weekend has been to get the sump to function a bit better. So i am going to try to explain the issues that i have had. See below the magnificent paint diagrams that i have made! 
So this is the design i had from the start (a bit simplified). Where i have 3 overflows where one goes to the skimmer, nr 2 is to control the height in the overflow box and the last is an emergency overflow. It runs into sump nr 1 which is situated higher than sump nr 2 connected with a 40mm pipe. The problems i have had is that the flow from the DT is higher than what can flow through the lover pipe connecting the two sumps when there is both air and water flowing. This causes the level in sump nr 1 to rise to a point where it stops sucking in air. Once this happens the flow through the pipe increases alot and the level in sump nr 1 goes down again. And this situation is a never ending story. I installed a ball valve on this lover pipe to see if I could stop the level going up and down and adjusting it so that there is just a little water going through the upper pipe connecting the two. This kinda works, but it also causes the level in sump nr 2 to rise very high when i have a stop in the return pump.
So something had to be done. Since I now have learnt (the hard way!) that a pipe flows alot higher when there is no air present inside the pipe, i wanted to lower sump nr 1 and connect the two with a single pipe that is submerged in both the sumps. And also increase the diameter to 50mm to have even higher capacity. Easier said than done. This is an idea I have had for some time now, but since it involves alot of work I have dreaded this. But this weekend i started. I drained the two sumps (a total of 350 litres of water that needed to be stored) and removed all of the LR that i hade into one of the containers with the water. All storage containers for the water had heat and circulation. I removed all of the equipment getting ready for the job in hand. I had to glue shut the two 40mm holes from the original design and drill two new holes for the 50mm pipe. Since i could not remove the two sumps due to another tank that was in the way I had to drill the two holes with the sumps still under the stand. This worked out very fine, but it was a pain to do. Very limted space and working both the drill and applying the water to cool everything was difficult and painfull.
Anyway, the operation was a big success. After drilling i lowered sump nr 1 and aligned the two new 50mm holes and installed the pipe. being very carefull that both holes was perfectly alligned in all directions. All of the bulkheads where glued using silicone as added protection. I did not want to drain everything one more time to fix a leak! The result is shown in another excellent paint diagram!
As you can see the two sumps are now level and this works perfectly. Almost better than I could have hoped for. The water level in the return chamber stays level and now I have plenty of room for all the water if the return fails. Earlier i had maybe 5mm of clearance when it stopped, but now i have maybe 20cm! Some other benefits that i got that i did not think of is that i have alot better access to the skimmer and since i removed some baffles from both sumps i now have room for a frag rack in sump nr 1. I am going to move all of my LR from sump nr 1 to nr 2 to make better access for this!. So i am very happy with the result.
This post is getting quite long now, but since I am wrinting about the sump here is a diagram of the entire system! With all the tanks (Yet another excellente paint diagram!). The skimmer is a Deltec SC 2060 and the return pump is a Jebao DC15000. In the water change tank i will have a manifold with 4 outlets to different reaktors. A separate post about this will follow.
As you can see I have another sump system that feeds and returns into sump nr 2. This is to the water change tank and the refugium. This is an entire own system. I use a Jebao DC6000 pump to feed this system and it is then gravity feed back into sump nr 2 just as a regular DT/Sump system. As you can see i have two return lines going. One too the water change tank and one to the refugium. During normal operation only the line going to the water change tank is used. The line going to the refugium is used when i am changing the water. This is so that i always has flow in the refugium when changing water. I am using naturall seawater that is stored outside in a 1000L IBC tank. The water change tank has a drain connected to my house drain. So a 160L water change takes me about 5 minutes, not including the time it takes to heat the water.
I hope this has been a post that has not been to dry to read. If you have any questions regarding my setup please ask!
So this is the design i had from the start (a bit simplified). Where i have 3 overflows where one goes to the skimmer, nr 2 is to control the height in the overflow box and the last is an emergency overflow. It runs into sump nr 1 which is situated higher than sump nr 2 connected with a 40mm pipe. The problems i have had is that the flow from the DT is higher than what can flow through the lover pipe connecting the two sumps when there is both air and water flowing. This causes the level in sump nr 1 to rise to a point where it stops sucking in air. Once this happens the flow through the pipe increases alot and the level in sump nr 1 goes down again. And this situation is a never ending story. I installed a ball valve on this lover pipe to see if I could stop the level going up and down and adjusting it so that there is just a little water going through the upper pipe connecting the two. This kinda works, but it also causes the level in sump nr 2 to rise very high when i have a stop in the return pump.
So something had to be done. Since I now have learnt (the hard way!) that a pipe flows alot higher when there is no air present inside the pipe, i wanted to lower sump nr 1 and connect the two with a single pipe that is submerged in both the sumps. And also increase the diameter to 50mm to have even higher capacity. Easier said than done. This is an idea I have had for some time now, but since it involves alot of work I have dreaded this. But this weekend i started. I drained the two sumps (a total of 350 litres of water that needed to be stored) and removed all of the LR that i hade into one of the containers with the water. All storage containers for the water had heat and circulation. I removed all of the equipment getting ready for the job in hand. I had to glue shut the two 40mm holes from the original design and drill two new holes for the 50mm pipe. Since i could not remove the two sumps due to another tank that was in the way I had to drill the two holes with the sumps still under the stand. This worked out very fine, but it was a pain to do. Very limted space and working both the drill and applying the water to cool everything was difficult and painfull.
Anyway, the operation was a big success. After drilling i lowered sump nr 1 and aligned the two new 50mm holes and installed the pipe. being very carefull that both holes was perfectly alligned in all directions. All of the bulkheads where glued using silicone as added protection. I did not want to drain everything one more time to fix a leak! The result is shown in another excellent paint diagram!
As you can see the two sumps are now level and this works perfectly. Almost better than I could have hoped for. The water level in the return chamber stays level and now I have plenty of room for all the water if the return fails. Earlier i had maybe 5mm of clearance when it stopped, but now i have maybe 20cm! Some other benefits that i got that i did not think of is that i have alot better access to the skimmer and since i removed some baffles from both sumps i now have room for a frag rack in sump nr 1. I am going to move all of my LR from sump nr 1 to nr 2 to make better access for this!. So i am very happy with the result.
This post is getting quite long now, but since I am wrinting about the sump here is a diagram of the entire system! With all the tanks (Yet another excellente paint diagram!). The skimmer is a Deltec SC 2060 and the return pump is a Jebao DC15000. In the water change tank i will have a manifold with 4 outlets to different reaktors. A separate post about this will follow.
As you can see I have another sump system that feeds and returns into sump nr 2. This is to the water change tank and the refugium. This is an entire own system. I use a Jebao DC6000 pump to feed this system and it is then gravity feed back into sump nr 2 just as a regular DT/Sump system. As you can see i have two return lines going. One too the water change tank and one to the refugium. During normal operation only the line going to the water change tank is used. The line going to the refugium is used when i am changing the water. This is so that i always has flow in the refugium when changing water. I am using naturall seawater that is stored outside in a 1000L IBC tank. The water change tank has a drain connected to my house drain. So a 160L water change takes me about 5 minutes, not including the time it takes to heat the water.
I hope this has been a post that has not been to dry to read. If you have any questions regarding my setup please ask!
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