Plumbing experts (and non-experts)....Lend me your brains!!!!

[AquamanE]

1. I don't have enough volume in the return for that without shutting the whole system down, so not really worth it.
2. I will not have any room to add any more equipment, LOL!

I may ditch the 3rd outlet, and just leave it at 2.



Fire away!

i think it looks good. i will add my two cents.

hard lines on reactors can make it a pain when doing maintenance on this. i prefer the smaller cpvc and flex stuff to feed those.

with regards to waterchanges... i had created piping for a powerhead that i would use to drain the fuge and other areas to the return. this allows you to perform bigger waterchanges without touching the display tank.

BTW- dont discard what the Godfather (Rogger) says. he knows his plumbing.

Keep up the good work.

 

[Rogger Castells]

Would you mind elaborating on this point and explain how you would implement this change? I have read that you should not limit your drain lines with valves and if you split your drain to your skimmer compartment and your fuge, don't you want to limit the water feeding the fuge with some sort of valve and thus you expose yourself to possible overflow?

Thanks!

Sure, the main pump is receiving water that in the most part has been filtered by either the skimmer or the fluidize filters, re-routing some of this clean water to a refuge instead of your display is not efficient.
There are several ways to resolve this, first, you can change the sump design to start with a mechanical filtration chamber followed by the refuge ->skimmer chamber ->main pump->split tank and fluidize filters.
The second is to use the emergency drain to feed the refuge or to use a tee after the main drain gate valve to run a line into refuge that shouldn't put any back flow into the line and i suspect should give you enough water to run the refuge.

 

[rovster]

i think it looks good. i will add my two cents.

hard lines on reactors can make it a pain when doing maintenance on this. i prefer the smaller cpvc and flex stuff to feed those.

with regards to waterchanges... i had created piping for a powerhead that i would use to drain the fuge and other areas to the return. this allows you to perform bigger waterchanges without touching the display tank.

BTW- dont discard what the Godfather (Rogger) says. he knows his plumbing.

Keep up the good work.

Thanks E. The feed lines to the reactors is flex PVC. These reactors come hard-plumbed with a 1/2" union. I felt it was inefficient to reduce those to smaller lines, so I kept with the PVC, but had to use ultraflex to join it up with the manifold.

Origionally, with that open valve, I wanted to add a fitting that I could connect a hose to in oreder to use my pump to pump out water into a nearby sink for a water change. Only problem is that the return section is too small to do this with the system still running. My back up plan is to just use a mag 7 with a hose I already have and use to transfer water to just pump water either out of the fuge or DT for water changes. I do plan on running some lines from the garage to the tank to bring in fresh and salt water from a mixing station I will be building.

I know what you're saying about listening to Rogger. I definitely value his opinion, and I'm already thinking of a few tweaks. My problem I think is I'm trying to do too much in a limited amount of space.

 

[rovster]

Sure, the main pump is receiving water that in the most part has been filtered by either the skimmer or the fluidize filters, re-routing some of this clean water to a refuge instead of your display is not efficient.
There are several ways to resolve this, first, you can change the sump design to start with a mechanical filtration chamber followed by the refuge ->skimmer chamber ->main pump->split tank and fluidize filters.
The second is to use the emergency drain to feed the refuge or to use a tee after the main drain gate valve to run a line into refuge that shouldn't put any back flow into the line and i suspect should give you enough water to run the refuge.

Makes sense. That said, I was worried that if I split my drain, not only would it potentially affect the siphon, but I wouldn't be able to control the flow to the fuge, and even worse, find my self in a situation where I would have too little. With the way I did it, I can precisely control the fuge flow. I do see the inefficiencies though, and wonder if it will negatively impact the whole filtration system.

I definitely think I will route the reactor return to the return section, as its pointless to feed nutrient poor water to the fuge. As I'm typing this, I can see how this design in a sense just "spins it wheels".

 

[Patrick Cox]

Sure, the main pump is receiving water that in the most part has been filtered by either the skimmer or the fluidize filters, re-routing some of this clean water to a refuge instead of your display is not efficient.
There are several ways to resolve this, first, you can change the sump design to start with a mechanical filtration chamber followed by the refuge ->skimmer chamber ->main pump->split tank and fluidize filters.
The second is to use the emergency drain to feed the refuge or to use a tee after the main drain gate valve to run a line into refuge that shouldn't put any back flow into the line and i suspect should give you enough water to run the refuge.

I have two drains in my tank and two returns. My sump has a skimmer compartment and a refugium. How would you make use of the two drains? Thanks.

 

[tommy tomato]

To OP, hope another question is ok.

tommy tomato, if I have a durso drain with an emergency drain, what would you recommend? Thx

I have two drains in my tank and two returns. My sump has a skimmer compartment and a refugium. How would you make use of the two drains? Thanks.

Patrick I think you would be better served creating your own thread. Include more info such as tank size, return pump size... Do you have a canopy? What are you trying to accomplish? Is this a new build? Or are you trying to revamp an existing one... Are you looking for more flow, less noise, or are you just trying to incorporate an emergency drain?

 

[Patrick Cox]

Patrick I think you would be better served creating your own thread.

Understood. Thanks.

 

[tommy tomato]

I think you can take care of the cascading water by adding a bubble trap before the return pump...

I get why you made the fuge section so high. It gives you so much more water volume there.. I did the same thing but my "cascading water" falls into my skimmer section and then I have a trap before the next section which is my return.. I don't get any bubbles in the tank.

 

[rovster]

I think you can take care of the cascading water by adding a bubble trap before the return pump...

