Connecting my sump to the tank.

[hclchicken]

I recently purchased a 100g tank. It came with a sump, some various piping, a eheim pump, some chemicals foods, hydrometer, heater and a ton of live rock. I have the live rock curing in the rubbermaid as shown below.

I'm curious though, before building the stand for the tank I need to design the connections. I'm not going to drill it, to worried about it cracking. But the sump as shown is confusing as how the person had it setup. You can see the bioballs on the left side of it. Then another plastic container of bioballs, with a pvp pipe connection on top. Then on top of the tank picture there is some sort of waterflow device.

What I'm assuming is, he had bioballs in both sides of the sump. Maybe some live rock in the center. Then the plastic box sat over the edge of the tank, and the pump was in the sump feeding it up. and through that waterflow.

I'm not sure if I want to head that direction since I'll be installing a protein skimmer on the right side of the sump. Leaving the bioballs in some way, and creating a water return but I'm not sure how I'll be doing it all. Also when operating a protein skimmer does it have an external pump, or does the protein skimmer have everything self contained?

[twychopen]

that tank looks like a 125 to me. My protein skimmer has everything self contained but the pump can come off.

[ErikH]

The two boxes in Image039 fit over the bioball side of your wet dry, the left side in 038. The water goes under the first baffle then over the second, allowing bubbles to escape before entering the last large chamber which would house your return pump. If you could get some better light, you would get less blur. Less blur= better pictures so we could see the fine details of the setup.

You could easily convert that into a nice sump. Left chamber, inlet and skimmer area; right side, rocks and return.

http://www.melevsreef.com/what_sump.html (http://www.melevsreef.com/sumps)

[tebstan]

Twychopen is right, that's a 125. Make sure to clean up those bio balls before you use them, the same way you're cleaning up the rock. A lot of people don't clean them like they should, and now sitting dry in your garage they're gonna get funky.

A lot of people put the skimmer in the sump because there isn't much room under their stand. But your tank is long enough, you could probably have the skimmer outside of the sump with just the skimmer pump inside it. Leave some valuable space open in there. There's that marineland brand skimmer that has the pump built into the footprint, aggiereefer had one. Don't know how it would perform on such a large tank though.

Oh, and welcome to MAAST!

[StevenSeas]

Marineland has a 300 gallon version of the skimmer, I liked it well enough. Great design and good skim, just doesnt do well at all if the water level varies so it must be put in a constant level section of the sump

[hclchicken]

I've measured the tank, it's actually 105.xx gallons, with a 72x16x21.

Thanks for help with the protein skimmer, I was under the impression it has to be sitting in a tank. So that's good to know. I'll try and find a price for a marineland 300. I'm going to try and find more information drilling a tank since I'm reconsidering it. I know the basics, go slow, lubricate with water, use a wooden frame to keep it stabil, and a diamond tipped drill.

I think I need a 1.5inch pipe for the pump I have. I put it into some calculator but really unsure if it's correct.

Do the bioballs replace the protein skimmer and vice versus?

Where do I find basic information on tank overflows, piping systems, and orientations. I assume i need a system that uses siphoning and I can use one pump for a return. if I drill the tank I can allow for a overflow directly into the sump. After that I just need to have the return somewhere far enough from the overflow exit from the main tank that it doesn't just leave the tank. can I have the overflow piping on the left third of the tank, and have the return piping on the right third of the tank?


Basically my sump can be setup like this, skimmer outside the sump on the left of it. With the sump pump in the left chamber. It then has a partion jointed the floor of the sump which forces the water to go over the acrylic to get into the right side.

I can then have refugium or just plain live rocks in the right side along with the return pump. I plan on piping it with pvp. Do i need to make sure the refugium and the return pump are separate or can they be fairly close?

[2Quills]

Agreed, you could easily convert that into a sump/fuge no problem. Melev's website is a great place to research sump designs as well as some do's and dont's with them. I'm a newbie to the site as well but if you'd like you can check out my thread I just posted some photos of how I drilled my tank. It's really not too difficult at all. http://www.maast.org/showthread.php?62240-2Quills-120G-Build-Thread if you're interested. Good luck with your build btw. I'll probably be following along.

[hclchicken]

Very interesting. I think I'm settled on drilling my tank, with a center overflow. Since I need a overflow drain pipe of 1.5 inches to suit my pump, does that mean I need the same size along with the pump. Plus if I have my overflow in the center what is the best positioning for my return pipe?

[2Quills]

Very interesting. I think I'm settled on drilling my tank, with a center overflow. Since I need a overflow drain pipe of 1.5 inches to suit my pump, does that mean I need the same size along with the pump. Plus if I have my overflow in the center what is the best positioning for my return pipe?

Honestly, if you're going to drill then you might as well drill for 2 drains, in my opinion. I'd try to maximize the draining capability of the tank simply because if one drain fails then you have a back up. I wouldn't want to limit myself on the overflow because I would rather have some flexibility to work with in the future if I ever decided to go with a bigger return pump.

What size/type of pump do you plan on getting?

Your returns can go pretty much anywhere you want them. But it's important to remember that which ever way you do it that you take measures to prevent backflow from flooding your sump.

[hclchicken]

What's the downside of using a mesh wire inside your overflow to prevent critters from getting in?

[2Quills]

What's the downside of using a mesh wire inside your overflow to prevent critters from getting in?

It's probably not a good idea to use any metals in your tank that aren't recommended for aquarium use. They will leach trace metals into your system which is never a good thing. I've seen lots of people cover their overflows using nothing more than egg crate/light diffuser. It's a plastic material and won't harm your system.

[ErikH]

You can use the plastic stuff that people make bingo bags with..... It's just a plastic grid that you can easily cut to fit your application. You could come by my house if you want to see my 200 in action. My number is in my signature, and I am home most times.

[hclchicken]

Is this a decent RO system for aquarium and drinking water? I was going to keep using brita, but might as well use both in one.

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/store/products/reverse-osmosis-filters-and-systems/reverses-osmosis-deionization-systems/standard-ro-di-systems/75-gp-5-stage-ro-system-no-di.html

[tebstan]

Is this a decent RO system for aquarium and drinking water?

Not familiar with RO systems... but RO tastes funny as drinking water IMO. Curious to hear if anyone else drinks from their RO systems?


You can use the plastic stuff that people make bingo bags with

What's this? And what's a bingo bag?