My 300G Built-in Reef - UPDATE - Tear down thread

[Anonymous]

Here's the action in the sump.

I need to add some elbows and conduits to quiten this down a bit. It's quite noisy.

I am pleased the baffles did a good job of getting the bubbles out. The sump is performing well so far.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Had my first flood today too. 8O

What fun.

I forgot about the returns creating a siphon. I did not drill a hole in the returns to break the siphon. My old tank did not have any returns going down into the tank like this one does. Needless to say, when I turned the power off, the returns siphoned the down to the upper penductor, then the siphon was broken. The sump couldn't handle that much volumn and it overflowed. I quickly hooked up my pump to the exterior drain outlet and that helped. All in all, I probably only wound up with 10G's on the floor. And zero gallons on my outlets

Louey

 

[GSchiemer]

Had my first flood today too. 8O

What fun.

I forgot about the returns creating a siphon. I did not drill a hole in the returns to break the siphon. My old tank did not have any returns going down into the tank like this one does. Needless to say, when I turned the power off, the returns siphoned the down to the upper penductor, then the siphon was broken. The sump couldn't handle that much volumn and it overflowed. I quickly hooked up my pump to the exterior drain outlet and that helped. All in all, I probably only wound up with 10G's on the floor. And zero gallons on my outlets

Louey

But you never spill water or have leaks. That only happens to us careless aquarists, remember.

 

[Anonymous]

:lol:

Now I must ponder where is the best place to drill a hole in the return line.

Any suggestions.

Louey

 

[GSchiemer]

:lol:

Now I must ponder where is the best place to drill a hole in the return line.

Any suggestions.

Louey

Under the water line and up high.

 

[Anonymous]

So, under the water line of the tank, but above the waterline in the overflow.

How about right above the waterline in the overflow as it sits with the power turned off.

That ought to work, yes ?

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Two words:

Check


Valve.

 

[GSchiemer]

So, under the water line of the tank, but above the waterline in the overflow.

How about right above the waterline in the overflow as it sits with the power turned off.

That ought to work, yes ?

Louey

It should be under the maximum running water line in the tank, so as not to splash water out of the tank. It does not matter where it is related to the overflow box. Water is going to drain or siphon to the lowest point, be it the overflow box or siphon break.

Greg

 

[Anonymous]

Galleon wrote:

Two words:

Check


Valve.

That doesn't sound like a bad idea either.

I think I'll do both.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Greg wrote:

It should be under the maximum running water line in the tank, so as not to splash water out of the tank. It does not matter where it is related to the overflow box. Water is going to drain or siphon to the lowest point, be it the overflow box or siphon break.

Greg

Gotcha. Thanks!

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Louey, I have a couple of questions for you

When you drain the sump with that pump, where does that water go?

Also, you have 2 overflows and 2 return pumps one at each end of the tank right? So when you have both of them running at the same time you have all this water pushing from each end towards the middle. Right? Do I understand what you are doing? I relooked at the pictures and its hard to tell what is on each end of the tank.

Anyway, what if you cycled the flow back and forth with the Iwaki's from one side to the other, that way you could get some nice back and forth motion going in the tank.

Also, if you have water splashing over the top, wouldn't the easiest solution be to cut your overflows a bit lower? That would lower the water level in the main

 

[Anonymous]

Knucklehead wrote:

When you drain the sump with that pump, where does that water go?

On the other side of the wall I put a hose bibb type fitting. I hook a waterhose to it and run it to the swamp behind the house.

Also, you have 2 overflows and 2 return pumps one at each end of the tank right? So when you have both of them running at the same time you have all this water pushing from each end towards the middle. Right? Do I understand what you are doing? I relooked at the pictures and its hard to tell what is on each end of the tank.

Each pump feeds up through an overflow. One pump feeds one end. The other pump feeds the other. I have a 1" riser that comes up through the overflow. At the top I tee off and the 90 down on each side of the overflow in the tank. Those riser go down to two penductors. So each Iwaki feed 4 penductors.

