Basement Sump project

[NateHanson]

I thought I'd post some pics of my almost-running basement sump on the same day as Daire posted her amazing tank project, just to help accentuate how impressive her tank is, by showing a totally ghetto setup next to it.

Anyways, here's my 55g sump. It's under and about 8 feet away from my display tank. Spaflex drain comes out in a 3" Tee on the left side, where the skimmer and heater will be, then there's four 1/4" glass baffles. Return section has a float valve for the top-off kalk (will be hooked up to a kalk reactor). Refugium is fed by a 1/2" valve tee'd off the 1" return line. The return pump is fed by a 1" bulkhead, has true-unions on both sides, an extra JG tubing port for feeding a future carbon canister, drip acclimation, etc.

Right now the return and drain are glued to each other under the display tank (making a temporary closed loop) for a freshwater test for a day or so, and to mix the salt when I drop that in tomorrow.

I'm really looking forward to the extra elbow room and water capacity. Anyone have any tips or suggestions before I flip the switch on this puppy in a couple days?

Thanks, Nate

 

[NateHanson]

Here's my fish-room (really more of a mini 5-foot-headroom fish alcove, but hey, I'll take it).
There will be shelves on the right with a 20g RO reservoir on top, kalk reactor and other junk in the middle, and two 10g tubs on the floor for water changes. (one for mixing new water, one for draining out the same volume for a change).

 

[dedfish]

Drilling went well then?

 

[NateHanson]

Drilling went well then?

Drilling went very well Jason. Thanks!

See here for details tank drillin' thread

 

[ReeferMedic]

Looks a little different than the other day, nice job........

 

[NateHanson]

Salt is in.

 

[Reef55]

Looking good Nate!
I've been busy at my basement as well... we'll have to visit both ways sometime soon. I added 2 dedicated 20 amp circuits for my tank over the weekend... hope to finish up wiring them tonight.

Mark

 

[NateHanson]

Did you use GFCI breakers on those circuits? Or just running them through a GFCI receptacle?

I ran a 20A circuit into the fish room with a GFCI circuit. Lights and upstairs pumps and heater are on a dedicated 15A circuit, so neither load is very high. Only about 8 amps upstairs and about 6 amps downstairs.

Nate

 

[Reef55]

I have GFCI's on each bank of outlets. They are ran in parallel so it is not one out and everything after it out. So for example, on one circuit I have 5 outlets, then 4, then 2, then 2, then 4. Each of those 5 groups has its own GFCI.

I didn't want a GFCI on the fusepanel because I don't want to loose everything on the circuit if it needs to trip. I am running a bit more juice than you also

 

[NateHanson]

Sounds like a good strategy

 

[NateHanson]

Project done. (at least the big parts )

I decided when I got up this morning at 6:30, and it was already about 70 degrees, that I needed to get this puppy on line immediately.

So a couple hours later, and my drain and return bulkheads are replaced, spaflex fittings glued and threaded into the bulkheads, and skimmer moved downstairs to the new sump. I still have a lot of fine tuning to do since there's about 800 gph now going through the return (up from ~400). Things are MUCH quieter upstairs now, and there's more flow in the tank.
One thing I need to work on is silencing the airflow into the durso at the top of the tank. I'll probably put a length of tubing on it to cut down on noise. Any other suggestions for that? I have a 1/4" JG valve on there now, and it's turned down about 1/8th (if it's all the way open the drain doesn't flow fast enough )

It'll be interesting to see what the tank temps do today.
Nate

 

[Reef55]

Nice Nate!! I'd like to stop by and check it out if I can

 

[NateHanson]

Sure anytime. You can probably give me some ideas on troubleshooting too. Just give me a call. (you still have my number?)

 

[Reef55]

so did you get to try to mod your durso?

 

[NateHanson]

No, haven't had time yet, but the sighing noise is bothering my wife. It's funny because it's much quieter than the racket that my sump used to make under the tank, and it always bothered me but she didn't mind. Now the tank is practically silent, and this little rhythmic hiss from the durso is making her edgy. She says she first thought the cats were alternating hissing at eachother, then last night she dreamed that a big giant was snoring in our house.

To fill others in, and hopefully get some ideas, the waterlevel in my overflow is going up and down by about 1/2" every 5 seconds, and air is rushing into the durso in rythym with that. So the tank constantly goes "ssss . . . . ssss . . . . ssss". Also If I remove the valve that's on top of my durso, so there's a larger 1/2" vent hole in the top, then my display starts to overflow. If I hold my finger over the hole to slow down the air, the drain catches up again.

Any guesses?

 

[NateHanson]

by the way, per mark's suggestion I removed the strainer from my durso inlet, to see if it was causing a restriction, and there was no change. (I also cut a bunch more slits in it while I had it off, just to be sure.)

 

[Reef55]

I'd try the airline down the durso next.

Yours is also different with that huge standpipe in your sump it is connected to... can you temporarily disconnect that thing in the basement and see if that helps?

 

[NateHanson]

That's a good idea mark. Could be a back-pressure problem.

Nate

 

[~Flighty~]

If I'm understanding your picture, I'm pretty sure it is back pressure. That will happen if drain goes underwater too deep in your sump. I'm not sure what the contraption that your drain goes to is, but ours just dumps out a few inches above the surface into a bucket with a hole at the bottom.

 

[Reef55]

Cindy, in his first picture, that 3" diameter standpipe on the left side of the sump is where his return is going.

Nate, looking at it again... if you make the bottom of that reverse standpipe taller (causing the drain pipe to not submerge so far), that might help.