NEW plumbing method for an ULTRA QUIET REEF TANK!!!! LONG !!!!

[ribs]

OK Off topic, tho, hehe.
That slip fitting sounds like a pvc conduit expansion coupling, or something else? Is it easier to adjust than a gate valve?
Pics of peoples setups are great to look at, lets see it!

I must say the pics of people placing solely an open stick of pipe "above" the tank bottom and another open pipe w/a valve underneath to get the water into the sump (instead of on the floor) is pretty sweet to look at, too.

 

[patsan]

Sorry to bother everyone again, but I'd like to know from people who have been running Herbie's method how often you need to make adjustments. This is what hapened to me:
I put the skimmer into the sump and started it up yesterday afternoon. All well and good.
By about 10 last night, I turned the skimmer off because the pump on it was making too much noise. (I have heard this is common with the ASM's when first put in..that's not really the issue too much here.)

When I turned the skimmer off, I did NOT touch any settings on the valves...just shut down the skimmer.
This morning, I decided to turn the skimmer on again. Within a short time, I start hearing noise, and see that the water in the sump was down by the bulkhead, so I quickly shut the pump off. I turned it on again and looked into the overflow box to see was rising higher than normal and I was waiting for the emergency drains to kick in. Before I let that happen I just turned the pump off again.
I had a few things to do, so about 20 minutes later I decide I need to tune it all in again and get the tank running. I first turned on the skimmer, then the pump and watched the water levels. I don't remember, but I may have just "tapped" the valve going into the return to slow it. If I did that, it was just barely and not even a turn on the valve. This time around, everything worked just right.

Is this normal? Each time will this slight adjustment have to be made if I turn the skimmer off? I'm just trying to learn what is normal and what isn't. Thanks.

 

[Beenalongtime79]

Pat,

Do you have the skimmer baffled off in another compartment that is separate from where the drain line is in the sump?

The real question is does the water level change in the drain line section when you turn on the skimmer?

As stated earlier, if you change the water levels in your sump, the water levels in your overflow will vary as well.

Peace,
John H.

 

[patsan]

Pat, Do you have the skimmer baffled off in another compartment that is separate from where the drain line is in the sump? The real question is does the water level change in the drain line section when you turn on the skimmer? As stated earlier, if you change the water levels in your sump, the water levels in your overflow will vary as well.
Peace, John H.

Yes, the skimmer is in it's own section. After I turned it all on again, I did add a little bit of water that would have been normal evaporation...but I only did that after it was running well again. I have a line in the bh section of the sump labeled "water level" then I like to keep it to a line a little higher. The guy I bought the tank from must have put the little higher line mark.
It would be great if I could do an autotop in there, wouldn't it?

Even if I didn't add the topoff water, there should have been enough in there so it didn't go to the top of the bh and just start taking in air. So that was my real question...is it normal to have to make adjustments each time I will be turning the skimmer off?
I really love this though. It is so silent! I got spoiled all day long by how quiet it was and when the skimmer pump started making noise, I didn't want to hear it. The skimmer pump from the MR1 is WAY louder than my new pump...but I wanted 100% silence.
After a few hours, the skimmer pump has quieted down and is now silent...so I couldn't be any happier. I just hope it (skimmer) stays quiet now. My next project will be dealing with and combating the microbubbles from the skimmer.

 

[Beenalongtime79]

Pat,

Let me try to explain the events from a physical perspective and what I think happened in your tank and this is assuming that you have not baffled the skimmer off in a separate section so that by altering it's level of activity you have altered the level of water where your drain pipe lies...