I get why you made the fuge section so high. It gives you so much more water volume there.. I did the same thing but my "cascading water" falls into my skimmer section and then I have a trap before the next section which is my return.. I don't get any bubbles in the tank.

I was thinking about that. I can do another baffle about an inch off the bottom and that should help with bubbles. Now, this cascading water we are worried about, would necessitate some MAJOR flow in the fuge in order for it to have a horizontal compoennt. What's to say its not like a Zero edge and if the flow is slow enough, it will just ride down that pane and produce minimal bubbles. Either way, I think an other baffle would be a good idea for insurance. It will not take up a lot of room, and it won't affect the volume in any of the chambers to any significant degree. And yes, I made it tall for more volume. Actually, I sacrificed some return chamber volume to make the fuge as big as possible. I plan to keep some cheato in there, not sure if I will also place some LR in there as well. Thanks!

 

[Joshporksandwic]

I think your garage is a mess.

 

[rovster]

I think your garage is a mess.

Have you looked in your back yard recently?:debi:


What do you think of the plumbing? Good to go? Strip it down and start over? Come on, help me out bro:rollface:

The sooner I get this up, the sooner you can hook me up with some browned out acros.........:strooper:

 

[Daimyo68]

I setup my 40b with a fuge that is 1" shy of the top rim. Water drops about 4" and I have no issue at all with bubbles. The flow is 1/3 of a turn on the 1/2" ball valve.

Sorry about the image looking messy, it's when I first set this tank up.

 

[rovster]

Thanks for posting that. Its almost exactly the same as mine, but your baffles are taller and just slightly smaller components. What is the height difference between your fuge baffle and your return? My skimmer baffles are at 9" and my fuge I believe is 12, so the water will drop approximately 4" or so. Like I mentioned previously, I've seen many set-ups with almost exactly what I have. I didn't invent mine, just copied. Rogger did have me a little worried. It seems most think its OK.

I appreciate all the comments, good and bad. That's why I posted. Gracias everyone!

 

[Alex1524]

Get your tank set up!! I owe you a frag!.....Once some of my corals grow... Sigh =-(
Looking good though bro. Nice and clean! Hopefully Dan Marino (You're son) doesn't break corals off of in this tank lol

 

[Daimyo68]

Fuge Baffle is 14". Water drop is roughly 4"

My water level is 10" in the sump

Roger is still correct though; if you have high flow through the fuge area. The high gph and the downward rush can/will cause bubbles, which can possinly be pulled into the return pump.

I supply my fuge with a T off from the return line. 1/2" pipe with a ball valve at roughly 1/3 open. Slow flow.

 

[rovster]

Get your tank set up!! I owe you a frag!.....Once some of my corals grow... Sigh =-(
Looking good though bro. Nice and clean! Hopefully Dan Marino (You're son) doesn't break corals off of in this tank lol

Haha. Don't worry man. If you want some more monti or a pocci frag, LMK. I thought Kayo wanted it, but I haven't heard. Should do well in your new (revamped) system. You can PM or text me. The pocci is easily 2.5" tall.

Dan Marino has causes a lot of unrest in my tank recently. Almost killed my utter chaos colony, ****ed off a bunch of other corals, almost killed a sunset monti that was just starting to color up:headwally: I have everything to make a nice mesh top for my tank. My worry is that he'll scratch the front glass using it as a pretend daytona raceway for is cars:deadhorse: I still love him though:hmm5::celeb1:

 

[rovster]

Fuge Baffle is 14". Water drop is roughly 4"

My water level is 10" in the sump

Roger is still correct though; if you have high flow through the fuge area. The high gph and the downward rush can/will cause bubbles, which can possinly be pulled into the return pump.

I supply my fuge with a T off from the return line. 1/2" pipe with a ball valve at roughly 1/3 open. Slow flow.

Alright, so relatively speaking, we have the same set-up, your chambers are jsut a tad deeper. I can easily regulate the flow with the gate valve to the fuge. I'm wondering if I should still put in another baffle just in case I want to increase the flow to the fuge. Another idea I had was instead of placing the baffle with the same spacing as the others, place the baffle very close to keep that downward column of water as tight as possible. What do you think? Or should I just forgo the additional baffle?

I think I might start gluing today. I'll post a pic of the rerouted reactor drain in a little bit.

 

[tommy tomato]

The additional baffle can't hurt. It will only benefit

 

[Lacy]

My 2¢ worth which isn't much considering of what was posted above. I would not paint it grey. I would leave it white. I know this sounds dumb, but to me the dark grey would make it look dull, drab and dark. The white gives it a brighter look.
Also, how long will the grey paint last? It might get scratched and have white areas show thru.

 

[rovster]

My 2¢ worth which isn't much considering of what was posted above. I would not paint it grey. I would leave it white. I know this sounds dumb, but to me the dark grey would make it look dull, drab and dark. The white gives it a brighter look.
Also, how long will the grey paint last? It might get scratched and have white areas show thru.

LOL! The OCD in me wants everything to match:eek1: I already spray painted a spare part and its pretty close. I think it will lok nice, but the white does seem rather nice. Maybe I should have ordered all the piping white (was an option). Anyway, the paint I'm using is for plastic. I think it should last a long while.






Here's a pic of the reactor drain rerouted to the return section....

I'll start gluing the pieces I know I'm not changing later. I guess i'll order that additional baffle this week and get that installed. Damn, if everything goes well, I'll be cycling before Christmas, LOL! I already started dumping old filters and old water in my curing bin in the garage, to maybe get that cycle going. Maybe I can start with partially cycled dry rock. Cant wait for aquascaping. Knowing me, there's another 3 month project:twitch: