Plumbing for 2 Display Tanks on One sump

[MantisShrimpMan]

The tanks I’m looking at are as follows:
Primary Display: 74 gallon
Secondary Crab Display: 17.1 gallon
Sump: Trigger Systems Platinum 20 cube

If money were no object, it would appear the wise thing to do would be to have 4 return pumps, so that each display had its own discrete set of two, hence having redundancy. Also, if I were attempting to keep plumbing to a minimum, having two return pumps, one solely responsible for each display tank, would prove to have the least complex design.

Id like to build my system with some redundancy but also not completely break the bank. Here’s what I have in mind:

from the sump, two Neptune Cor 20s. Each has a check valve. That feeds into one shared tubing system. The water from both is then moved into a UV sterilizer. From there, the singular tube is split off using gate valves(?), so that the flow is appropriately distributed for the large vs the small tank.

ive included a rudimentary image. I will likely add in unions for the ability to disconnect to clean, and maybe some Neptune apex flow
Is this viable?

I’m wondering if this can provide to both tanks while having the redundancy of a multi return pump system.

can I feasibly use valves to distribute flow so that my larger tank is receiving significantly higher flow than the smaller tank? Based on the 10x rule as well as the fact that I’d be keeping coral in the larger tank, I’d imagine I’d need about 1100 GPH for the larger tank (increase from 740 to account for extra flow for corals) and about 200 gph. for the smaller one.

also, each cor 20 produces 2000 GPH, but I’m aware that having junctions, elbows, check valves, etc reduces head pressure. Between the two cor 20s and all this plumbing, will I be left with enough power to keep both tanks turning over properly?

 

[mike550]

Not an expert but I’ve seen folks proposed this before. A few observations for you to consider

1. Two pumps feeding a single line is problematic. I think it has something to do with keeping the flow balanced between them.

2. Why does all the water in your main line go through the UV? The flow rate through your UV might be your limiting factor. You could use one Cor20 to feed the UV at the right flow rate and the other Cor 20 to pump water and merge after the UV.

3. The gate valves make sense. It seems check valves have a love/hate relationship on this board. Personally, I’m not a fan. But I’d consider adding some unions so replacement / maintenance is easier

 

[srobertb]

The tanks I’m looking at are as follows:
Primary Display: 74 gallon
Secondary Crab Display: 17.1 gallon
Sump: Trigger Systems Platinum 20 cube

If money were no object, it would appear the wise thing to do would be to have 4 return pumps, so that each display had its own discrete set of two, hence having redundancy. Also, if I were attempting to keep plumbing to a minimum, having two return pumps, one solely responsible for each display tank, would prove to have the least complex design.

Id like to build my system with some redundancy but also not completely break the bank. Here’s what I have in mind:

from the sump, two Neptune Cor 20s. Each has a check valve. That feeds into one shared tubing system. The water from both is then moved into a UV sterilizer. From there, the singular tube is split off using gate valves(?), so that the flow is appropriately distributed for the large vs the small tank.

ive included a rudimentary image. I will likely add in unions for the ability to disconnect to clean, and maybe some Neptune apex flow
Is this viable?

I’m wondering if this can provide to both tanks while having the redundancy of a multi return pump system.

can I feasibly use valves to distribute flow so that my larger tank is receiving significantly higher flow than the smaller tank? Based on the 10x rule as well as the fact that I’d be keeping coral in the larger tank, I’d imagine I’d need about 1100 GPH for the larger tank (increase from 740 to account for extra flow for corals) and about 200 gph. for the smaller one.

also, each cor 20 produces 2000 GPH, but I’m aware that having junctions, elbows, check valves, etc reduces head pressure. Between the two cor 20s and all this plumbing, will I be left with enough power to keep both tanks turning over properly?

OMG I just posted a similar question. I have only one return line due to a long run and would like 2 pumps (one running and one to kick in an emergency). I can’t use COR-20’s as I don’t think each at 50% will produce enough flow. My last setup had 2 COR-15’s on different lines so it was easy to set them to 40 and have one bump to 80 in an emergency.

I’m leaning towards using good/reliable cleanable check valves and sticking with a cleaning schedule. As mentioned, reef2reef is conflicted on these. I would definitely use unions and probably swap them out yearly but maybe just having an extra to rotate as you clean them is more reasonable.

The mileage varies because a, people tend to use the cheapest crap they can find and b, some of us (not me!) are running much cleaner water thru them.

My only advice is to make sure that if it fails, you have enough room in your sump to handle the backflow as if it didn’t exist.

I have head pressure to contend with personally and as also mentioned, if the pumps are not balanced they’ll be fighting each other a bit I think.

 

[MantisShrimpMan]

OMG I just posted a similar question. I have only one return line due to a long run and would like 2 pumps (one running and one to kick in an emergency). I can’t use COR-20’s as I don’t think each at 50% will produce enough flow. My last setup had 2 COR-15’s on different lines so it was easy to set them to 40 and have one bump to 80 in an emergency.

I’m leaning towards using good/reliable cleanable check valves and sticking with a cleaning schedule. As mentioned, reef2reef is conflicted on these. I would definitely use unions and probably swap them out yearly but maybe just having an extra to rotate as you clean them is more reasonable.

The mileage varies because a, people tend to use the cheapest crap they can find and b, some of us (not me!) are running much cleaner water thru them.

My only advice is to make sure that if it fails, you have enough room in your sump to handle the backflow as if it didn’t exist.

I have head pressure to contend with personally and as also mentioned, if the pumps are not balanced they’ll be fighting each other a bit I think.

What I’m wondering is if you were to use dual return pumps if you can have a check valve and a Neptune flow sensor in line for both prior to the merge region. I’ve never programmed a Neptune system but from my other experience with coding, I’d imagine you ought to be able to run an if statement whereby if the flow on one pump acts up, you can cut power to that pump (no need to run electricity to something not working, and wouldn’t want to be putting electrical current into the water if it were somehow a castrophic pump failure), tell the other pump(s) (whether it’s a dual return or who knows, maybe if you’re running a bigger system you might have even more merging return pumps) to ramp up to compensate for the loss on the other side, while alerting the user that they need to look into the issue when they have a chance, and the check valves should keep from any back flow during said response.