Sump pipe work help.

[Sleepingtiger]

I may be still a little confused but, if I understand you correctly...

I would turn the pumps off and let the water drain into the sump. Then I would remove the water in the overflow box. It looks like the intake pipes are using a compression fitting. I would remove all three PVC intake pipes by unscrewing the fittings.

At this point you should have a dry overflow box and only the bulkheads and the compression fittings coming out of the overflow box.

You might want to remove the bulkheads and make sure the gaskets (and overflow box) are perfectly clean. Then you can tighten them, hand tight + 1/4 turn. You have to be careful not to over tighten but they should not be spinning when you try to tighten the other fittings.

You can watch the video at the link below on how to properly tighten the bulkheads.

How To Select and Properly Install Aquarium Bulkheads

Bulkheads allow you to transfer water from one side of an aquarium to the other and allow for traditional PVC plumbing to be connected. In most aquariums, bulkheads are used for drain and return pipes on your display tank but can be used for many other things too. Some tanks come pre-drilled for...

www.bulkreefsupply.com

All of this is really pretty straight forward and will give you piece of mind you will not have a leak in the future.

Hope this helps.

Steve

i am confused.... there is a compression fitting that fits on bulkheads? I have never seen any fitting that fits on the thread for the nut of a bulk head before.

 

[ying yang]

I can twist the screw at the top when I try tighten the pipe

You say when you try hand tighten 1 or all 3 of the arrows outlined and arrows pointing at them are still spinning when you try hand tighten them,without actually being there to see its hard to say but i know if tighten a plastic fitting to much you can cause a split/hair line fracture and this will make the nut keep spinning as its never tight enough to grab hold of the thread and stop spinning so i suspect you may have done this.

Umm actually i looking back at your photo and you saying the screw at the top spins when you tighten the pipe so maybe you mean the bulkhead itself.
If you mean the bulkhead still spinning,when you installed it did you do it by yourself or was 2 people as need one person to hold the pipe in the weir in display tank and then you hand tighten the bulkhead from underneath the display tank otherwise the pipe in the weir above the glass in your photo will just keep spinning.
Some photos from above the weir of the pipes and you outlining which actual fitting you mean would be great help to all as we all on same page then or even a video showing which pipe/ fitting is spinning but as you mentioning bulkhead im thinking its the fitting that is touching the bottom glass but as this thread is getting quite few days old now i take it you have rectified the problem or just think its not leaking so leave it as it is?
Which if left it as it is and the bulkhead underneath is tight enough connected to pipe above the glass in weir but just spins,that may not be a problem but me personally would never leave like that and take the risk as want everything to be how it should be on initial install ^_^