Sump intake question

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kdrun76

Piranha
MFK Member
Mar 4, 2009
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I am almost done setting up my first sump. I will have two of them running by mid September, but the idea of a "plumbed tank" is brand new to me despite having been in this hobby for a good 25 years.

One at a time. My question today is about a 180 gallon tank with a 55 gallon sump tank. The overflow boxes (I think that is what they are called) are really small maybe 5" square and located right at the surface of the tank. On the side of the tank facing the water there are openings for water to enter these boxes that extend down only 1.25" from the surface of the tank!!! The hole in the back wall of the tank where the plumbing then takes this water down to the sump is down at least 4-5" from the surface.

Like I said I am new to this...so pardon the nOOb question. (FYI there is no water in this tank yet...still doing the plumbing.) If the only water leaving this tank is getting skimmed off the top 1" of the surface, then only floating poop is going to get filtered out?!?!!! I know the biological filtration won't care where in the water column the water comes from.... but what about mechanical?

The top of this tank is over my head. It came on a ludicrously tall stand that I cut down some, but I had to leave enough room for the sump tank and pump...so its still mighty tall. Running a gravel vac is going to require a step ladder and a bathing suit, but will get done. I just fear it won't get done with the quality I am used to doing, and now I see my filters only slurp from the top 1" of water.

Do I:
a.) drill the over flow boxes and get water slurped from the top 5 inches rather than just the top inch? (Some quick Math says 5" of water from the tank in the sump will not over flow it as that is only 37 gallons.)
b.) invest in a pair of ginormous power heads and guarantee that no poop ever lands on the bottom (my poor fishies!!)
c.) run a canister filter along side the sump that has a MUCH lower intake, I was plannig to run a Rena FilStar XP3 any way...will this be enough?
 
I have valves to control all of that. (I hope they do anyway.)
 
I run a canister along with my sump for redundancy and increased mech filtration on my 180. If I has a sump with filter socks then it would probably not be as necessary, but...I don't. The harmful part of the waste is rarely the visible solids. Wet dry's are really effective partly because they pull water from the surface, where most of the bad stuff tends to accumulate. I also run a 3200 gph wavemaker that aids in keeping crap from settling too much
 
I do have socks.

That is a HUGE wave maker... yipes!
 
It's more than a powerhead though, its a wavemaker. Vortech mp40w. So it doesn't run at that 24 hours. Has variable flow patterns and night mode, etc...
 
I am not sure I understand your comment on the return being capable of skimming wastes.

Water from teh top inch of the tank will enter the bulk heads and drop down through pipes, pass through socks and accumulate in a chamber. When it reaches the needed height it spills over a plate filled with holes that allows the water drip down through the biomedia. It then spills into a shallow collection area where the intake for the pumps will collect it and pump it back up to the tank. The pump is rated at 550gph at 5' of head. (If I remember right.)


I had not considered a rugf. This is the time to consider it, the tank is still empty.

I have UGF plates from at least one and maybe 2 70 gallon tanks. This tank has a much larger foot print. Its 5x 2.

A very real question is...am I trying to fix a problem that doesn't exist?
 
as long as you do your gravel cleaning once every couple weeks, you will be fine just don't overfeed where you have waste sitting in the gravel. Wet drys are extremely effective filtration. Do you know how much the overflow boxes are rated for? I ran a 55g sump on a 300g that was overstocked I had a 2400gph pump on it with overflows that were rated for about the same. So as long as your overflow boxes are rated for more than what the pump can put out, you can really get some serious water movement with that sump.
 
You're only running about 3x turnover per hour, but the overflows will scoop up a lot more than you think. The amount of water flowing into them will help pull any suspended waste up into the box. A powerhead is useful to keep debris from settling, although not a requirement by any stretch. The supplemental canister is a good idea IMO, but a bigger pump would probably help too... The last thing I would do is drill a hole in the o-flow box 5 inches below the surface.
 
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