Remote sump - beananimal setup

[Kaidman]

Just bought a new house and plan on getting a larger tank. We are wanting to put the sump in a room inside the garage. I want to use a beananimal drain, but I'm afraid it may not get a siphon because the pips will need to go down into the crawlspace through the block wall into the garage then go up 2-4ft before going into the sump. The distance between the sump and display is approximately 50ft. Will this head pressure cause an issue for a beananimal drain? If so, what other option should I consider? Will the 50ft horizontal cause any problems?

Here's a bad drawing to help demonstrate what we're planning to do.

 

[ericarenee]

Very bad idea

Very bad idea

To run the drain to sump line with a (Trap). Non pressure line running Down then back up, you will create a place for detritus and heavier items like sand and so on to get trapped in that space under the house.. This might work If you do a small sump under the tank maybe just big enough for filter socks but i would NOT recommend this at all.. We have a basement sump and i have a similar issue with getting Dirty water outside because the sewer tap is on the other end of the house. So i pump the water up then over instead of down up out the window and Back down..

Hope this helps you.. Put the Tank on the garage wall or Sump on Garage floor on some Insulation Foam. the Top of the sump should be lower then the line running from tank to sump..

Good Luck

 

[Kaidman]

I was afraid of that, unfortunately the picture isn't accurate so switching walls isn't an option in the living room at least. If plumbing out to the garage isn't an option the sump might need to be under the tank.

 

[ericarenee]

If you can get a straight shot across the Crawl space and into the Garage . Set the sump on the floor. You can have the water to enter close to bottom of the Sump (drilled lower with sump on Floor on insulated foam) Then have a baffle to take the water back up to top of sump and drop into filter material.
So what i AM Saying if the Garage floor is Lower then then house Deck (structure the floor is sitting on) You can Do this.. Also It Looks Like from your Image you can Drill each floor Joist and Get the line even 10 inches higher.

If you post images of under the floor and the door from garage to house with the steps down to garage floor can get a better idea..

 

[Kaidman]

Ok that makes sense. So you're saying to drill the sump from the side near the bottom for all 3 drains of the beananimal to enter. This will avoid creating a trap in the pipe, but move the trap into the sump itself basically. The reason I was planning to put the sump on a stand was to increase ease of access for cleaning. If I put the sump on the floor, I can mount reactors/skimmer etc above it to still have easy access.

We don't take possession of the house until the week of July 6 at some point. So I can't take pictures of the crawl space or garage right now. I do know the crawlspace and the garage floor are about 2 blocks tall before the subfloor.

Next question: I could've swore I read in the beananimal thread somewhere that the pipes entering the sump should only be submerged a few inches for best results. If I were to plumb them in from the side near the bottom of the sump they will be well below a few inches from the surface. Is this going to cause an issue for the siphon to get going correctly?

 

[latino277]

2 cinder blocks is about 16" high. If you put the sump on the floor, you might be able to drill the siphon line closer to the top. How tall is the sump you plan on putting there?

 

[Kaidman]

The dimensions of the sump haven't been decided yet. I wanted to make sure I have the design planned out first. The current plan for the display size is ~360g (96L x 36W x 24H). I was hoping to have approx 100g sump.

 

[ericarenee]

I think you will have plenty of room. As long as the pips are under water you will be fine even if you drill close to the bottom you can make the first sump chamber or separate tank that is say 3 foot tall (from basement floor level to below your Display tank bottom level) Then have the sump tank on a stand from there. You would need to put a power head or pump in this first tank to keep things from settling on bottom or clean it regular.
As far as the bean animal over flow. The Pipe should be At least two inches under the water. not no more then if i remember right .

 

[SGT_York]

Horizontal pipes create significant issues when trying to start a siphon system. For the Bean animal to lift the water over the first overflow a true siphon must start for that to happen all the air needs to be purged from the horizontal line.

Typically a BA with a straight drop takes 30 seconds to truly start, a horizontal run could be minutes if it starts at all depending on the length and grade of the horizontal slope. Without the siphon starting a Bean Animal drain can only handle 10% of it's siphon flow.

A bean animal was never intended to function with horizontal runs, I don't think this will work the way you have it intended. If you insist on horizontal runs a herbie (bottom drilled) will give better results as there is no siphon or lifting water through the first overflow and you can trip the pipe to the bottom of the overflow for more pressure to flush the air from the pipe.

 

[Kaidman]

I thought herbie was an early form of bean animal, and is a siphon. Maybe I need to look into it. Would a durso function ok in my case? Or what, if any options are there?

 

[CuzzA]

I don't think either a Bean nor a Herbie will work well here, at least not directly. They're both a full siphon drain and the air must be purged. Drilling the holes lower in the sump is still going to cause issues as the water in the sump will create back pressure and may never clear the air inside the pipe. In a typical full siphon set up the drain should terminate 1" or less above the sump water level.

I would still run pipe to the garage. You could do a few things. Try it and see if it works, which I doubt. If it doesn't you could run a larger diameter pipe from a sump under the tank to the main sump in the garage, say 2 inch pipe. And then run your return from the garage sump. This way you won't have any issues with a full siphon start up as the bean drain will be setup as designed and since the return pump is in the garage sump it will be pulling water and sending it the display, the water in the tank sump, with the assistance of gravity, will make its way to the garage sump assuming you drill bulkheads down low in the garage sump and it is lower than the tank sump.

Or nix the whole idea of a sump in the garage, make your stand a little taller for easier access for maintenance, yet still run the pipes for an auto water changer/mixing station and ATO.

 

[SGT_York]

A durso won't have the startup issues, a herbie is not a siphon (physically lifting water) so it doesn't have the startup times, but it too needs to purge the air from the drain lines and if there is not enough height (head pressure) to push the air out of the lines then it won't function any better than a noisy durso.

What is the height difference between the top of your sump and the bottom of your tank, and how far up would the reverse siphon (from crawlspace to top of sump) be? Lastly what is the length of the horizontal run?

 

[Kaidman]

The height difference between the top of the sump and bottom of the tank would be roughly 3 feet. If I were to put the sump directly on the ground like suggested there would hopefully be no reverse siphon from the crawl space to top of sump. The horizontal run is roughly 50ft.

I'm leaning towards CuzzA's suggestion of just putting the sump in the stand. I don't want to run 4-5 pipes and then not achieve a silent drain. Keeping the sump in the stand would also allow me to keep the Apex controller and modules all in one location, which was becoming a headache to think about too...

 

[SGT_York]

Sounds like a plan, 50 feet would not have been possible with only 3 feet of drop.

Enjoy the tank!

 

[ericarenee]

The height difference between the top of the sump and bottom of the tank would be roughly 3 feet. If I were to put the sump directly on the ground like suggested there would hopefully be no reverse siphon from the crawl space to top of sump. The horizontal run is roughly 50ft.

I'm leaning towards CuzzA's suggestion of just putting the sump in the stand. I don't want to run 4-5 pipes and then not achieve a silent drain. Keeping the sump in the stand would also allow me to keep the Apex controller and modules all in one location, which was becoming a headache to think about too...

not to mention at 50 feet you would need a large external return pump for high head height. Mine is 2600 gph at 17 feet . I Am running from basement up 7 feet over about 16 feet then up another 5-6 feet to get over top of tank. This long span of pipe for drain and return has to be cleaned a few times a week oops YEAR ...as Stuff will grow inside the pipe. I just have a clean out at each end and a round brush on the end of a thick plastic line . Kinda like heavy trimmer string. But its worth it to me to have the equipment down stairs.