Lets talk about sumps

[redwinger]

Have seen this on other forums so I thought we should try it as I think we have a better knowledge base than most clubs. What is everybodys opinions on sumps? Meaning size, design,equiptment that is housed, flow through, baffle design, the importance of a sump, material for a sump, topoff through the sump etc. etc. I would like to hear everybodys ideas and what they do. Hopefully we can all learn something along the way. We all know it is allmost a nescessity to have one but maybe we can come up with some new ideas.

[coldwaterreefer]

i need help in that area to thanks redwinger

[redwinger]

That is kind of what this for to help and hope I learn a few thing along the way. What are you planning on CWR? It would be nice if spazz and JG24 could comment in this thread also as they build these on a regular basis.

[coldwaterreefer]

i have a 40 long with baffles in it but was wondering if i need to modify them to make them higher

[jules77]

I personally wouldn't use anything but acrylic for on the fly changes. As you can recall we added 2 bulkheads fairly quickly and we had trouble ;>
I dont think any one design woks for all but I certainly would add 2 things to mine as an afterthought:
1. Probe Holder- Greg must have forgotten this one we went through my design, but I would still like to have one.
2. Media capability- I think every sump should be built with some way to force water through an area for carbon, phos ban, or whatever. I ended up creating a removable plumbing piece to run these items but it is a PIA to remove or add.

Those are my thoughts, like I said acrylic is perfect for sumps for ease of making changes/ improvements. In fact if I really wanted to add these 2 items it could fairly easily be done in a few hours without removing the sump only emptying the water for a few hours.

[coldwaterreefer]

i would like ideas for a 46in long 20wide sump/refugium if anyone has any?

[jules77]

BTW- good to see something constructive going on in here for once... NIce work winger

[redwinger]

I think acryllic is the way to go as far as the ability to custom design it and also the ability to add bulkheads later is a little easier than glass. I have a glass sump right now and it does the job but would much rather have a custom designed acryllic one. Brett how high are your baffles and how far apart are they?

[David Grigor]

My opinion on sumps......Keep it simple. I have yet to have a sump that actually requires baffles ( except in a sump/refugium combo ). The longer the sump the more time for the bubbles to disapate themselves. Also, with the philosophy of less flow through the sump and use other circulation methods in the tank, I really don't see much need for an elaborate sump.

I do get tickled sometimes with how elaborate and/or complicated people like to make their sumps. While there are always exceptions to the rule, most is unnecessary except for really really short sumps due to lack of space under the stand.

If you do need baffles I recommend avoiding the baffles that start from the bottom up. Main reason, if you auto topoff fails off and goes unnoticed you are you have limited the amount of time before the pump goes dry because sometimes that last compartment is only a gallon or so of actual water volumne.

[jules77]

If you do need baffles I recommend avoiding the baffles that start from the bottom up. Main reason, if you auto topoff fails off and goes unnoticed you are you have limited the amount of time before the pump goes dry because sometimes that last compartment is only a gallon or so of actual water volumne.[/quote]

Defintely agree, since I have had this problem with my design which is based on:
http://www.melevsreef.com/acrylics/sumps/f/sump_f.html with some minor mods. My return section is probably 1-1.5 gallons and seems to be the area that shows all the effects of evaporation.

[oyam123]

I agree with less is more. I had a sump with no baffles and i did a great job.
Now i got one with baffles and everything seem to be a hard fit.
I plant to go back to bafflefree sump, and just keep skimmer, heat, and pump in it. Acryllic sounds like a good idea....and i would like a way to filter the water a bit better comming into the sump...can one add a sump prefilter to keep floss or carbon.??
thanx

[redwinger]

David sumps are sometimes overly complicated than need be. Mine is pretty simple but there are some things I would like to change later on down the road. The baffles starting from the bottom up is a good point as it will happen down the road where the pump runs dry. I persoally like to run a high turnover to the sump allthough many disagree with me I feel it is best in my situation. I have an extremelly high turnover (about 90 times) circulation via tunzes. My thinking on it is to get as much of the detritus suspended via in tank circulation and move it as fast as I can to a filter sock and then to the skimmer my whole idea of BB is to get the crap out of the tank ASAP. It is kind of a pain to clean the sock every couple of days but I find it easier than doing a water change weekly or to siphon. I still have to siphon but just not as much. Other systems I think a slower turnover to the sump is ideal.

[David Grigor]

John, I agree it is a different philosophy absolutely nothing wrong with your logic if it's important to you to minimize the amount of detritus that settles in the tank. I am personally resolved to the fact the siphoning the detritus from the show tank is a necessary evil therefore it isn't as important to me to minimize.

Less flow through the sump also means less likely to overtax your overflows and cause a mess. That doesn't mean you still can't have high flow providing have put thought into sizing the overflows large enought not to where one little something getting clogged or clogs a few teeth and cause the tank to spill over. I sometimes cringe at how hard people push stock overflows in a standard RR tank.

I will also so that depending on the length of your sump, you may find that even with high flow baffles are probably not needed. While in your case of a 75g tank where the sump has to be shorter than 4' especially to house external pump etc if may be necessary. I did have several thousands of gallons of water flowing through a sump before that was 4' long. The amount of distance it takes for the bubbles to go from one end of the sump to the other and that the flow across is linear across the entire width of the sump ( 26" in my case ) can also eliminates the need yet people design them that way because they have seen others designs even though their sump is longer than the example.

[sls]

i plan on having a fuge sump made out of 55gal. it will only have baffles to seperate sump and fuge. one overflow will go to fuge and one to sump. on the one to the sump i am gonna make a 8-10 in. piece of pvc with endcap probably like 2" in diamiter that i can attach to bulkhead. drill holes in it and i will run carbon through that. this way i can remove it easily for changing carbon etc... This way my return pump also has like 20 gals. of water in it at any given time. i dont think enough people think of water volume where the return pump is. like david stated most return compartments only hold a gal. or two of water at best.

[David Grigor]

I do like the point the other Dave brought up. More baffles built in can also limit your flexability to different hardware that you may not have accounted for in the original design. Most common example would be skimmer footprint. You want to get that killer skimmer but it just won't fit because of the baffle locations.
Having at least one compartment that forces water to flow through for carbon, filter floss and or carbon is definately valid. For me, it is rare to use such media, in the event that I do feel the need, I have a HOB canister filter that I can use for emergencies.