will this hurt my water pump?

[JP!]

Thanks for the compliments guys!
DeLgADo, that's why I cut back the output, so the pump wouldn't run itself dry.


On a side note, as you all can see I have the river rock in the bottom of the tank right now. I wanted to supplement it with either sand or some finer gravel. Should I add some play sand (tan color) to keep with the brown substrate, or should I do some black gravel or black sand to contrast the brown river rock?

 

[Dr Joe]

Unless you want to do little pond or islands I'd say keep it simple and stay with the larger gravel.

If you get it too busy of scenery, no one will notice the little diver and bubble-up oyster.

And if you HAVE to put sand in play sand is the dirtiest.

Dr Joe

.

 

[Potts050]

make sure who ever pulls the car into the garage is sober

 

[dr_sudz]

I would personally run a line back to the sump in order to relieve the presure and you can put a ball valve there so that you can control how much gets put to the sump and to the aquarium incase you decide to have more or less flow.

 

[JP!]

got the third overflow line put in today and pump is now running wide open

 

[Dr Joe]

Glad to hear it.

 

[Potts050]

with rallysman, no short term probs at that level.

If it was long term I'd shunt the excess back to the sump.

Tho it's not supposed to hurt magnetic drive type pumps, it does, in most cases, raise the temp of the pump body. It may not be enough to harm the pump, but if it's submerged it may heat up your water when you don't want it.

Hurry up with pix.

Dr Joe

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What am I missing here.......
If you restrict the outflow of the pump, then it is moving less fluid and therefore doing less work. It should therefore draw less current and run cooler. Unless your deadheading the pump, you should have no problems restricting the flow.
Restricting the input side causes a severe enough p-drop that cavitation can ocour, potentially damaging the prime mover.