Newbie Overflow Issues

[Crustaceon]

Let’s do a simple checklist:

1. Adjust the in-tank box side as low as possible. We can fine tune this later.

2. Make sure there are no air bubbles in the U-tube

3. Check to see if the drain line is only 3/4” - 1” under water in the sump chamber.

4. With the pump running, do you see debris/bubbles whizzing through the tube? A well-tuned overflow box will self-clear any air bubbles. You can test this by using an airling tube and gently blowing air into the u-tube inlet while it’s siphoning.

 

[Apollo7235]

I’m thinking there’s a “finger” on the end of the hose somewhere that’s partially blocking the flow, lol. Pardon my analogy.

Yep, I think that it's the reduced output from the 1" bulkhead that's the primary issue!

I am usually pretty handy with most things, but I have absolutely no idea about anything when it comes to plumbing, so when hubby told me to get 1" drain hose, I came home with 1"OD vinyl tubing, silly me.

 

[Crustaceon]

Without a secondary and a valve to regulate the “full siphon” there won’t be a full siphon. It will fluctuate between full siphon and not with water level in overflow box going up and down. This will be associated with gurgling

Yes, but you will also see momentary function of the overflow. The tank likely will not overflow itself and instead will act like a “toilet flushing” periodically (typically every thirty seconds or less). This is coming from someone who has set up numerous siphon overflow boxes.

 

[theMeat]

Let’s do a simple checklist:

1. Adjust the in-tank box side as low as possible. We can fine tune this later.

2. Make sure there are no air bubbles in the U-tube

3. Check to see if the drain line is only 3/4” - 1” under water in the sump chamber.

4. With the pump running, do you see debris/bubbles whizzing through the tube? A well-tuned overflow box will self-clear any air bubbles. You can test this by using an airling tube and gently blowing air into the u-tube inlet while it’s siphoning.

5. Let us know how much or if no water is on your floor because 3/4 may not be enough to sufficiently drain the tank

 

[Crustaceon]

Changing to a 1” is going to make it gurgle like crazy.

5. Let us know how much or if no water is on your floor because 3/4 may not be enough to sufficiently drain the tank

Maybe you should ask me how much water is on my floor considering I’m running a single 3/4” drain on a ball valve and a backup drain (which is pretty much dry) (also note the reduction from 1” to 3/4” on the unions). Oh, and this is with DUAL RETURN PUMPS. Also, maybe it might be a good idea to try small and reversible adjustments that don’t result in creating a permanent indoor waterfall? Just a thought.

 

[theMeat]

Yes, but you will also see momentary function of the overflow. The tank likely will not overflow itself and instead will act like a “toilet flushing” periodically (typically every thirty seconds or less). This is coming from someone who has set up numerous siphon overflow boxes.

Appreciate you’re trying to help, that’s what makes this site great. But 3/4 is too close for comfort, and a bigger pipe on a single drain system will run quieter. As someone who has set up many I’m sure you’d agree

 

[Crustaceon]

Appreciate you’re trying to help, that’s what makes this site great. But 3/4 is too close for comfort, and a bigger pipe on a single drain system will run quieter. As someone who has set up many I’m sure you’d agree

Knowing the box style she’s using, I know that 3/4” tube is supposed to be underwater or it WILL gurgle. It doesn’t matter if it’s a 1/2” tube or 1” tube. The same will holds true because it will draw air. The difference though is a smaller diameter tube will try to purge itself of air. A large one won’t which equates to noise. There’s an individual chamber the U-tube is draining into which allows the siphon to stop if the input flow stops. The adjacent chamber (with the drain) needs to have a few inches of water in it which applies pressure and pushes air out of the line, “burping” it in the sump. This also increases flow. Ideally, you run a dual drain overflow box with a primary siphon drain that’s dialed down until it barely can’t keep up and a secondary drain to take up the remaining flow. With a single drain, either you run a gate valve and dial in the drain flow just enough to maintain a siphon with a few inches above the bulkhead to prevent a whirlpool from forming (can be tricky) or you run a gigantic drain and deal with the pond fountain noise in your house. Like I said, It’s probably wiser to test all other options before completely replumbing the thing with something that will work, but will have serious downsides.

 

[Apollo7235]

@Crustaceon, @theMeat

Thank you both for all of your input!

I will go through that checklist as soon as I have a moment and let you know what I find! I am all for using what we already have set up as long as it is correct and well-functioning.

As far as re-plumbing with the 1" drain hose, it's really no biggie. Since this is my first tank and I am a total newbie, I had already planned to have issues, so nothing I have done so far is 100% permanent. The only issue I foresee will be potential damage to the bulkhead because I have a feeling hubby may have sealed that connection, but no big deal. I have another bulkhead coming in tomorrow and I will double check at Home Depot to see if I can grab one with the hose if they happen to have what we need.

