New tank, need help making a sump.

[nealio]

Ok so I decided instead of trying to buy a brand new tank out right, I would ask around to see if anyone had a tank that they didn't want anymore.

Well it worked, I was giving a buddy a ride home and I said I had to stop by the fish store for some filter media. After talking for a bit I brought up the fact that I needed to upgrade my tank, and he said he had at least a 30g sitting at home in his garage gathering dust. If I wanted I could pick it up it would be mine. So what did I say? *celebrate HELLL YEAH!!

So tonight I'm going to go pick it up and start cycling it. Since its 30g and I have that other 10g sitting around I was going to use the 10g as a sump. I currently have a penguin mini in the 10g, but I'm thinking that’s not going to be enough filtration for the 30g.

So I read, and read, and read about sumps last night, but they were all for marine tanks. Does anyone know of a good article that I could read to set up a sump for freshwater tank? Its a plexi-glass tank (he thinks) so I don’t mind drilling some holes or doing whatever I need to go get the best set up. I' would like to build a custom stand this weekend for it, so I would like to have an idea of how I’m going to set up the sump before I start the stand.

Thanks for all your help guys!

 

[rohnds]

sump setup is used mainly in the saltwater tank but that doesn't mean that you couldb't use a sump in your FW tank. Whether it is designedd for SW or FW, the basic principles are the same ... matter of fact identicall (as far as I can tell).
Simply follow the directions you read in those articles. It should work with a FW tank as well.

Rohn

 

[Mahamotorworks]

Sounds about right water goes into the sump gets filtered and then get put back in to the tank. You really dont have to drill any holes in the tank. you just need a tube for water intake silular to a HOB Filter. Then an output hose or tube. For the out put you can take some PCV and drill holes in the side to disperse the water in the tank. It dosnet have to be fancy it just has to work.

MAHA

 

[JWright]

Well... it's not quite that simple...

There are two "water moving" parts to a sump. The part that takes water out of the tank, and the part that puts water back in.

There's no way you're going to get two pumps to perfectly balance each other. Even if it's a 1 GPH difference, that means after 1 hour, one of the tanks is going to have an extra gallon in it (which actually means your floor will have an extra gallon _on_ it). Same goes for hooking a siphon tube up to the top tank. Your return pump will never exactly match the flow coming from the siphon tube, and you'll have a watery mess.

That's where drilling comes in. If you have a hole in your tank very near the top, and a tube runs from that down to your sump your problems are solved. Just make sure the tube running down is moving more water than the pump is pumping back up.

The water will obviously stop flowing downward once the water level in the display tank drops below the level of the hole, but the pump will shortly move enough water back up there to push more water down. Viola... no drained tanks or wet floors.

The same thing can be accomplished with something called an "overflow box" if you don't want to hassle with drilling.

CPR CS50 Overflow Box - Marine Depot - Marine and Reef Aquarium Super Store

Note: I have no experience with actually setting up a sump, so my description of how a predrilled sump would work is simply based on my understanding of hydrodynamics. Additionally, I've never used the overflow box posted above, so don't take my posting it as my endorsing it. I have no idea how well that particular model works...