I am going to use the Tunze's to get a little wave action going.

Also, if you have water splashing over the top, wouldn't the easiest solution be to cut your overflows a bit lower? That would lower the water level in the main

No can do. The overflows are made of glass. The covers that you see are acrylic.

I am going to screw around with the penductors tomorrow. I need to figure out if I have to much simulated flow through the penductors, or to much real flow coming from the Iwaki's.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Cool

I am excited

I want to see the stocking plan now!

hehe

 

[Anonymous]

Yesterday I figured out that two Iwaki 100's are just way to much flow for this tank. The amount of flow I had was borderline ridiculous. My two 1.5" drains are probably a bit undersized, but seriously, even if it weren't for that problem, I still wouldn't want that much flow in the tank.

I tried throttling the Iwaki's back a bit using the ball valve, but that made the tube feeding it trying to collapse.

So I tee'd off one of the Iwaki's to feed both of the returns. I still have a tremendous amount of flow in the tank.

Maybe I can add the other Iwaki back when I bring my 75G on-line as the refugium. Maybe, maybe not.

Worst case is I have a back-up pump in the closet.

Here's a few shots that shows the flow across the top. I stuck my hand in the tank in the center and lower parts of the tank and there's real good flow there too. The flow in this tank is so much more awesome that my old reef.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

I added some 90's and pipe's in the sump to quiten down the drains. It worked quite well.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Nice so far Louey!

I drilled my return right at the water level/1/8" under. It provides a bit of surface movement inthe corners where the overflows are.

And I do think long term dumping of saltwater into your freshwater swamp will cause problems. Do you want aptasia to adapt to fresh water? )

B

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks Bingo.

And I do think long term dumping of saltwater into your freshwater swamp will cause problems. Do you want aptasia to adapt to fresh water? )

I wonder if my saltwater will have any effect on the swap? The swamp is supposed to dry up in the winter time, but it never has in the three years I've lived here.

I suppose I could find a dry area back there to dump in to.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Yesterday I figured out that two Iwaki 100's are just way to much flow for this tank. The amount of flow I had was borderline ridiculous. My two 1.5" drains are probably a bit undersized, but seriously, even if it weren't for that problem, I still wouldn't want that much flow in the tank.

I tried throttling the Iwaki's back a bit using the ball valve, but that made the tube feeding it trying to collapse.

So I tee'd off one of the Iwaki's to feed both of the returns. I still have a tremendous amount of flow in the tank.

Maybe I can add the other Iwaki back when I bring my 75G on-line as the refugium. Maybe, maybe not.

Worst case is I have a back-up pump in the closet.

Here's a few shots that shows the flow across the top. I stuck my hand in the tank in the center and lower parts of the tank and there's real good flow there too. The flow in this tank is so much more awesome that my old reef.

Louey

Did you throttle them at the intake??

 

[Anonymous]

I decided to redo the electrical outlets that my MH ballast plug into. Having them screwed to the stand didn't leave me as much room as I need to view the time on the appliance timers. And there was the concern about water spills, as has been duly noted :lol:

I also had the frequency drives for the Tunze 6200's mounted directly to the stand. I saw how easily some water could get spilled on them, and they cost mucho dinero, so I needed to move them to.

So I mounted a piece of plywood next to the electrical panel and mounted the outlets and drives there. They are well out of the splash zone, so I stayed with regular boxes and MC cable.

I'll neaten up all those cords once everything is up and running and all the bugs worked out. Looks kind of sloppy right now.

Louey

 

[Anonymous]

Galleon wrote:

Did you throttle them at the intake??

Yes.

I figured I could throttle them back on the other side, but throttling pumps back seems like a waste of electricity.

I think I am going to be happy with the flow using just one Iwaki. If not, I could get some new pumps with a little bit less flow and sell the Iwaki's. I'm not opposed to doing that if need be.

Louey