It's so on now - 72g Reef build

[neilanh]

Yeah, about 540 out of a 950 pump. Perhaps I should try the 1" route and see what it gives me.

 

[Ziggy953]

I say upgrade to the 1" and see what happens.

 

[Ziggy953]

Hmmm...I seem to remember you telling me about a pump change on your closed loop....an update is overdue!

 

[neilanh]

Yes, overdue - I've been working on it all weekend, so here's where we are.

First on the CL, rather than cut everything up and replumb with 1", I decided to try a bigger pump. Mag12 ordered from F&S and was delivered in 2 days. I'm happy with this. The CL is currently disassembled as I've been working on the main plumbing.

Which is pieced up mostly now.

First, and overall shot (Don't mind the completely trashed garage please)

The tank. You can see the plumbing for the CL isn't hooked up to anything. You can see how the HOB overflow was plumbed, and the return.

Back side - overflow and the return

This is a (crappy) pic of the plumbing from the back side of the stand. On the far left is the 10g fuge, where you can see the 90deg elbow which feeds the return back to the sump. The flex line is between the return pump and the rigid PVC from the earlier shot. This just gives me some flexibility. The rest I'll detail later.

This is the fuge. 10g tank sitting long ways in the stand. The overflow line comes in from the right, and follows around the rim of the tank to the other side. Below the water line is the 90deg elbow that feeds the return back to the sump. I actually successfully drilled this 10g this afternoon - I was so proud.

Fuge from the front of the stand

Alright, finally the sump plumbing. This is from the front. All the way left is the 2 main overflows. 1 from the HOB overflow box, and the second (closest camera) is the overflow from the fuge. In the middle is the 2d port overflow from the HOB. This is T'd off, with ball valves on both. The lower one eventually will route over to the other 2 dumps in the sump on the left, the one headed right is en route to the fuge. I'm going to redo this section, rotate the T 90 deg to give me some more height so I can route it the way I want. Right now it's just dumping straight down.

Everything is working as expected, except the noise level in the HOB is ridiculous. Trying to find ways to squelch it. Ideas?

Also, the return is using the Mag9.5 that I took off of the CL using all 3/4" plumbing. It's crazy the amount of flow that's coming out of it. I mean, it's putting out more than the mag12 is on the CL now. Insane what a few 90 elbow and fittings will do I guess. But that really blew my mind. It's powerful under the right circumstances. I may need to do something with the CL plumbing after all.

 

[Ziggy953]

I'm not sure, everything looks good to me.

The only thing I can think is the overflow is sucking air down the drain pipes and that is causing the noise. Did you put a ball valve on the return pump? If you did try turning that back some and see what you get. Also the part of the overflow that is in the tank where is the water level on that chamber in side the teeth?

 

[neilanh]

I was just thinking about throttling back the return. If you look at the 3d pic in my previous post, you see how the water is flowing so high above the walls? I think that's cuz there's too much flow? I didn't put a valve, but can give that a try or drop it to the mag7.

Inside the tank it's pretty much full, well above the siphon tube inlets.

 

[Ziggy953]

If that is the case the you are pushing more water into the tank then the overflow can handle. That doesn't make much sense since yours should be able to handle 1000gph. It could be all the twists and turns of your plumbing that has it restricted. You may want to stick the Mag7 on there and see what it does. It looks like you could switch them out pretty easy.

 

[neilanh]

That's definately what's causing it. I throttled it back, and it helped quiet it down. Then I opened it back up full and used the filter pads provided with the HOB, that helped too. I dont want to use those permanently, so I'll need to figure it out.

I don't understand why it can't handle it. It is handling it, it's just doing it loudly. It's a 1200gph overflow with only a 950gph pump, which has some loss due to head height. *shrug*

 

[Ziggy953]

That's definately what's causing it. I throttled it back, and it helped quiet it down. Then I opened it back up full and used the filter pads provided with the HOB, that helped too. I dont want to use those permanently, so I'll need to figure it out.

I don't understand why it can't handle it. It is handling it, it's just doing it loudly. It's a 1200gph overflow with only a 950gph pump, which has some loss due to head height. *shrug*

You are loosing a lot of drain line flow because of the valves, 90s and the horizontal sections of your plumbing. Add all of that up and you are probably close to maxing out your drain when compared to the pump. You may do better with the Mag 7 as your return pump.

