# Sump Build Thread Start to Finish



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

So I'm delving into finally building my 1st sump. This will be for a 55 gallon tank housing African Malawi cichlids. This is my experiment so to speak as my main goal is to build a 75 gallon sump for a 300 gallon tank. I figure....go through the growing pains with a little system 1st! I am sick and tired of the hassles of fighting with the Magnum 350 canister and the second filter on the tank is a large HOB. My goal is to have no hardware in the tank.

The plumbing is to be a BeanAnimal silent overflo.

The sump with be a DIY all glass tank that I am using old plate glass window.

Mechanical filtration I am thinking of being polyfibre sheeting. Biological filtration with be a K1 Kaldnes chamber.

I plan on building an internal glass overflow weir that I will be needing advise on. Dimensions, width (i.e. coast to coast or not).

I will also need help with the return configuration and I am planning on doing a DIY spray bar. Most spray bars angle to the surface for agitation however this seems to defeat the purpose of circular water flow and suspending particles when a surface overflow is used. It seems to just fight itself. I am hoping I can point the spray bar down, creating the flow to be down the back, across the bottom to the front, up the front, then back across the surface to the overflow.

I will start posting some pics as I go along, I have already built the sump and have the heater and return pump. Please follow along and I look forward to your constructive criticism as well as taking advantage of your personal experience!

Cheers!


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

House renos left a bunch of old aluminum framed windows being pulled out. Recycled the aluminum for a few bucks and saved some of the glass.

Here are the raw glass pieces:


I've never cut glass before but I splurged on the Home Depot glass cutter special, think it was about $8. Almost all my cuts went as they should have 1st time (almost  ) I used a large metal square as my straight edge and periodically dipped the cutter edge into a dab of motor oil. Once scribed I then put the opposite end of the cutter (shaped like a round ball) under the scribed line, just in from the edge. Gentle hand pressure (wear gloves!) on either side of the cutter and the glass just popped down the scribe line. Not all cuts were perfectly straight, a few were a tiny bit wavy. These edges I used as the top edge of the sump tank. I then used fine sand paper on the top edges just to take a bit of the bite away.
.

.
This is the silicone I used, seems to be the one most recommend. I've come across some that say the formula has changed, I don't really know. Most seem to still be using this product.
.

Here is the back and 1 end siliconed in place. I marked out where each piece was going so that time wasn't wasted trying to figure it out on the fly. I was amazed at how the silicone pretty much held everything in place once the glass pieces were in place.
.
Here are all pieces in place and I've used painters masking tape to add stability. I was impressed at how the tank was nearly bang on square on its own! Simple pressure on opposing corners was used to square it up to near perfect. You will notice the blocking I used. This was to keep the bottom seams perfectly aligned so that the front and back panes sat directly over the bottom pane. Worked exactly as I had hoped.

Dimensions are 29" x 12" x 12" = 17 gallons.
.

.
Photobucket is doing some kind of weird thing right now so I can't upload the finished pick quite yet. Stay tuned!


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

I am trying to figure out the height of my baffles to allow the main tank to drain in the event of a power failure.

How do I figure out how much water the tank will drain? It will drain below the height of the overflow because of the 2 returns being lower. How do I know their placement? I plan on using 2 - 3/4" returns running to a spray bar. How high can the returns be drilled? I've read you can put a small hole in the top of the return to break the syphon?

How close to the top edge of the tank can the returns be placed? Is it based on the hole size? The purchase site didn't tell me the size of hole needed for a 3/4" bulkhead, still have to figure that out.

I will need to calculate the volume of tank water that will drain + the volume of water in my 1 1/2" overflow pipes to determine total amount of water that could be added to the sump, correct?


----------



## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

http://reefcentral.com/calc/sump.php

http://www.diyfishkeepers.com/SumpSizeCalculator.htm

Those should get you pretty close.


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

lilscoots said:


> http://reefcentral.com/calc/sump.php
> 
> http://www.diyfishkeepers.com/SumpSizeCalculator.htm
> 
> Those should get you pretty close.


Thanks lilscoots. I know how to calculate the volume of water per inch of tank. What I am trying to determine is how much water will actually drain out of the main tank with a power shut off. I understand that the amount of height the water will drop will be determined by the return placement (where the returns enter the tank) as well as the height of the overflow. I want the running height to be just above the top trim line so I don't see any space between top of water and trim. The height of water lost will be from that point down to where the syphon from the returns will break. This is the point I don't know how to figure out. Will I lose 1", 1.5", 2" of main tank water??? That will determine my max water in the sump. This can be easily figured out with the sump running but what I was wanting to figure out in advance was how high to build my baffles.

I wonder if I have to just build the whole plumbing overflow set up and run it into a bare sump and then measure how high the water rises in the sump? The work baffle height backwards from this? I wanted to figure out everything in advance (measure twice, cut once idea!)


----------



## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

Where you drill the anti-siphon hole will determine the exact height of water lost from the main tank.


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

lilscoots said:


> Where you drill the anti-siphon hole will determine the exact height of water lost from the main tank.


I have read the hole can be drilled in the top of the pipe that enters the tank but won't water spray up above the water surface possibly ? Can it go at the 1/2 way point?

