Major Evaporation and Spewing Bubbles??!

[BlueDolphin]

I was wondering if the evaporation I was experiencing was normal. I have a sump and it seems that the water level falls below the water line the day after I put more water in.

Also, the pipe pumping water back into the tank seems to constantly be pumping out tiny bubbles? Is this caused by my pump?

 

[brndfrb]

do you have micro bubble baffles right before your pump? How old is it? Sometimes you ahve to allow time for everything in the sump to geta slime coating on it before the microbubbles stop.

 

[BlueDolphin]

My whole tank setup is about 1 - 1.5 months old. I'm not sure what microbubble baffles are though....

 

[brndfrb]

do you have a picture of the sump/

 

[BlueDolphin]

Here is my sump - the picture was taken when I first setup the tank, so the water looks cloudy.

 

[Brad]

I can't say if your evaporation is "normal" or not...but I can say that I'm personally amazed by the amount of water that evaporates from my system every day.

If you don't have a leak...and the water level is dropping...that's evaporation and it is what it is. Replace daily with fresh RO water (only the water evaporates, not the salt.

 

[Reefaddict]

Yeah I have the same thing going on right now in my tank and sump! 29gal reef with 20g sump. LR and DSB in sump with the turbofloter skimmer. The skimmer is releasing tons of micro-bubbles into the sump and then my Mag 5 is blasting them back up to my main tank.
Where my water dumps into the sump, is extremely turbulent. It is causing almost a gallon a day of evaporation. That is, I add a gallon of distilled to the sump everyday. I check the SG and it is about 1.025, sometimes it drops a little lower when I add a whole gallon, but not much.
I was curious if that was "normal" as well...sounds like it is!

I am interested in these microbubble baffles though! Never heard of them. Could someone please explain what they are, and where I can get some? Sounds like I could probably be getting some good use out of them!

Thanks

 

[brndfrb]

see this is my sump. Notice to the left right before the pump there are three baffles. That is so the micro bubbles don't make it to your pump.

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/download.php?id=6056

 

[fishfreek]

How much water are you adding daily? You may just want to rase the overall water level in the sump some.

To find your max safe water level in the sump shut off your pump and wait for all the backsyphoning to stop. Then add more water to the sump till its about 1" below the lip of the sump. Now start up the pump and wait a few minutes for the water level to equilize in the sump. Then take a sharpie marker or tape or something and mark the water level and that is your max operating water level. Never fill the sump beyond that point. Then mark the min operating wter level to be just above the point where your pump starts to suck in air.

Keep your water level within those two marks on your sump and you will be ok.

 

[seehorse]

I have a 125 with a 35G sump and although i don't experience and micro-bubbles, i do need to add 2-2.5G fresh water daily...