 

[neilanh]

You are loosing a lot of drain line flow because of the valves, 90s and the horizontal sections of your plumbing. Add all of that up and you are probably close to maxing out your drain when compared to the pump. You may do better with the Mag 7 as your return pump.

But, then what will I do with this mag9.5?

But - yes, I think you're right. I'm gonna let it run for a bit (I'm cold and wet and just done for today) and try that out tomorrow.

 

[Ziggy953]

But, then what will I do with this mag9.5?

But - yes, I think you're right. I'm gonna let it run for a bit (I'm cold and wet and just done for today) and try that out tomorrow.

Well if you must do something with the MAG9.5 I can help you find a suitable home for it.

 

[fijiwigi]

The setup is great I really like it and its designed perfectly. I really think you would yield a much better result by just using 1" vinyl tubing from the Mag pump directly to the tank with just one solid pieced of 1" vinyl tubing. Your flow would be much better I was shocked by the difference it made with that extra 1/4" of space you can push 25% more water threw the tubing. PVC is great for the drain line but not good at all for the return line IMO. And in regards to the noise is a lot of it splash noise? I had the problem with my skimmer splashing into my sump and I totally could not watch a movie in my livingroom because of the splashing. I added vinyl tubing to extend under the water line and the noise went away. I also added a curved pvc pipe to direct the drian flow into the water and now its no longer noisy. If its pump noise rattling against the sump try and put a towel rubberbanded around the pump to cushion it so its not plastic vibrating on plastic. Also I am having a hard time understanding your drian line from the pics How many elbows are there in the drain ideally there should only be 1 is there more??. Anyway hope my opinion on it is somewhat helpfull

 

[Ziggy953]

The setup is great I really like it and its designed perfectly. I really think you would yield a much better result by just using 1" vinyl tubing from the Mag pump directly to the tank with just one solid pieced of 1" vinyl tubing. Your flow would be much better I was shocked by the difference it made with that extra 1/4" of space you can push 25% more water threw the tubing. PVC is great for the drain line but not good at all for the return line IMO. And in regards to the noise is a lot of it splash noise? I had the problem with my skimmer splashing into my sump and I totally could not watch a movie in my livingroom because of the splashing. I added vinyl tubing to extend under the water line and the noise went away. I also added a curved pvc pipe to direct the drian flow into the water and now its no longer noisy. If its pump noise rattling against the sump try and put a towel rubberbanded around the pump to cushion it so its not plastic vibrating on plastic. Also I am having a hard time understanding your drian line from the pics How many elbows are there in the drain ideally there should only be 1 is there more??. Anyway hope my opinion on it is somewhat helpfull

I think Neilan's problem is too much flow.

I've got both vinyl and rigid PVC as return lines on my system and I like the PVC hands down over the vinyl. The PVC doesn't get algae growth like the vinyl does and it doesn't flex when the pump turns on or shuts off. When I replace my main return pump I will have 0 vinyl on my system.

 

[ccCapt]

Nice job. Very well planned out.
You can try this to quiet your HOB overflow. It works really good.

 

[neilanh]

I was looking for that pic earlier, I remembered seeing it somewhere... is there a larger one? I see the solo cup, but I'm sure there's more to it than that.

 

[ccCapt]

That's the only pic I have, but it's just a cup over the drain pipe with a hole in the top. The hole/airline lets the air in and the cup keeps the noise inside.
I used a small piece of eggcrate to wedge the cup in there.

 

[Ziggy953]

So....How is the progress now?

 

[neilanh]

tank is running for the planned week in the garage with no issues. I'm waiting on a friend who cut acrylic for me to put a bubble trap and tower in my sump to get me those, otherwise I hope to start the process of moving it all indoors this weekend.

 

[Ziggy953]

Excellent!

I just put a few of your corals in my main tank. I'm working on cleaning the frag tank out and fragging up all the digi and acros I have in there. I needed the room. I remounted your Blue Tort (the one you said you paid too much for) there was so much algae growing on the plug I decided it was a good idea to remount it.

They are all looking great. The odd ball coral you picked up that was on the black plug, it's the one that kind of curves like gazel horns, it has started growing like mad. The others are looking good but I haven't noticed any real growth.

 

[neilanh]

Appreciate you taking care of those for me, and I'm glad they're starting to takeoff, you know - so I can pay you for your services with frags and all

Some updated pics wouldn't hurt my feelings, btw hehe