Attaching 2 sumps

[kfig7]

Has anyone ever attached to sumps? I currently have a 30 gallon sump/refugium and I also have a 30 gallon wet/dry filter laying around. I was thinking of attaching them together. I think it could work if I used 2 1.5" bulkheads with small pvc pipes connecting the two sumps. Anyone see any problems with this?

 

[pat8you]

Nope. People have done it before. If you put one bulkhead low in the tank and connect it to the other tank high it is the same as putting in a divider/bubble trap.

 

[AdamHorton]

Here's a video of my setup:

YouTube - New sump/refugium plumbing

I'm very happy with it. Before I had the second overflow going from the sump to the refuge, I just had a large DIY piece of pipe going between the two, which was ugly and not so reliable and took a lot of space up.

The only thing I don't like about this setup is that there is one situation it introduces that could flood my living room: if that second overflow (the one on the bottom going from the sump to the refugium) loses its siphon, there will be some spilling before the pump eventually turns off.

I was thinking about creating a sort of "waterfall" where excess water could spill over into the refugium before it would overflow everywhere, but that seems like it would be difficult for me to do properly.

I feel like it would be a more elegant solution to just use one larger tank with some dividers, but doing it this way allows me to just use smaller tanks that I can more easily fit underneath the stand without having to take it apart or anything. Also, I didn't have to deal with getting any of the materials necessary to create dividers in a larger tank and so forth.

 

[cabezon]

I did it. it is tricky to get set up perfectly because if you use hard tubing it has to be perfectly aligned or it will leak.

I used the bulkhead that was already on the wet/dry to attach to a rubbermaid. I raised the w/d to attach it, thinking I would get more volume in the rubbermaid. dur dur dur, all I did was lower the level in the w/d. Someday when i feel adventurous I may get another rubbermaid and do it right. I would also use flex to attach rather than straight PVC.

 

[David S]

The only thing I don't like about this setup is that there is one situation it introduces that could flood my living room: if that second overflow (the one on the bottom going from the sump to the refugium) loses its siphon, there will be some spilling before the pump eventually turns off.

Adam
could you extend the slots further down the over flow box closer to the bottom of the syphon pipe to lower your water level in the sump so you have enough room in there to collect the excess water in the event of air break

just a thought
otherwise you could drill both sumps and join together with pvc piping which is what I did?

 

[AdamHorton]

As far as drilling goes, the sump (the one on the left) is acrylic and can be drilled, but the refugium (right) is glass and can't be drilled. At one point I had a giant U-tube connecting the two but I switched it to the overflow design I have now because I wanted to get more water volume by filling the sump as full of water as I could.

Lowering the water level in the sump is certainly a possibility, but I'm afraid that if I lower it enough to catch all of the excess water in the system that I'll lose that 10 gallons I was trying to save by going with the overflow design in the first place, which would mean the water level in the sump wouldn't be high enough to use that overflow at all. That would basically put me back to where I was before with the giant ugly U-tube. Come to think of it, I have a picture of what that setup used to look like:

http://www.adamhorton.com/files/flog/newrefugium.jpg

The "waterfall" idea I mentioned before might be a solution that only involves drilling the sump. I threw a drawing together in MS Paint and I'll try to explain what my idea is -- hopefully...

http://www.adamhorton.com/files/flog/sumpy.jpg

The black tank on the left is the sump, the blue on the right is the refugium. The green tube represents the overflow that's there right now. That keeps the water level below a certain point. The part in red is what I was thinking of adding. If the overflow ever fails and the water level gets higher, it would get to that part I drill out of the sump (maybe 1/2" lower than the top) first and just spill over into the refugium. I suppose the same thing could be accomplished with drilling and PVC...

Does this design look feasible?

 

[David S]

As far as drilling goes, the sump (the one on the left) is acrylic and can be drilled, but the refugium (right) is glass and can't be drilled. At one point I had a giant U-tube connecting the two but I switched it to the overflow design I have now because I wanted to get more water volume by filling the sump as full of water as I could.

Lowering the water level in the sump is certainly a possibility, but I'm afraid that if I lower it enough to catch all of the excess water in the system that I'll lose that 10 gallons I was trying to save by going with the overflow design in the first place, which would mean the water level in the sump wouldn't be high enough to use that overflow at all. That would basically put me back to where I was before with the giant ugly U-tube. Come to think of it, I have a picture of what that setup used to look like:

http://www.adamhorton.com/files/flog/newrefugium.jpg

The "waterfall" idea I mentioned before might be a solution that only involves drilling the sump. I threw a drawing together in MS Paint and I'll try to explain what my idea is -- hopefully...

http://www.adamhorton.com/files/flog/sumpy.jpg

The black tank on the left is the sump, the blue on the right is the refugium. The green tube represents the overflow that's there right now. That keeps the water level below a certain point. The part in red is what I was thinking of adding. If the overflow ever fails and the water level gets higher, it would get to that part I drill out of the sump (maybe 1/2" lower than the top) first and just spill over into the refugium. I suppose the same thing could be accomplished with drilling and PVC...

Does this design look feasible?

looks ok,i would probably just drill a 1" hole and fit a tank connector then a piece of pvc pipe long enough to over hang the second tank!but to be honest by doing this you may as well take the over flow off and just use your fountain/1" pipe permanently, this will eliminate the air break problem completely,as long as your second tanks level is kept to the correct height this should also be enough to hold excess water from your dt in the event of a power cut.

 

[David S]

Has anyone ever attached to sumps? I currently have a 30 gallon sump/refugium and I also have a 30 gallon wet/dry filter laying around. I was thinking of attaching them together. I think it could work if I used 2 1.5" bulkheads with small pvc pipes connecting the two sumps. Anyone see any problems with this?

I've done this,its works very well have a look in my profile for pics.