 

[theMeat]

Knowing the box style she’s using, I know that 3/4” tube is supposed to be underwater or it WILL gurgle. It doesn’t matter if it’s a 1/2” tube or 1” tube. The same will holds true because it will draw air. The difference though is a smaller diameter tube will try to purge itself of air. A large one won’t which equates to noise. There’s an individual chamber the U-tube is draining into which allows the siphon to stop if the input flow stops. The adjacent chamber (with the drain) needs to have a few inches of water in it which applies pressure and pushes air out of the line, “burping” it in the sump. This also increases flow. Ideally, you run a dual drain overflow box with a primary siphon drain that’s dialed down until it barely can’t keep up and a secondary drain to take up the remaining flow. With a single drain, either you run a gate valve and dial in the drain flow just enough to maintain a siphon with a few inches above the bulkhead to prevent a whirlpool from forming (can be tricky) or you run a gigantic drain and deal with the pond fountain noise in your house. Like I said, It’s probably wiser to test all other options before completely replumbing the thing with something that will work, but will have serious downsides.

Do not wish to argue. For the sake of anyone who might come in here to gather info
- on a single drain system you want air going down the pipe with the water. A bigger pipe will allow enough air to be constant, instead of the sound of a toilet flushing again and again when full siphon is established. Water in overflow gets higher, full siphon begins to establish, water going down drain increases, gets low enough to suck air (toilet flushing sound), repeat.
- On a reef ready tank with a single drain it’s risky to put a valve on that drain. With an overflow box there is much less room for error and is a flood waiting to happen.
- A single drain system will make noise. With a bigger pipe the noise will be less. A diy stockman standpipe at the top of bulkhead is about as quiet as it safely gets.

 

[Crustaceon]

(Taking the high road and not going to insert a passive/aggressive disclaimer)

Yes, odds are single pipe will make noise because trying to control a single siphon line is incredibly difficult and you might have to run an open drain for the sake of convenience (3/4” is still plenty, charts be danged). The good news is there are plenty of guides on how to build a “silencer” for that drain to reduce noise levels and have a safe drain. Again, ideally it’s better to run two or more drains and TBH, it might be easier to just exchange that box for one with dual drains. It’s worth it. Also again, going with larger pipe will increase noise because you’re replaced the gurgling of air bubbles with the sound of water splashing directly into the surface of the water in the sump and the echo within the drain tube. But I guess you could install a four inch drain tube nearly horizontal and have less noise overall. I don’t know if that would be considered a trough or drainage ditch at the point though. On a side note, the 187g tank I’m working on is drilled for dual 2” drain bulkheads.... I can’t for the life of me understand why someone would ever think they needed that much flow to the sump. The filter sock would look like an airport wind sock.

 

[theMeat]

^ hope it’s drilled on back and not bottom, then yeah, dual 2” is the way to go

 

[Crustaceon]

^ hope it’s drilled on back and not bottom, then yeah, dual 2” is the way to go

It’s drilled on the bottom in the corner overflows. When I had my 100g up and running, I ran a beananimal with a 1/2” primary, 3/4” secondary and a 1” emergency. This was with around 500g flow to the display. I’m curious to see how people are pulling off dual 2” drains and keeping that quiet aside from putting their sump in a different room.

 

[theMeat]

It’s drilled on the bottom in the corner overflows. When I had my 100g up and running, I ran a beananimal with a 1/2” primary, 3/4” secondary and a 1” emergency. This was with around 500g flow to the display. I’m curious to see how people are pulling off dual 2” drains and keeping that quiet aside from putting their sump in a different room.

Wow, you musta been running the 1\2 wide open. Without knowing the particulars let’s say the 1/2 full siphon was completely straight vertical run wide open at 48” will max out under 400gph. There’s calculations for this. Water flow has been around a long time. Has already been figured out. Tried and true. Here’s an example of a calculator you may find useful

Pipe Flow Calculator | Hazen–Williams Equation

The gravitational flow form of the Hazen-Williams equation is calculated to provide water velocity and discharge rate that can be achieved through a pipe with provided proportions.

www.calctool.org

Not sure how this info helps op who is asking about a single drain system, or why you keep trying to compare a single drain to a full siphon with secondary

 

[theMeat]

@Crustaceon
here is an article from “bean animal”. In it you can try to understand how a bigger pipe will run silently. You’ll need a valve of course.

Silent & Fail-Safe Aquarium Overflow System | BeanAnimal's Reef

Build the world famous "Bean Animal" silent and fail-safe aquarium overflow system. No noise, no adjustment, no floods. A truly set and forget setup that makes the Durso and Stockman style of standpipes obsolete! Build your own today!

beananimal.com

 

[theMeat]

@Apollo7235
Your return pump will have a siphon. When power goes out or you turn off return pump the siphon from return line in tank will drain down to sump and overflow sump. Make sure to drill a hole on return just below water line in tank to act as siphon break.
Here’s vid

This a better solution than check valve

 

[Crustaceon]

Wow, you musta been running the 1\2 wide open. Without knowing the particulars let’s say the 1/2 full siphon was completely straight vertical run wide open at 48” will max out under 400gph. There’s calculations for this. Water flow has been around a long time. Has already been figured out. Tried and true. Here’s an example of a calculator you may find useful

Pipe Flow Calculator | Hazen–Williams Equation

The gravitational flow form of the Hazen-Williams equation is calculated to provide water velocity and discharge rate that can be achieved through a pipe with provided proportions.

www.calctool.org

Not sure how this info helps op who is asking about a single drain system, or why you keep trying to compare a single drain to a full siphon with secondary

That 1/2” line was typically ran at 3/4 open, always under full siphon. I probably had less that 50gph going down the secondary drain. I set it up to have water in the overflow box rise very slowly and let the secondary drain pick up the slack.

