Bubbles, ball valves and sump water level...

[sdergar]

I've wanted to get rid of the bubbles that get into my DT. There isn't a lot but and some say it's bad and others not so much. I've never had so many that I had an issue but it was always bothering me in the back of my mind. I noticed that if I had the ball valve going into the sump fully open it would create more bubbles than a bubble wand. I have the two lines coming into the sump. One goes into a refugium that flows out to the main sump and this is reduced to a slow amount. The other goes into the skimmer section. If I had to guess I would say 25% goes refugium with the rest going into the sump. So the sump ball valve remains somewhat closed as I mentioned fully open just creates a bubble factory. Inevitably when I'm doing PWC's I usually end up with more water in the system than what I took out, not by much, but anytime that happens the bubbles almost disappear with the higher level in the sump.

I do have a bubble trap before the return section in the sump and I have a 12 gallon top off container with a float valve in the return section to account for evaporation. Today I raised the level of the float valve to keep the level in the sump higher and hopefully less bubbles.

So I guess in a long winded way are there better ball valves that don't cause bubbles when fully open? Are other people's tanks that sensitive to bubbles and water level changes?

Steve

 

[PrettyFishies]

A pic would help.

I created extra baffles to trap the bubbles from my return bulkhead

 

[sdergar]

Well, so far the higher level in the sump seems to be doing the trick. I'm thinking of removing the sump ball valve. Any reason it should be there? The one going to the refugium slows the flow to it so the rest would pour into the sump.

When I was constructing my reef ready tank I was told to put ball valves everywhere. What flow controls do most people have?

Steve