At night, you turned off the skimmer and thus the water level in your sump rose slightly and this would lead to a domino effect that would cause a rise in the overflow area. At night, the water is also evaporating from the tank and thus your overall water level is actually decreasing for the total system. In the morning, you turn on the skimmer and you haven't replaced lost water and the skimmer turns on and water level rises in the skimmer, but decreases in the sump... it becomes low enough that the bulkhead starts sucking up a little air which actually means you are pumping less water into the main display, which means you are actually flowing less water. This will actually lead to a decrease in water in your overflow. At this point you then turn off the skimmer and then check on the overflow. What happens is now the skimmer is losing water and water level is now rising in the sump and the pump is no longer sucking in air which increases flow and thus you get a twofold effect that will cause levels to rise in your overflow. You have restored pump function so that increases flow to original status and the water level in the overflow will have risen and you've also restored the water in the sump to its original level and that will also cause a rise in the water level in your overflow. If you had left the pump running and not messed w/ any settings, it would have returned to the parameters set before you turned on the skimmer in the morning. If you don't want this to happen to you, you will need to replace evaporation water lost or baffle off the drain area so that water level always remains constant no matter what else you are doing in the sump.

Peace,
John H.

 

[Beenalongtime79]

Pat,

With all things being equal... you should not have to adjust your setup constantly. I don't... It takes time to equilibrate back to the old level when you are making rapid changes in water levels or you get air sucked into the return pump.

Peace,
John H.

 

[patsan]

Gotcha! Thanks! :thumbsup:

 

[Beenalongtime79]

The more experience you have w/ it, the better it'll be when predicting how it behaves. I'm glad that you are happy w/ the zero noise level!

Peace,
John H.

 

[patsan]

The more experience you have w/ it, the better it'll be when predicting how it behaves. I'm glad that you are happy w/ the zero noise level! Peace, John H.

Oh man....I couldn't be any happier with it.
I read this thread months back, but my husband said he didn't want to re-do the plumbing on the tank. So I forgot all about it.
Last week Nirol linked it in our TBS thread, and since I had to plumb the tank I just got, I figured why not try it. Even though it took me from Saturday until yesterday to do all the plumbing, it was totally worth it. I also feel very confident that I have 2 emergancy drains, but I also don't think my main drain will ever get clogged. Just nice to know it's there if needed.
But again, I couldn't be happier and I thank everyone for all their help with any questions I asked to get it all done and set up.

 

[ribs]

Has anyones tank overflowed, or any other disasters/close-calls that arose from using this method?

 

[drock59]

that is the point of this method. No overflow or flood if you do it right.

 

[RGibson]

Herbie that emergency return is a very good idea,that is very similar to what is used for large chill water return tanks with water flow of 5,000 gal per min and up.

 

[patsan]

Nope, it's all working great!

 

[KAiNE]

Anyone using an auto top off with this method?

I got 2 drains merging into one; therefore I get a slight fluctuation in water height (+/- Ã"šÃ‚½ ") in my sump. Flow rate of about 2800gph.

 

[Beenalongtime79]

I've been using autotopoff for a long time now and it works great, but I don't really need an autotopoff to get this system to work flawlessly, since my return area is baffled off so that water in the sump where the return line is submerged never fluctuates.

Peace,
John H.

 

[javajaws]

Anybody have any idea if this would work with a pair of side/top mounted bulkheads plumbed into an overflow skimmer box appx 12x6x6? I'm worried that there wouldn't be enough head pressure on the primary drain to make this work.

Also, has anybody tried plumbing a recirculating skimmer feed line off the primary drain line...any luck? I would think as long as the skimmer feed is consistent in the GPH going thru it wouldn't matter.

 

[Andreash]

I haven't read the entire thread, but here is a tool that can be used to calculate the flow.

to get better results, you need to apply some flow equations..

The outflow is basically a first order system, and the valve that thread starter uses to get the correct height in his overflow, is represented by "a". The level of water in the pipes is "H", "g" is gravity and "A" is area of the watercoloumn..


so in my opinion, threadstarters idea is great, and is based on good theory.