 

[Crustaceon]

@Crustaceon
here is an article from “bean animal”. In it you can try to understand how a bigger pipe will run silently. You’ll need a valve of course.

Silent & Fail-Safe Aquarium Overflow System | BeanAnimal's Reef

Build the world famous "Bean Animal" silent and fail-safe aquarium overflow system. No noise, no adjustment, no floods. A truly set and forget setup that makes the Durso and Stockman style of standpipes obsolete! Build your own today!

beananimal.com

I ran that exact setup on my 100g using an eshopps eclipse L. I could never get it to run quietly until I reduced sump turnover to around 5x and drastically reduced siphon tubing size. IME, it’s pretty much impossible to get a stable siphon on a 3/4” drain on 500gph, let alone with a 1” or larger pipe. The volume just isn’t there to make it work correctly. Now I could have ran a much larger return pump to quiet down the drain, but I’d have to deal with a noisy sump, not to mention pump noise... On my 187 build, I’ll probably be running around 1000 gph into the sump. I’m still figuring out exactly what to do here, but it probably will end up being a 1” siphon tube on a gate valve and a 1 1/2” durso, with a ball valve just for the sake of mitigating some of the echo. I’m toying with the idea of setting the larger pipe at a shallow angle to keep the water on the bottom of the pipe and not bouncing around so much.

 

[Apollo7235]

@Apollo7235
Your return pump will have a siphon. When power goes out or you turn off return pump the siphon from return line in tank will drain down to sump and overflow sump. Make sure to drill a hole on return just below water line in tank to act as siphon break.
Here’s vid

This a better solution than check valve

Thank you!!! I bought the check valve as well just to be extra safe.....I REALLY don't want to clean up an overflow, hahaha. Funny thing, my next step was looking for instructions on how to do exactly this, so really, thank you very much!

Back to my original problem:

We installed the 1" drain hose which definitely helped, but did not solve the problem. I finally threw up my hands and said, 'this darn thing must be defective.' I called Marine Depot, considering my overflow box is the MarinDepot 800, and asked what the deal is because I MUST be missing something, right? RIGHT?!?

According to my new friend Marine Depot Scott, I need to either get a different return pump or install a flow valve. When I bought all of my tank equipment, I made my selections based off of good reviews rather than just brand name selections, and the Aqueon pump I chose had really good reviews....... Bleh. According to Scott, Aqueon is notorious for incorrectly rating their equipment which seems to be the case for my wonderful little pump. I'll tell you what, I think I would be pretty darn impressed if I needed that kind of flow! That being said, I just purchased the Sicce Synchra Silent 1.5 return pump that, thankfully, has an adjustable flow. Somebody please reassure me that all will be well with this one?!

Sincerely hoping that this solves my problem! Good Lord, I am so far beyond frustrated! I never would have thought this would be such an issue!

Now to write AlgaeBarn and have them hold my second Ultimate Refugium shipment.........

 

[Mical]

After reading this entire thread, personally I'd get a large return pump and a a gate valve on your return line from your pump. Something in the 1000 GPh range or better.

 

[Sarcazian]

@Crustaceon
here is an article from “bean animal”. In it you can try to understand how a bigger pipe will run silently. You’ll need a valve of course.

Silent & Fail-Safe Aquarium Overflow System | BeanAnimal's Reef

Build the world famous "Bean Animal" silent and fail-safe aquarium overflow system. No noise, no adjustment, no floods. A truly set and forget setup that makes the Durso and Stockman style of standpipes obsolete! Build your own today!

beananimal.com

Wow, the Bean system is still around and kicking? I have been out of the hobby since shortly after these started coming out.

To the ops... I had a CPR (I think) overflow on a 36G Bow with a sump that was converted from a wet/dry. I would never run that setup again nor recommend it to my worse enemy.

- The U Pipe was a real PIA.
- It was loud as heck even with adapting things. My wife complained that she was watching TV next to a pool skimmer basket. Okay, I was able to partially fix that with reef central at the time.
- Power outages could lead to issues with the sump over flowing (if not over-sized like mine) or the display overflowing if the U-Pipe broke suction and the main sump chamber was too larger (only happened once).

So, please consider a few things;

1. Test, test, and test again. You want to make sure the water does not overflow or break siphon on you.
2. Consider getting yourself one of those plugs with a water monitor so it shows off the return pump if things are too high. I have never tested this since I went drilled after that tank and now AIO. I would have loved something like that back in the day.
3. Consider the impacts of #1 on your sump chambers. Is that 20G sump cut in 1/2 for an ATO? Overall make sure to consider as many redundancies as possible. Unless you are on a concrete floor and just don't care.