Ok plumbing people

GoingPostal wrote:

danreefs wrote:Will you have 2 sump's one for the refugium and one for the for you'r gear skimmer and stuff ?

No, if I do a fuge it will be small, I've never had much luck at growing macro algea and I don't have a skimmer yet so space is not an issue at the moment. I can always add a 20 gallon next to the sump if space permits if it becomes necessary. So basically my sump right now just needs to hold my heaters and pump. I'm trying to run this as low tech as possible. Not a gadgets kinda girl.

Thanks for the pics Garret

lol it's hard to stay away from all the fun gadget's in this hobby

where are the overflows on the tank? Does your sump have a place for a filter sock? My water comes from my tank and spills into a filter sock, this is the chamber with my skimmer. Next it goes through a bubble trapand into my fuge. Then it spills over into my return pump compartment, where it is pumped back to the tank. My sump is a 20 gal tank with acrylic dividers.

hey Brad...was just reading your "plumbing" post. Are you using the filter sock to slow the rushing water from your drain or truly as a "filter" .
Mine is set up (I think similar to yours) but I do get a lot of rushing water.
Mods... you can move this if necessary.
Thanks. Melissa

I use the filter sock to catch any debris, and it does not arreate the skimmer chamber then. My sock fits into a piece of acrylic with a 3 inch hole glued to the side of the sump. You would not believe how much crud that sock takes out. I change it about every 3 days.

Ok here's the tank so you can see the overflows


The sump has a filter sock that everything will drain into, I have to buy a couple more so I don't have to constantly clean that one though.

i would suggest making the sump big enough to hold everything you might need one day. If you are not going to use a skimmer right away are you thinking bio balls or are you going to keep water parameters up with water changes? Did you also get an overflow kit or do you have to make your own overflow pipes?

Well it's big enough to hold a skimmer and pump and honestly that's all I'm concerned about. Just water changes at first, although it shouldn't be a huge issue, all that's going in is my clownfish and gramma so the fishload in there is non existent. I have the overflow kit from all glass so all I need is the piping back and forth from the sump. I'm going to make an order list later and have you guys critique me.

yeah this wont be that bad than since you have a kit on the overflows. Did it come with the bulkheads for the tank as well than? If it did see if the insides of the unions are slip. Than just figure out what size pipe will slide in there nice and just use reducers to get what size pipe will be carryng water from that point. It is best to chang sizes right at the tank because that will help with the head pressure at that point. It is just known to be better to reduce at the last minute.

tiffany, I did all of my plumbing myself using mostly PVC but I was advised when setting mine up to make sure your bulkheads are threaded on both ends (the part that drops down beneath the tank into your sump, and the part that sits on the inside of the tank in the corner overflow for your durso standpipes or whatever you are using. ) If you ever had problems, if you use glued PVC youd have to disassemble everything. I also would try to get all THREADED unions for your return pump or any other unions you use. If you glue them to your pipe, yes you can remove your mag pump which is what u wanna do for maintenance, but then if you modify anything later,then the unions arent gonna be able to removed.
Just make sure, threaded bulkheads and threaded unions. Mine is really simple...and if I can do plumbing for the first time, you can too.