New sump water return question.

[Norwood]

so heres what we got so far. in progress to having a 55 gallon sump for our 120 gallon tank! sorry for the crappy sketch.. and the overflow box is hanging on the back of the 55 gallon in the pic. and we are building a new stand and a canopy for the 120 gallon. so with this setup- what kind of submersible pump should i get. what would YOU guys put in it. best bang for my buck please. dont want to go broke. haha. we are figuring on spending at least 80 though... unfortunately. and the pic of the 20 gallon sump is what the tank came with. we are upgrading big time!

 

[Jc1119]

Any way you can measure that overflow box to see what size it is? It appears to be a cpr..........length, width and height will help

 

[Norwood]

Black box: 5 high, 3 deep, 8 wide. Clear box: 9 high, 3 deep, 8 wide.

 

[Jc1119]

http://www.marinedepot.com/overflow_boxes_cpr-ap.html

Looks like you've got a cpr cs90 box which flows 600 gph. A quiet one 3000 flows 819gph with no head and a 2200 is 594 with no head. @ 5feet of head the 3000 is pushing 540 and the 2200 is pushing 410, so I think either one of these would be within the limits of what the box will handle. Not saying to use a q1, just using it for a point of reference.

Best thing to do is measure from where the pump would sit up to the top of the aquarium in feet, then add 1 foot of head per fitting (90) and that'll give you the actual head height. Based on most setups, it'll be between 5 and 7 feet.

Keep in mind these are pump suggestions that will stay within the limits of the box you have. You can upgrade your overflow box if more flow is desired

 

[BarbaraClark]

He wants to know if the one we have provides enough flow to keep this tank spotless, or if we sould upgrade the box

 

[Jc1119]

With a light to medium stock the box should be fine, but as a fish keeper I know how hard it is to not push stocking levels on a tank. If it were me, I'd probably upgrade the box to something like the cpr cs102. Twice the drain capacity and 2 drains, so even if you didn't throw a giant pump at it now, you'd always have the headroom to upgrade in the future.

The current box will definitely handle the tank, but without much wiggle or "grow" room. I like over filtering and my fish LOVE ovefiltering.....

another option is to forgo the overflow box altogether and drill the tank, but I'm not sure how deep you want o go with this..........

 

[BarbaraClark]

Is there a way to create a siphon without drilling? I thought about and brought up drilling earlier. How much would upgrading the overflow box cost?

 

[Jc1119]

I think the bigger box is around 120 is I remember correctly. Unfortunately, the hang on box is the alternative to drilling. Drilling has it's advantages, but the advantage of the box is it's not so permanent and you could use it on another tank down the road if you wanted to

 

[Norwood]

So how hard would it be to make a CPR cs102 myself? I'm a DIY kinda guy as you can see. Haha. And how does the sump design look? Does it look effective? Also I went to a glass place to get plexiglas cut. Cutting plexiglas yourself is a pain! Haha. Also for anyone making a sump. Glass places charge wayyyy less for plexiglas than home depot or lowes.

 

[Oughtsix]

It appears to me that your sump design isn't going to work how you expect.

Bio balls should always be sitting in the air with water trickling over them. If your refugium is filled with water your bio ball chamber is going to be filled with water. Bio Balls are pretty lousy media when submerged.

I am a big fan of bio balls because of how well the break incoming streams of water down to drops of water creating a huge water/air surface area for oxygen exchange and off gassing. So I would encourage you to use them but with a better implementation.

I would recommend making the first compartment smaller and using filter socks, a big sponge or filter floss in it. Keep your refugium how it is. Make the third compartment the bio ball chamber and run a low water level in it so the bio balls are surrounded with air.

My beliefs are that many fish keepers worry about having enough oxygen in the water for their fish to survive. But emphasis should be placed on having so much oxygen in the water that other parameters can be a little off at times and the fish being healthy enough to survive due to the surplus of oxygen. I look at it as trying to run a Marathon at sea level vs trying to run a Marathon at the top of the Himalayans. The extra oxygen at sea level will allow me to get a lot farther than the lack of oxygen on Mt Everest.

To me Bio Balls and the huge water/air surface they create are the best; most practical way I know of to get oxygen into the water. I always run a bubble stone or two under my bio ball chamber to keep a constant incoming supply of fresh air in the bio ball chamber.

Just my thoughts though...