Overflow still won't work

[csb]

I don't know how you guys do it, but I think you're all either smoking crack or into some voodoo black magic.

I'm now 3 weeks into my 2-day "add-a-sump" project. I've written about it several times here, and it's been the most hellish, stupid, frustrating project I've ever encountered.

PROJECT HISTORY:

1. Attempt to build sump, but learned that working with acrylic is voodoo magic.

2. Ok, so I bought a pre-built sump, then found out it wouldn't fit through the door on my stand.

3. Did some voodoo math, and figured that I could shave off a 1/4" of a brace and the sump was supposed to magically fit through the door.

4. an hour later, with 1" shaved off a brace, a tank full of floating wood dust and unhappy fish, I gave up trying to fit the sump through the damn door.

5. Had to go buy wood. Braced up the tank, took the damn front of the thing apart and put in the sump.

6. Built a DIY HOB overflow and u-tubes. Plumbed everything up. Found out that the drain (3/4" w/ Durso) wasn't handling the flow of approx 400gph.

7. Took the dam overflow apart and re-build the durso with 1" pipe. Still no good.

8. Drove my *** all over the place getting more parts, including bigger 1" bulkheads and bigger drain tubing. re-build the overflow yet again, full 1" drain added along with the previously expended 1" durso. Still no good.

So here I am now, just wanting this damn stupid sump to work so I can get my tank back to a normal state, instead of a "under construction" state. BUT, apparently that's not what the gods have in it for me. All you DIY guys are full of voodoo magic ... "Umm, yeah, I built this overflow in my spare 5 minutes this afternoon and threw it on my tank. It works perfectly".

Dunno what to do now. I think I'm going to hire someone to stand by my tank 24/7 and manually transfer water from the tank to the sump. $6.00/hr will buy me an overflow. Either that, or I'm going to go down to the damn Home Depot for the 5 millionth time, and build me a new 6" drain pipe and 6" durso. With my luck, it probably still wouldn't handle the flow.

I think my only solution now is to dump more money into this piece of junk and buy one of those pre-made CPR overflows and hope to god it comes with enough voodoo magic to work properly, because quite frankly, I'm about 3 seconds from getting out of this hobby. That's how much patience I have left.

 

[dweakl01]

Relax, have a beer, drain your tank, put your livestock in a rubbermaid container, have another beer, drill your tank, install your overflows, and have a beer watching your water run out of your tank.

Life will be much easier after that...at least you'll be three beers towards a buzz if it doesn't work.

 

[csb]

Sorry, I recently moved my tank and draining it once was a hassle enough and I don't want to do it again. Especially, since I dont' have the tools or ability to even remotely begin to figure out how to drill glass, only to build yet another durso that's somehow not full of the voodoo magic needed to make it drain at the proper rate.

... and if I break the tank while drilling it?? Then what??

OH... and that would the irony of the entire project. After having taken the stand apart to fit the sump in, only to later drain the tank when I could have done that in the first place and placed the sump into the stand through the open top (with the tank removed from the stand). Yep, that'd just be the icing on the cake.

I think a CPR overflow with the lifter pump would be the best thing to do, unless you want to come over here and just make it all work for me while I drink a beer and watch.

--csb

 

[BeanAnimal]

What can I say....

At this point, buy the CPR and relax. DIY is just not in the cards for some folks. Maybe another day and another project will change that, but for now take it easy and take the easy way out.

Next time invite a mechanicaly inclined friend or two over, it will come to you, it just takes time.

Most of us have had similar (Or worse) chains of events happen. As a matter of fact, I had a router mishap today and broke the piece I was working on and somehow managed to break the entire wing off of a concrete gargoyle in the process... and cut two of my fingers, all while my freakin lunch burned on the stove and the acrylic I put in the oven began to bubble... I call it multitasking Sometimes it is just best to walk away and try again later.

 

[Chihuahua6]

You may not want to ear this but you asked so here goes.
All this trouble may be telling you something here. Forget the sump. Sell it or use it for something else. Hang on overflow boxes have a high failure rate. You do not 'need' a sump. It's nice to have but I would never risk flooding my floors and killing everything in the tank just to have a sump. Kick back and relax and thank the voodoo gods for not allowing you to flood your floor ; )

 

[spence15610]

Don't buy a CPR they are junk, check out a Lifereef over flow, they about the same price as a cpr but much better (knows from experience)

 

[dweakl01]

Regardless of what these guys have told you, I'm still all for the beer-infested plan.

