Sump Specs for 200G

[Euge]

Hi,

I'm not to familiar with setting up custom tanks and what not but my dad wants to set up a 200G custom made tank and he wants me to help with the sump. My question is how big does the sump have to be for a 200G sump for filtration? And what should the pump be rated as? I always thought for good filtration you need a turnover rate of 4 times your tank size per hour. Does that mean he would need a 800GPH pump? How about having two smaller sumps would that be a better idea? Any input much apperciated..

 

[PeteFromTassie]

I'm very interested to hear the replies to this one too!!! I will one day be building a sump for my 7x2x2!!!

Cheers,
Pete.

 

[jsodwi]

Check this site out it will help you calculate sump size and pump size and maybe give you some ideas
http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-01/gt/index.php

 

[Boydo]

I use a 70 gallon sump for my 280 gal and run 2 AQ-6000 pumps rated at 600 gal/hr each, I Had more fish in the tank a while ago and used 1 mag24 but was to more current for younger fish. As for how to do it, a couple time a year the lfs has a great sale on glass tanks so I start with one of these. I get 1/4" acrylic for divederrs and directing flow, and a couple tubes of aquarium silicon. I keep mine simple but normally you want good aireation on returning water, then a screen or something to remove large debris. Then the water goes through bio balls or sometype of bio material, Purigen or zeolite next followed by foam. here is pic of my sump for my 550 gal, the sump is a 120 gal.

 

[Danh]

I have a sump on a 90g that I made myself. 2x1.5" overflows into 2 5g buckets with a drip plate, a pre filter and 4g of biomedia each. They are in a 35g rubbermaid bin with about 10g of water in the bottom of it. I've got a mag9.5 which is 950 gph. You can't really do two seperate sumps, but you can have 2 pumps in the same sump. You have to take into acount the height that the pump was to suck the water from, or pump the water to and factor that into its rating. My 9.5 at about 4" of head is only running about 750gph. Depending on what you're putting in the tank I'd say 1800-2500 gph. You may want to get 2 pumps in it. If one fails you've still got the other one going. If you've got a lot of other filtration like canisters or hobs then You can go less than that. For my 180g I have 2x2" overlfows. I will have about 8g of bio media, probably about 60-80g sump and about 2400gph.

 

[Danh]

I have pics of the whole process for my 90g if you want to see them.

 

[Euge]

I have pics of the whole process for my 90g if you want to see them.

that would be amazing if you could post them. PLEASE!

 

[Danh]

90g acrylic

drilled w/ bulkheads: 2 overflows and 1 return in the center

35g rubbermaid roughneck bin with two 7" tall plastic baskets epoxied to the bottom.

bio tower (bucket) the bottom and about 1/4 of the way up the sides have holes drilled in them.
pot scrubbers

Filter sponges and prefilter clippings

more sponges

cut up plastic drinking straws

cheap prefilter and drip plate. That Tower is running about 350-400gph or so.. I think I should have put a few less holes in it, but it does alright. The two buckets in the sump

They are sitting on the bins to keep them out of the standing water. The second bucket now has about 4gallons of bioballs in it. I ordered them from ebay and they hadn't arrived by the time I was setting the sump up.

Its in the stand with the mag9.5 on the floor beside it. I cute holes in the top and I am using to to control splashing. It may work a little better with no lid, but there would be a lote more water loss to splashing and evaporations.

That has the lines run and you can see the spray bar in the middle. Its a 1/2" piece of pvd about 12" long. It has 14 1/8" holes on the bottom side.
These are some of the tools I used.It is ALL NECESSARY!

I also have a bag of carbon and peat in the sump near the intake of the pump.

So for your 200g maybe you can use 4 2" overlfows and 4x5g buckets with about 4g of biomedia in each one. You'd need a huge sump. You can get large cattle troughs or something like that. I would probably do 2 returns/pumps. 2 1400gph maybe. That would be PLENTY.

 

[Euge]

thanks a lot danh... will be sending these to my father if thats cool wit you?

 

[5am]

nice sump design...