150 gallon aquarium setup

[FrogFish38]

I am in the process of upgrading from a 125 gallon saltwater aquarium with a canister filter (fish only) to a 150 gallon with a sump (fish and coral). I have a few questions about flow of sump pump required to support this and also size (diameter) of return line and if I should use the Herbie or Durso overvflow. My biggest concern is that I'm set up to make sure I don't have an overflow in the event of a power outage.

Thanks for any help.

 

[Jimbhoy13]

Welcome to R2R and to reefing. Lots of knowledgeable and helpful people here who will support and advise you when needed.

 

[Ron Reefman]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

Lets do this in parts.

How big is your sump going to be?
Do you know how many and what size the holes are in the overflow of the tank?

If you have the ability to run a Bean Animal drain, that's really the way to go.

 

[SCReef'n]

The flow through your sump is a matter of some debate. Some people insist it should be high others say lower. I prefer a slower flow through my sump vs. say a 10x Volume flow. I also run a bean animal overflow which you can find plenty of examples of On here. It runs extremely quiet and is quite responsive to tuning. As far as overflows, a back flow prevention device is cheap and the flapper style ones are quite effective I have one on my tank it works very well at limiting the amount of water that gets siphoned back to the sump. As with all things in this hobby, you need to have redundancy so keep your return line high or put a float switch for sump level on the return pump.

 

[Peace River]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!!!

 

[Bryn]

Welcome to R2R...

 

[Fred2482]

Welcome! Good info provided above.

 

[KJ]

Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[vetteguy53081]

 

[Ippyroy]

Welcome to R2R!

 

[Billldg]

Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[MastaMind82]

Welcome to R2R!

 

[BeltedCoyote]

Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[SPR1968]

I use 30mm return pipe from the main pump but the overflow/down pipes are 40mm and are silent. Just a main down pipe and a second emergency pipe

As far as sump flow I prefer slower so the media and skimmer can do it’s job and in my new big tank the sump flow is around 3-4 x turnover. Most of the circulation in the display comes from MP60’s/40’s

On the sump just make sure it can hold all the water in the event of a power failure and the main pump stops. You can add an anti siphon hole to the return pipe on the end as well

And Welcome to R2R!!!

 

[AcroNem]

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

 

[lavoisier]

Howdy and welcome to R2R. I concur with using a Bean Animal for optimal safety and quiet. As stated above, flow should be engineered with powerheads. Far more efficient and adjustable. Research...one of the fun parts of our hobby. ;Bookworm

 

[Flux Capacitor]

Welcome to R2R!

 

[devensmall]

Welcome!

 

[fishguy242]

hi welcome to the reef going to love it here!!
lots of fun/info/fun/help/fun....

 

[FrogFish38]

Thanks for all the advice,
My sump will be 25 gallons and I have considered the bean animal, but I don’t have enough space to run three lines as my center column where I am going to run the piping is only 2x4 inches. If I ran the bean animal I could not fit my return line.