Altough I havent tested high flowrates. It should be no problem to get this system to work with high flowrates. But when the flow gets higher, the stability will suffer.. meaning that if dirt or algae is building up near the vent, high flow systems will overflow sooner, and the emergency drain get som flow in it..
Basically will the highest flowrate for this system be the same as for an open pipeline straight to the sump, since this occurres when the valve is fully open..

Some cool features with this system, is that you could implement full electroncally control of the flow by letting a small pressuretransmitter measure the "height" of water in the pipes, and regulate the flow with PID-control on your returnpump.
And this could give us the opportunity to maximize the flowrate to the owerflows limits..

There is a lot of cool stuff to learn and use in the world of electronics combined with our reef tanks..!

 

[Qdoggie]

What ever happened to just a goldfish in a bowl???


Great input Andereash. W O W, this industry has come a long way.

 

[BeanAnimal]

I have skimmed through this thread and I think the major aspects of this design are being lost in all of the banter.

ANy time you fully submerge an overflow, it becomes a siphon. If the free flow of the system (air and water) is enough to keep up with the return pump, then this will work. A siphon will pull more water than a pipe flowing with air and water.

The concept is very simple, you start a siphon and dial back the valves so that the siphon is slowed enough to keep the overflow box from draining and sucking air... or overlfowing and causing a flood.

The seperate emergency standpipe Must be there because such a system is not reliable. The "balance" is achieved by chanign the flow with a ball valve. Because this is a siphon, sump level, barometric pressure, specific gravity, slime in the pipes... etc etc will have an effect on the siphon strenght and therefore the postion of the valve.

In other words if you use this method without an emergency standpipe drain, you are asking for trouble. There is no way around it. You also still run the risk of sucking air and making noise..... that is why most of us don't use a ball valve to create a full siphon. Instead we allow air to be introduced to the drain system.

With a standpipe that draws air, there is NO chance of overflow due to sump level, baromatric pressure, pump fluctuations etc. If the air intake becomes blocked the system creates a full siphon and prevents overflow. If one is smart enough to hook airlines to the top of the standpipes and curl them over to the max water level... an emergency siphon is created if the water rises enough to cover the airline openings.

Bean

Bean

 

[javajaws]

In other words if you use this method without an emergency standpipe drain, you are asking for trouble. There is no way around it. You also still run the risk of sucking air and making noise..... that is why most of us don't use a ball valve to create a full siphon. Instead we allow air to be introduced to the drain system.

I think its been stated over and over again that this method can't be used without a backup overflow....its a critical part of the mechanism because of the reasons you have mentioned.

However, you fail to see/recognize the fact that the system is somewhat self tuning:

1) After the ball valve is set (correctly) the primary drain will never flow more than you have allowed - so it won't "suck air".

2) If the ball valve is slightly too restrictive (or becomes so due to buildup in the pipe)...the system is somewhat self correcting due to the ability to increase the head pressure on the intake and thus compensate (to a point). After so much of this auto compensation it will then be necessary to adjust the ball valve (or clean your drain). This also works in the opposite direction and is another reason that when the valve is "set" the drain won't suck air. So long as you have a sufficient variance (+/-) in the head pressure on the intake you'll be ok.


BTW, I was able to get this system to work on my tank. Its setup like this: 2 external durso-style drains with the bulkheads mounted on the top/side of my tank. I've got an internal skimmer/overflow box about 12x6x6. Inside my overflow box I've got 1 elbow for each drain (1.5" BTW). The elbow for the primary drain is pointed down, and the elbow for the backup drain is pointed up (top of that elbow is just below the bottom of the overflow teeth). I've sealed the airline from the primary drain so that a siphon is created. So long as I don't submerge the drain totally the siphon is restarted automatically. Adjustment of the primary drain is via a gate valve. Backup drain is fully open. I run about 900 gph through the primary drain. Return pump is a T4.

After I got this setup the loudest thing on my system (aside from the skimmer) is a Sequence pump running my closed loop (which is pretty quite itself).