 

[GROSSR]

Let me ask you this, why won't the overflow work? It is a simple siphon concept. The lifereef, once filled properly, has never failed for me.

rich

 

[sjm817]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7905189#post7905189 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by spence15610
Don't buy a CPR they are junk, check out a Lifereef over flow, they about the same price as a cpr but much better (knows from experience)

Ditto. You think you have problems now? The CPR wont help matters.

 

[BeanAnimal]

I know nothing about commercial overlows, other than some are good and some are bad.

Use whatever the guys in the know suggest

 

[GROSSR]

I have a Lifereef and it has never failed in 4 years. I even built a diy based on the Lifereef and it never failed. It is really a great design and product.

rich

 

[csb]

Yeah, I'm going to buy the lifereef overflow ... sounds much better than the CPR. My DIY overflow does indeed work, but I just can't seem to get it to handle anything above 300 GPH. That's all. I'll probably set it aside and perhaps use it on a project in the future that requires less flow. Ordering the lifereef today ... it's supposedly able to handle 700 gph, so that ought to have no problems keeping up with my 400-500 gph flow.

As for the sump... Yes it's nice to have, but I do indeed need it for a few reasons.

I think I'll have some beer.

 

[GROSSR]

What size U tube are you using?

rich

 

[csb]

Originally, everything was built from 3/4" tubing ... u-tubes, drain, etc. This worked OK up to 300GPH. For some reason, I calculated everything based on 300GPH, but neglected to note that my mag5 was really putting out somewhere around 400GPH. Oops, my stupid mistake.

I was able to force the overflow to handle that capacity by adding a second u-tube (2 x 3/4" tubes) and plugging the hole on the top of the durso to force the drain into a full siphon. It handled the flow then, but I wasn't comfortable running the thing maxed out like that. No safety margin.

SO... knowing that I was close, I built a new durso from 1" pipe, drilled a hole for a bigger bulkhead, upgraded to 1" drain line, and expected that to handle the flow... but still, it's performance is really about the same as the 3/4" line... ***. The tank slowly fills to the rim because the overflow just can't handle it.

So really, I've thought about it and I think the problem is something a little more fundamental ... I think the outer box isn't deep (tall) enough! I built the overflow from 2 standard Lee's boxes, and I think the depth of the outer box is limiting the whole design to about 300gph. Without making that outer box taller, there's not much I'm going to be able to do to increase the capacity of the overflow. That's just the way it is.

No problem ... I built something that works, it just doesn't work at the flow rate I want. Crossing my fingers now in hopes that the lifereef will handle my flow without any trouble. Another solution would be that I use a valve to de-rate the mag5 (or use a mag3), but I've set my target on achieving a certain flow rate and I don't want to sacrafice that because I"m use the sump return through a SCWD to create my overall tank flow.

Anyway, so there's the reason it doesn't work. Fundamental design flaw from using Lee's boxes.

 

[sjm817]

One of the advantages LR has over other overflows is the flow capacity. It will easily handle what you are doing and a lot more. I have one and it laughs at a mag7 and easily handles my Eheim 1260 which has a ton more flow than the mag7 did.

 

[csb]

That's what I like to hear... so really, if I wanted to even go higher than my mag5, I'd be able to do so. Good news.

--csb

 

[MayoBoy]

Why not just put a valve on the return side and throttle the pump down a bit; or, put a tee and valve and shunt the excess water back to the sump?

 

[csb]

As I mentioned above, I'm trying to achieve a certain flow rate for my tank. De-rating the mag5, or using a mag3, sortof defeats the whole purpose.

 

[MayoBoy]

Sorry - didn't read everything closely (damn boss keeps interupting me)

Did you try it using the SCWD? They "absorb" a lot of flow due to switching pressure. A Mag 5 at 3' or 4' with a SCWD might put you below 300 GPH.

 

[csb]

Yeah... The SCWD is inline and it works as it's supposed to .. but the overflow just can't deal with the flow and I can't seem to increase it's capacity any more beyond where it's at. I'm kinda stuck now though ... having some issues ordering from lifereef and it looks like I"m not going get the new overflow for at least another week. I just can't handle my tank being ripped apart like this any more. I just can't deal with it... this whole project has been a mess, and I guess it's fitting that it's going to be stretched out even more. I'm about to just smash the whole damn thing and forget about it.