And I can't find consistent info on how close to the edge of glass you can drill? Closer to the top edge is better to minimize syphon flow but how close is too close? I'm reading 1" from any edge and also I read the same diameter of the hole. So a 1" bulkhead will basically need approx. 1 3/4" hole, so its top edge has to be 1 3/4" down from the top edge of the tank. Confusing.....and only have 1 chance to get it right....


----------



## centrecolonel51 (Aug 3, 2011)

I always just drill a hole on each side of the pipe right at where I want the water line to be. Some water comes out there but most goes down to the bottom. And I drill at a slight angle so the water points down and doesn't make any noise.


----------



## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

As far as baffle height goes, depending on the height of the sump I just put the baffles an Inch lower than what I thought I needed to for a little leeway if my calculations were wrong. you can calculate the volumes for each compartment when the pump will be running at different baffle heights. Calculate the volume of water draining back into the tank with a power failure. If those two add up to less than the sumps volume great, if not repeat with lower baffles and see where that gets you.


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

lilscoots said:


> As far as baffle height goes, depending on the height of the sump I just put the baffles an Inch lower than what I thought I needed to for a little leeway if my calculations were wrong. you can calculate the volumes for each compartment when the pump will be running at different baffle heights. Calculate the volume of water draining back into the tank with a power failure. If those two add up to less than the sumps volume great, if not repeat with lower baffles and see where that gets you.


I think I will end up doing it in what might be an easier way. Think I will set up the sump with the main tank with no baffles. Get the pump running and mark the sump water level. Then turn the system off and measure how many inches drain into the sump. Then I can work backwards from there and know my max volume in the sump without flooding in the event of a power failure or if I kill the pump while feeding.


----------



## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

That'll work too. I like math, so for me a few minutes on paper is still "easier"


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

lilscoots said:


> That'll work too. I like math, so for me a few minutes on paper is still "easier"


haha....I thought it would be a simple calculation based on hole height x = depth of water y multiplied by the tank length a and width b to give display tank gallonage c. Add in the overflow plumbing volume using surface area of piping diameters of 3/4", 1", 1 1/2" and length of said pipes d, e, & f (return will split from 1" to 2x 3/4") = g (total water entering sump in power outage). Then work backwards to determine depth needed in sump using sump length l and width w. Simple! Except I don't know x...hmmmm :lol:

Again, upon reflection, as this is my first sump build, I think I will drill the tank, plumb it, and see how much water drains into the sump. lol


----------



## chiroken (Sep 25, 2007)

OK, so a month has gone by and no actual building has happened.

I am waiting for an online shipment to arrive this week and it will contain my diamond hole saw bits among many other things including a couple of 5 lb food tubs. You know what that means when the bit shows up? Yup, drilling holes in glass. Never done it before but have watched tons of vids. How hard can it be??!! I will get the laptop and polarized sun glasses and again make sure the tank sides are in fact plate glass and not tempered like most 55's are (why is that anyways?). I am applying the measure twice cut once principle to the plate/tempered glass.

Last weekend I went and bought almost all of the fittings and PVC pipe for the 2 sumps I have planned (this 55g tank with 17g sump and the next big project is a 300g tank with 75g sump). I had my extensive list and started adding them to the shopping cart. Wow, sure ended up with a lot. Good for me, bad for the store, it was there last day of business after 44yrs, 50% off everything. I was still shocked the bill came to $112. Still need to find quality valves to install on the full syphon pipe of my bean animal overflow system. They seem to run about $45 from what I gather. Still not sure which ones to get, pretty limited around here.

Question: the guy sold me PVC cement AND primer. I didn't realize I needed primer? Thought the cement was all that was needed. True or false? Got the clear stuff so no purple streaks (plan on painting exposed pipe black anyways).

Hopefully I will be getting another 55g on Thursday so I can transfer the fish out of the 55g that will be used as the new display tank. Once it is empty I can then actually start the building.

Hope to provide some actual pics of the progression in the near future, I've got 95% of everything that is needed to move forward.


----------



## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

the primer removes any grease or other residues that may be on the pipe. You can also use it to prime the pipe for painting in lieu of sanding the pvc. To remove any purple lines, just have paper towel handy and wipe the joints after gluing, this also ensures the joints look very clean.


----------



## Mcdaphnia (Dec 16, 2003)

lilscoots said:


> the primer removes any grease or other residues that may be on the pipe. You can also use it to prime the pipe for painting in lieu of sanding the pvc. To remove any purple lines, just have paper towel handy and wipe the joints after gluing, this also ensures the joints look very clean.


 Primer also comes in clear. The purple pigment is just to make the building inspector's job easier. He can tell the cleaned connections at a glance.

http://www.oatey.com/products/plastic-p ... nsf-listed


----------



## norva (Jan 23, 2013)

Has anyone seen valves that close when power fails? Valve with a dampener that stays open while the power is on and closes as soon as power fails?


----------



## lilscoots (Mar 13, 2012)

There are check valves that allow water to flow only one way, or there are valves with solenoids that will can open with power and close when power is removed.


----------



## norva (Jan 23, 2013)

thank you....i think I will use the valves with the solenoids for my sump and sorry to hijack the thread


----------

